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Top Island Seafood

Jan06

Restaurant: Top Island Seafood

Location: The Marketplace, 740 Valley Blvd, Alhambra, CA 91801. (626) 300-9898

Date: December 29, 2016 & July 17, 2017 and March 10 & September 15 and December 22, 2019

Cuisine: Cantonese Chinese

Rating: Great — and great value — Cantonese

The San Gabriel Valley is just oozing with new Chinese Restaurants to try.

And no category is more crowded than the Cantonese Banquet House. Top Island fits right in the middle of this pack, offering up all the luxury ingredients in a big format at reasonable prices. Look at that sign on the left, lobster for $8.99!

And check out “party like it’s 1989” cove lighting in the giant banquet hall!

And a big pano of it.

2002 Gardet Champagne Cuvée Charles Gardet.

Boiled peanuts.

Sweet and sour goose webs (3/10/19). Goose webs are goose feet. These had the weird texture, but a really nice interesting sour flavor.

BBQ pork and jellyfish (3/10/19). Awesome sweet BBQ pork and first class jellyfish. Not all jellyfish is that great but this one was.

The super deluxe BBQ plate (earlier and 12/22/19) with pork, chicken, jellyfish, pork hock/foot and more (9/15/19)!

Westlake Beef Soup (9/15/19 and 12/22/19). Really addictive soft textured mix of ground beef (or maybe pork), tofu, egg white etc. Very mild but delicious.

NV Jean-Noel Haton Champagne Grande Réserve.

Walnut shrimp. Sure it’s a white guy dish, but this was delicious.

Salt and Pepper squid (9/15/19). Tasty calamari.

Salt and pepper shrimp (9/15/19 and 12/22/19). Someone doesn’t know how to mix up the preps. Very salty, but delicious.

Fish filets with black bean sauce (3/10/19). Really nice light fish.

2006 Paul Hobbs Pinot Noir Hyde Vineyard. VM 89. Dark red. Subdued, brooding aromas of dark cherry and chocolate. Fresher red and dark berry flavors are brightened by zesty minerals and given grip by dusty tannins. Finishes with very good persistence but limited definition. A serious, deeply concentrated style of pinot that needs some cellar time to loosen up.

Peking Duck (earlier and 3/10/19 and 9/15/19 and 12/22/19). This particular duck came with buns instead of pancakes. These were really nice buns, smaller than some. The meat was great, as good as any LA peking duck.

The skin was in the first picture, most of the meat was here. Needed more hoisin sauce as usual.

The “meat” section of this duck is actually pretty edible. Some places it’s just a carcass.

Duck second way (3/10/19 and 12/22/19).

Zoom on the second way (12/22/19).

You put this in the lettuce cups and add hoisin. Nice crunch.

2013 Boundary Breaks Vineyard Riesling No. 198 Reserve. VM 90. Quite reduced on the nose, with slightly shy aromas of Asian pear, white pepper, champagne mango and chamomile. The palate is quite honeyed and coats the cheeks and tongue in a soft layer of sweet fruit. A strong acidity keeps the palate in motion and prevents the wine from feeling fat. 58 grams per liter of residual sugar.

2012 Domaine de l’Ecu (Guy Bossard) Muscadet de Sèvre-et-Maine Taurus. The top broke off (the glass!) and so few of us dared try it for fear of broken glass.

From my cellar: 2006 Henri Boillot Meursault 1er Cru Charmes. VM 93. Ripe peach, orange and hazelnut on the nose; a real essence of Charmes. Then opulent, sweet and rich but with very good inner-mouth tension to the ripe peach flavor. A seamless, highly concentrated wine with a wonderfully silky texture and a very long, fruit-driven finish. This fruit was harvested early, noted Boillot.

Seb brought: 2005 Didier Dagueneau Pouilly-Fumé Silex. 92+. There is no doubting this is Sauvignon blanc – it has that straight out green grass, a bit of lime, definitely very crisp although not tart. When NZ makes SB, this is what they are going for I think. Very well done version of that style.

Lobster noodles. A solid lobster dish. Maybe a touch “fishy” and while the noodles looked gross, they tasted great with the drippings.
2012 Giesen Pinot Noir The Brothers. VM 90. Bright medium red. Perfumed aromas of strawberry, rose petal and spices. Juicy and intense, offering very good concentration to its brambly red berry and cherry flavors. Finishes with firm but smooth tannins and very good tactile persistence.

Lobster Causeway style. Covered in crunchy garlic bits. Awesome! We ate the salty garlic by itself too afterward.

Dungeness Crab with garlic sauce (3/10/19). Very light fry. Delicious sauce and shell was soft enough you could crunch through it.

We didn’t have the King Crab the first couple of times I went but we should have. So we got one on 3/10/19. Only $17 a pound or something!

King crab causeway style (3/10/19 and 9/15/19 and 12/22/19). Might have been fried but those garlic bits were so good!

King crab with garlic (3/10/19 and 9/15/19 and 12/22/19). Tender and delicious.

Conch. Chewy and interesting.

Curried Meat. Can’t remember which meat, maybe beef or mutton. Pretty delicious though.

Fried pork chop. I didn’t love the oily taste.

Sweet and sour pork chops (3/10/19 and 9/15/19). MUCH better than the oily ones.

Roast pork with crispy skin (12/22/19). Really great meat flavor and nice crispy skin.

Seb brought: 2010 Marcassin Pinot Noir Blue-Slide Ridge Vineyard. 95 points. In a great place. A showy wine highlighting ripe red fragrant fruits with a sweet edgy appeal. Quite pretty for a large scale pinot as slightly faded sour cherry fruits are well integrated with bright acidity and baking spice. Finishes really lasts. Quality stuff.

Pigeon (earlier and 3/10/19 and 9/15/19 and 12/22/19). Straight from the Promenade — but actually quite nice.

100 Flower Chicken (12/22/19). This is pressed chicken with crispy skin and shrimp paste. This particular version was excellent, quite awesome.

Chopped pork and string beans. Classic dish. Excellent verison with crunchy beans and lots of pork.

Chinese greens. tasty (surprisingly).

A different tasty green (3/10/19 and 9/15/19).

Stalks with Chinese sausage (3/10/19 and 12/22/19). Love that salty/sweet sausage. Offsets the fibrous stalks nicely.

A different type of stalky vegetable (12/22/19).

Fried tofu (3/10/19). Similar garlic crunch to the causeway style.

2015 Château Doisy-Daëne Grand Vin Sec. 93 points. Tasted like Durian! Very dry and very interesting.

Fried sweet and sour fish. Not bad. Typical orange sauce.

Fried rice.

Yin yang fried rice (earlier and 9/15/19 and 12/22/19). Fried rice is underneath and covered with pork and shrimp sauces. Delicious!

2002 Chateau Montelena Cabernet Sauvignon The Montelena Estate. VM 93. Good deep ruby-red. Highly aromatic nose combines musky redcurrant and tobacco. Plush, broad and fine-grained; atypically sexy and showy for this wine, in much the same way that Montelena’s basic 2002 Napa cabernet is unusually pliant and rich. Finishes with big, dusty, but rather suave tannins. This offers early accessibility but has the material and structure for extended aging. The alcohol here is 14.3%, the highest since the 1978, which was 14.4%.

Chicken chow mein. I love these crispy noodle dishes. Great and very addictive once the sauce softens the noodles.

Adam brought: 2004 Harlan Estate Proprietary Red Wine. Parker 98. Another rating identical to that which was given in 2007 (when first tasted from bottle), the 2004 Harlan Estate is performing essentially the way I suggested in 2007 as it is one of the more precocious and accessible of the Harlan Estate wines to date. A great showing at this retrospective, this wine, which seems like a hypothetical blend of a Pauillac, St.-Estephe and Graves, represents around 1,500 cases from 40 acres of beautifully manicured hillside vineyards overlooking Oakville. Still dense purple to the rim, with notes of creme de cassis, charcoal, blackberry and sweet toast, the wine is full-bodied and voluptuously textured with the tannins largely resolved. But the density and richness suggest this wine can go a long, long way, even though the window for drinking it seems open and inviting already. A world-class, first-growth wine if there ever was one from Napa, this is simply an exquisite Harlan Estate that has atypically reached mid to late adolescence at the age of ten. That is great given the fact that these are 30- to 40-year wines – possibly even half-century wines. Drink it over the next 30 years.

Black pepper beef (earlier and 9/15/19). Vietnamese style dish, quite good.

French style beef with mushrooms (3/10/19). Very tender flavorful beef.

Steamed fish with ginger and soy. Too plain for my taste.

Coconut buns (earlier and 3/10/19).

Buns with pepper or something (12/22/19). Very plain buns with the dusted seasoning. Hmm.

I brought some pistachio gelato from home (which I made).

Red bean soup for dessert. Looked like the output of a bad case of food poisoning.

Close up 9/15/19.

After my advanced gelato class, trying a slightly new pistachio formulation — Pistachio Madeline Gelato — base uses my same awesome Pistachios from Bronte Sicily but also a small amount of egg yolk for extra body. I baked the Madelines from scratch and soaked them in hand made Grand Mariner syrup — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — oh my! — #SweetMilkGelato #gelato #IceCream #NomNom #dessert #Pistachio #lemon #orange #Sicily #GrandMariner #Madeline #cookie #baking

Getting whacky — Thai Peanut Coconut Lime Chili Gelato — Salty peanuts, Thai coconut cream, lime zest, and serrano chillies — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — almost too spicy! — #SweetMilkGelato #gelato #IceCream #NomNom #dessert #chili #spicy #thai #peanut #coconut #lime #SavorySweet #Serrano

9/15/19 two more gelati:

Cherry Cioccolato Fondente Gelato — working to squeeze the most chocolate humanly possible into a dairy gelato. This is 70% cocoa Valrhona and 100% Callebaut Chocolate base is my best yet — only 17% milk it has an INTENSE chocolate taste, plus house-made White Chocolate Amareno Cherry Ganache rounds it out — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — #dessert #icecream #FrozenDessert #nomnom #dessertlovers #dessertporn #icecreamlovers #gelatoitaliano #foodporn #gelatolover #food #foodgasm #foodblogger #dessertgasm #desserttime #foodphotography #gelatoartigianale #gelatomania #dessertlover #icecream #icecreamlovers #chocolate #valrhona #Callebaut #cherry #amareno

Matcha Almond Latte Gelato – Ceremonial Matcha Green Tea and Sicilian Noto Romano Almond gelato base — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato –#dessert #icecream #FrozenDessert #nomnom #dessertlovers #dessertporn #icecreamlovers #gelatoitaliano #foodporn #gelatolover #food #foodgasm #foodblogger #dessertgasm #desserttime #foodphotography #gelatoartigianale #gelatomania #dessertlover #icecream #icecreamlovers #almond #matcha #GreenTea #Sicily

I like how they tagged Yarom’s chair with the bills.

Great wine lineup tonight (for Chinese).
The big boy with the manager.

Overall, a great time and really solid meal. Orignally, I thought Top Island isn’t in the league with Elite or such for high end Cantonese, but this whole feast was $35 a person with tax and tip! So considering with had Peking Duck, Lobster etc and it was all very tasty this was a steal. All the dishes were enjoyable and they have a huge menu. Plus, as Yarom says, “they treated us like Pharaohs.” I.e. we had great service as they were very warm and brought out all the dishes “slowly” (by Chinese standards). Too bad they don’t have this sort of quality on the Westside!

I also must chime in that in light of our 3/10/19 dinner I have to upgrade Top Island to one of the best SGV Cantonese places. The service is really great. They brought us our dishes in a carefully selected (wine friendly) order, one at a time. The prices on sometimes expensive things like lobster and king crab are really fabulous, and overall dish quality is extremely high. Almost every dish was excellent that night (and on a previous trip a couple weeks before I missed). Great place!

For the 9/15/19 and 12/22/19 dinner I continue my thinking that Top Island has a really top notch Cantonese kitchen. Food is really really good. Service is great too, although the place is a bit of a zoo given how big and popular it is. Our 12/22/19 was a hilarious CF of a dinner though — not in any way the restaurant’s fault. We had a table they said seated 12-14, which really seated about 10-12 (and 12 was pushing it) and then ended up with 15 people (because it’s hard to manage the numbers at these things). We were so packed in at this table, sitting an extra foot away so the chairs made it around. But most problematically, with 15 people the dishes only got around to about 12ish — and so it turned into a “lord of the flies” style frenzy. Total chaos — if a touch amusing.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

or more crazy Hedonist dinners here!

And a bunch of wines from the second night:

12/22/19 wines:

By: agavin
Comments (1)

Posted in: Food

Tagged as: BYOG, Cantonese cuisine, Chinese cuisine, crab, Gelato, hedonists, Lobster, Peking Duck, san Gabriel valley, SGV, Top Island, Top Island Seafood

Shanghainese at Southern Mini Town

May04

Restaurant: Southern Mini Town

Location: 833 W Las Tunas Dr., San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 289-6578

Date: April 26, 2016

Cuisine: Shanghai Chinese

Rating: Tasty, but too much MSG

A couple of us Hedonists drove out to the SGV for lunch intending to go to Tasty Noodle House, but they were on summer holiday so we went next door instead.
Southern Mini Town, despite the weird name, is a pretty ordinary looking SGV Shanghainese.
The inside has that SGV vibe.
Including the helpful “menu as wall decor.”
House special two flavor shrimp. The right one was the simple white sauce shrimp and the left a onion based sweet and tangy sauce. In both cases the shrimp were extremely tender and well cooked. The “spicy” (not really) sauce was better, very good actually.
String beans. Classic dish. A pretty good version. Beans were crunchy.
Special beef tendon. Not so much tendon, actual meat. However the sauce, onion based and tweet and sour made it taste like my mom’s sweet and sour pot roast / brisket. Good stuff.
Garlic ribs. Hot and fried, but a bit chewy and not enough garlic. This was one of our least favorite dishes.
Fish filet in spicy sauce. Very similar sauce to the “spicy” shrimp, but not as tangy. Helped by adding vinegar.
Beef and scallions. Okay. Tender beef, but not amazing or anything.

Shanghai pan fried buns. Excellent. They ought to be as a Shanghai cuisine signature item.

Shanghai steamed dumplings (XLB). Disappointing as the dough flavor was too dominant and there was little to no juicy broth. Not enough pork flavor for sure.

Overall, Southern Mini Town was okay. By non SGV standards it would be quite good. For the SGV, it’s just fine. I’ve had a lot better Shanghai food. And HUGE negative. I was walloped with a massive MSG headache about 45 minutes after leaving. About 25% of the places out here will use a lot of MSG, but plenty don’t.
Tasty Noodle House is where we were originally trying to go.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
Comments (2)

Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, hedonists, SGV, Shanghai, Southern Mini Town

Tasty Duck X 4

Mar16

Restaurant: Tasty Duck [1, 2, 3, 4]

Location: 1039 E Valley Blvd. Ste B102. San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 572-3885

Date: February 28, 2015

Cuisine: Chinese

Rating: Great Duck!

Tasty Duck is a regular spot with my Hedonist food and wine club.

The interior is jammed and the turnover is high. There isn’t even a space inch to stand while waiting for a table as the serves need what little space there is to reach the tables. Although tonight being Sunday, the crowds died down by 8pm.

NV Billecart-Salmon Champagne Brut Rosé. VM 92. Pale orange. High-pitched red berry, orange zest and jasmine aromas, with suave mineral and smoky lees notes adding complexity. Spicy and precise on the palate, showing very good punch to its strawberry and bitter cherry flavors. Opens up smoothly with air and picks up a bitter rhubarb quality that lingers onto the long, tightly focused finish. This bottling showed more brawny character than many past renditions of this cuvée, but with no lack of vivacity.

The main event: Peking Duck. Not only was this delectable, with fantastic crispy skin and delicate meat, but it’s artfully arranged. We had two plates of these per table and it was a feeding frenzy!

Here are the traditional accompaniments, starting with excellent pancakes. One mystery question I must ask: why do Chinese restaurants insist on putting far too few pancakes and too little hoisin sauce on the table?

A pancake in the making. For some reason tonight the hoisin seemed saltier and less sweet than usual, so wasn’t quite as good. The meat was awesome as always.

From my cellar: 2011 Coche-Dury Bourgogne Blanc. VM 88. The 2011 Bourgogne is an excellent introduction to the domaine. Tension, energy and focus are the signatures in a wine that announces the Coche-Dury house style beautifully. Citrus and white flowers abound on the finish.

agavin: I brought this way overkill pedigree, which had a long citrus finish. Very nice.

Cold appetizers. Spicy beef, seaweed salad, cold chicken.

2006 Sine Qua Non The Hoodoo Man. VM 94. Sine Qua Non’s 2006 White Wine The Hoodoo Man is insanely beautiful. Remarkably fresh for a nine year old white, the 2006 The Hoodoo Man will change readers’ perceptions about what California white wines are and can be. A rich mélange of apricot, peach, honey and exotic white flowers graces the palate as this voluptuous, intense, yet remarkably vibrant wine shows off its utterly compelling personality. Slightly reductive, the 2006 needs a good bit of air. Today, the 2006 shows no signs whatsoever of fading. It should continue to drink well for another 5-10 years. The Hoodoo Man can only be called an absolute triumph in viticulture and winemaking. Time and again, I thought I had mixed up my glasses and that this was 2013 White Wine Résisté. The Hoodoo Man is 39% Roussanne, 31% Viognier and 30% Chardonnay; 75% from John Alban’s vineyard and 25% from Eleven Confessions. The wine was aged in 58% new oak, the rest 1-2 year-old barrels and a dollop of stainless steel.

French style Beef. Extremely tender and delicious, almost sweet, morsels of filet.

2012 Maurice Schoech Riesling Kaefferkopf. Middle dry.

Their interesting take on “walnut shrimp.” The fried shrimp, sweet mayo sauce, and walnuts is supplemented with pineapple! Not my favorite rendition of this dish. Still good, but I can live without the pineapple. We’ve gotten spoiled.

2012 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Leistenberg Riesling Kabinett. Vinous 87. Nectarine, pine nuts and lemon oil on the nose. Delicate tropical fruit flavors are brightened by a salty twang. Refreshing acidity gives a feminine character to the finish. Nicely balanced.

Duck part 2 (with bean sprouts).

2010 Cherry Pie (Hundred Acre) Pinot Noir Stanly Ranch Vineyard. VM 90. The appropriately named 2010 Cherry Pie offers up juicy red cherries, mint, cinnamon and cloves. In this vintage, the Cherry Pie has tons of energy and minerality to support the racy, sleek fruit. Sweet floral notes add lift on the finish. The 2010 is a gorgeous, exuberant Cherry Pie with great balance and overall harmony.

agavin: a very contentious wine at the table. Ron and I thought it tasted like cherry cough syrup. Way too high alcohol for pinot noir to my Burgundy pallet. Those who like more of a sledgehammer to the face loved it.

Some amazing Shanghai style soup dumplings (XLB). Tasty little morsels stuffed with pork and broth. We got 2 orders of these.

2012 Louis Jadot Gevrey-Chambertin. Burghound 89-91. A ripe yet markedly cool and restrained nose offers up notes of cassis, spice, earth, underbrush and menthol. There is a lovely mineral streak to the rich and relatively large-scaled flavors that possess excellent mid-palate concentration and plenty of verve on the complex and impressively persistent finish. This is a fine Gevrey villages and worth your attention plus it is sufficiently pliant to enjoy young but should reward longer term cellaring as well.

agavin: just super young one note village Burg. Not bad, but way too primary for my taste.

Simple vegetables. These barely had sauce, but yet were surprisingly yummy. They did have an “oil” flavor (in a good way) and were very light and crunchy.

2009 Château Branaire-Ducru. VM 92+. Red with a pale rim. The fruity nose hints at macerated red cherries, bitter chocolate and dried herbs. Then big, fat and soft on the palate, with fresh, harmonious acidity providing adequate lift to the black cherry, chocolate and sweet spice flavors. The long, plush finish offers a concentrated coffee and red fruit cocktail quality. Still very young and likely to develop more complexity. As good as this is, Branaire-Ducru is one estate where the 2010 will likely turn out to better than the 2009.

A very nice mixed fried rice.

2013 Sine Qua Non Grenache ♀. Super massive and extracted grape juice.

Pork hock. Some kind of crazy pig leg. Some serious fat here and the skin was a bit mushy, but the meat fell off the bone and was incredibly tender and delicious.

See the meat.

Giving her the bone!

2009 E. Guigal Châteauneuf-du-Pape. VM 92. Deep red. Potent cherry, redcurrant and floral scents are given a musky, earthy touch by a hint of rhubarb. Sappy, sweet and broad on entry, then tighter in the mid-palate, offering bitter cherry and raspberry preserve flavors and a touch of licorice. The clinging finish is shaped by silky, even tannins and given bite by a hint of cracked pepper.

Corn soup. Meat, peas, corn, carrots, egg. Super simple. Incredibly delicious. I don’t know what it was about this soup, both flavor and texture, but I had 3 bowls!

1994 Bodegas Muga Rioja Torre Muga. VM 94+. Bright, deep red. Expressive aromas of red- and blackcurrant, plum, tar, tobacco, and nutty, spicy oak. Sweet entry, then very concentrated and silky; really expands in the mouth. Strong acidity gives the flavors a penetrating, lively quality. Very long, subtle finishing flavors supported by firm but not harsh tannins. As suave as this extremely impressive wine is right now, it will be better for several years of additional bottle aging.

agavin: certainly my red wine of the night, as it had age and complexity. Really nice.

Lamb with green onions. A nice tender lamb.

2006 Inniskillin Vidal Icewine Niagara Peninsula VQA. GV94+. #1; COLOR-medium to dark golden; NOSE-pineapple jam exploding; apricot; mango; exotic; this is seductive; gorgeous nose; canned peaches; PALATE-huge viscosity; almost like cream; completely coats your palate; gorgeous pineapple; peach and apricot; the delicious factor is simply off the charts; virtually almost impossible not to like this; the fruit is fantastic; I would like a little more acidity, but this is delicious

Crispy whole red cod with sweet and sour sauce. A really nice fish, but VERY sweet and VERY fried.

2013 Larkin Cabernet Franc.
Beef rolls with BBQ beef and cilantro. Really nice, tasted like rolled up Pho. The shell was a bit chewy and tough, which detracted.

Overall, another fantastic meal. Tasty Duck isn’t the most adventurous SGV place, but they do an excellent job. They were super friendly and willing to serve us the dishes one at a time over a long period. Tonight was better than on some of the overcrowded Saturday’s when they don’t have as much bandwidth for us.

The duck was first rate, as good as Peking duck gets — more or less. Although I was disappointed in the hoisin tonight. Some other dishes, like the pork hock, and the XLB were amazing too. A few others just so so, like the shrimp. Tasty Duck is all about the duck.

Also, as usual for Chinese, the order of the food is so crazy from a wine perspective nothing really matches up right.

For more Hedonist adventures or

For more LA Chinese reviews click here.

By: agavin
Comments (4)

Posted in: Food

Tagged as: hedonists, Peking Duck, SGV, Tasty Duck

White Guys Can Cook Noodles

Jan13

Since I’m a noodle fiend, and Dan Dan Mein is one of my all time favorites, and a lot of my home cooking focuses on pasta (and pizza and gelato) I got it in my head to try making this amazing noodle dish at home — super authentically of course.

So I hunted around for recipes and came across this hard core one to use as my base.

For those of you that don’t know, Dan Dan Mein is the sort of “OG Sesame noodles.” But it’s so much more than the watered down version we get in the states. Ever wonder why sesame noodles are sometimes spicy? It’s because they derive from this dish, which in its true form is always hot. But it’s more than hot. Good dan dan is very complex incredibly aromatic, nutty, spicy, numbing, meaty, and a hefty bowl of chow.

Then before meeting my pal Sebastian out in the SGV for some Szechuan I stopped by the 168 Market and spent about an hour hunting down all the ingredients. I went so far as to make sure even normal items like garlic and peanuts were grown in China! Subtle things like the differences in vegetable breed can influence the flavor of a dish.
We start off making chili oil from scratch. This particular incredibly Szechuan oil is flavored with Szechuan peppercorn, star anise, cinnamon, and “regular” chilis.

Here are the Szechuan Peppercorns, which I learned were also known as Prickly Ash or sometimes Red Ash. They smell amazing (and strong) and have a citrus note and a numbing quality on the tongue.
Dried star anise, which smells like licorice. Oh, and the cinnamon.

Then the chili flakes, and peanut oil.

First try. Let it get too hot. Don’t do this (notice the brown color).

Next try went much better. You basically cook the peppercorns, anise, and cinnamon in the oil slowly to 325.
Then strain out that stuff and dump the regular chilis in and let it sit until it becomes super red and potent.

Next up we brown the meat for the dish. I actually made the noodles twice the first week, once with turkey (above) and another time with lamb (below).
The sauce for cooking the meat involves a mix of shaoxing wine.

The incredibly yummy (and salty) Szechuan sweet bean paste.

And some dark soy sauce (plus a little five spice powder)..

Then in with the browning meat you add sui mi ya cai. This mystery ingredient, which apparently is some kind of preserved mustard green, took me about 30 minutes to possibly locate in the market. None of the employees knew what it was. This “spicy preserved vegetable” was the closest thing I could find. Perhaps it’s the right stuff. Perhaps it’s a variant. It’s certainly preserved and certainly mustard green.

Here they are cooked together with the sauce, then set aside until the noodles are ready. As my friend Bryan, who tried my second batch, commented, the preserved vegetable makes it much more Chinese.

Next up we work on the noodle sauce which is more soy sauce and sesame paste.

Pretty!

And the five spice powder.

And the aforementioned Chinese garlic.

Mixed together.

Some more Szechuan peppercorns needed to be crushed to go straight into this part, so I used my killer mortar and pestle.

You blend it up.

Then incredibly dump a huge amount of that red chili oil in.

And keep stirring.

Meanwhile, some peanuts (also from China).

Chopped.

Then the noodles. The recipe called for Lanzhou noodles, which are flat and white. These turned out to be about the same as most of the restaurant dan dans.

They cook fast.

Then you put the sauce in the bottle of the bowl, dump in some noodles.

Layer on the meat mix, peanuts, and some chopped scallions.

It looks great above, but you need to mix it up.
Here is the fully mixed version you eat. It might not be a looker, but the dish is incredible and I was very pleased how it turned out. Just like restaurant dan dan, all the good stuff is at the bottom, the rich sauce, the meat chunks etc. The lamb version really kicked ass too (most dan dan uses pork). I also used more meat then most restaurants do and tried to keep the sauce under control so it didn’t get too soupy.

By: agavin
Comments (4)

Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, Cooking, Dan Dan Mein, noodles, san Gabriel valley, SGV, Sichuan, Szechuan cuisine

Say Hi to Shi Hai

Feb02

Restaurant: Shi Hai

Location: 1412 S Garfield Ave. Alhambra, CA 91801. (626) 282-3888

Date: January 26, 2015

Cuisine: Cantonese Dimsum

Rating: Fun dishes, good, but dumpling skins too thick

My quest to try all the great dimsum houses in the LA area (mostly the San Gabriel Valley) continues with newcomer Shi Hai.

The name apparently means “sea world.” Hopefully no “blackfish” served here. 🙂

I brought only a 100mm macro lens and so capturing the dining room was a challenge. It’s sort of SGV high style 2015. This substantial wine nook betrays the recent Chinese interest in wine — even if all that Bordeaux and Cal Cab clashes hideously with the food!

Another nice pretty menu.

The usual tea.

We didn’t actually have to ask for mustard, and when we asked for water and soy sauce and vinegar we got 2 out of 3 on the first try! This is A+ service for an authentic dimsum house, some places you ask 3-4 times per item.

Shrimp dumpling (Har gow). The filling was good, but this dish betrayed Shi Hai’s biggest problem, their thick sticky shells. Getting these puppies out of the steamer intact was nigh on impossible so you ended up with a filling and a pile of shredded skin on your plate.

Shrimp and Bean Sprout Leaves Dumpling. I never find these “veggie” type ones as good as the meatier varieties. This also had the sticky skin problem too.

Surf clam and crab egg shrimp dumpling. I liked both the way these looked and the ocean flavors.

Octopus dumpling. Content-wise, this may have been just a Har Gow in disguise, dressed up as little octopi. But they sure are cute.

Shanghai juicy pork bun. Always a favorite. These weren’t the best XLB I’ve ever had, but they were tasty just the same. Here the dough thickness was reasonably in check.

Crispy cruller rice noodle. This is only the second time I’ve had the rice crepes with something friend inside (the first being at Elite). Weird, but it works, combining the soft and sticky textures with the crunchy. The thing inside was basically a tempura shrimp.

Baked BBQ Pork Bun. The flavors were good, but these felt a tiny bit soggy.

Roast Suckling Pigeon. This succulent little roast fowl is ironically paired with… Pringles! Despite that, it was a tasty little game bird. The skin was nice and crisp and the meat had a dark gamey quality I really liked.

The pigeon was served with mayo and salt.

Heads up! — shows of the 100mm lens to nice effect.

Sticky rice with lotus leaf.

The inside was a little wet, but the sausage was good.

Shi Hai Dan Dan Noodles. Now this is a little odd at a Cantonese place, but maybe it’s a nod to the popularity of Szechuan.

Either way, while it looked kind of wet, the flavors were deep, with a lot of sesame and that pleasant medium numb from real Schezuan peppercorn. I love this stuff.

Steamed sweet bun. How could anybody resist these little piggies? They were filled with some kind of dark taro/sweet bean mixture. No pork involved as far as I can tell.

Overall, Shi Hai was good but not great. I’d put it in the second tier of SGV dimsum underneath Elite, King Hua, and Sea Harbor, but in line with Lunasia and Shanghai #1 Seafood. It absolutely blows away what Downtown and Westside places I’ve tried, and is certainly a worthy destination. Shi Hai also has an interesting menu, and I’d like to go back and try another round or two of dishes. If only they tuned up their dumpling shells to be lighter and less gummy they’d be great.

It should also be noted that it’s just a short wander across the street for some excellent snow afterward!

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

The build out might be new, but it retains a modernized version of the old 80s Monterey Park Style — cove overload!

By: agavin
Comments (1)

Posted in: Food

Tagged as: California, Chinese cuisine, Dandan noodles, dimsum, Monterey Park, san Gabriel valley, SGV, Shi Hai

Heavy Noodling at JTYH

Sep22

Restaurant: JTYH Heavy Noodle II

Location: 9425 Valley Blvd. Rosemead, CA 91770. (626) 442-8999

Date: September 17, 2014

Cuisine: Chinese

Rating: Tasty

The SGV has every kind of Chinese food. JTYH specializes in homemade noodles and dumplings. For those of you not in the “noodle know” knife cut noodles are made by shaving a block of raw dough directly into boiling water with a sharp knife.

Heavy Noodle, lol. The sequel to Heavy Metal the Movie?

The decor rivals Crustacean and The Bazaar. Not. But the food is tasty and the prices astounding.

Uh oh, Yarom is ordering. Expect pig ears!

The menu.

1998 J. Rochioli Chardonnay South River Vineyard. Oxidized, and certainly not getting any better, but with an enjoyable custard vibe.

Pig ear w/ spicy oil. I told you so. This is two pig ear dishes in 4 days. I’m not a fan.

2012 Caspari – Kappel Enkircher Ellergrub Riesling Spätlese feinherb “Alte Reben”. Sort of half dry with a lot of asphalt.

Cold cucumber. Chinese pickles. These are fine.

2005 Dönnhoff Schloßböckelheimer Felsenberg Riesling Auslese Goldkapsel. 93 points. Nice and sweet and nectar-like.

Smoked Chicken. You would not believe this is chicken. Tastes like ham!

From my cellar: 2001 Ulrich Langguth Piesporter Goldtröpfchen Riesling Spätlese. 92 points. Quite ripe – more Auslese in style – with a typical Mosel flavor profile. Enjoyable, and a good value for an ’01 Spatlese.

Celery. Yep.

2010 Willi Schaefer Graacher Domprobst Riesling Spätlese. 92 points. Lime juice, orange, apricot and apple. The sweetness of the pure fruit does show but it is cut through by very good acidity and it finishes very cleanly.

Beef roll. This “burrito” of vegetables and cured (pastrami-like) beef is pretty awesome.

From my cellar: 2002 Bouchard Père et Fils Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Les Cazetiers. IWC 92. Ruby-red. Highly aromatic nose combines dark berries, Cuban tobacco, smoke and game. Sweet, lush and fat, especially in the context of this vineyard, showing more texture than definition today following the racking. Best now on the very long, subtle finish, which features suave, sweet tannins and excellent firming acidity.

Boiled dumpling: pork w/ napa or leek. I’m not sure which dumpling Yarom ordered, but these had a tad more vegetable than I would have liked. Still, I ate three.

2009 Flying Goat Cellars Pinot Noir Rio Vista Vineyard. 91 points.

Shredded potato. This is a common central Chinese dish. Pretty darn yummy actually, particularly dipped i a bit of dumpling sauce.

2003 Flowers Pinot Noir Sonoma Coast. 91 points. Holding well with good fruit and good balance still. Nice red cherry fruit roll-up, compote strawberry and vanilla. Secondary flavor of toasted walnuts and almonds. Nice smooth wine, would drink now.

Szechuan Style Beef (I think). Some tasty beef in a red chili sauce with just a bit of spicy numbing peppercorn.

1997 Arrowood Syrah Saralee’s Vineyard. IWC 90. Ruby-red. Complex, musky aromas of raspberry, game, mint, nuts and woodsmoke. Ripe, layered and deep, with a pleasing pliancy and enticing flavors of raspberry, cola and smoky oak. Finishes with fine tannins and a persistent, subtle flavor of tangy raspberry.

Spicy Lamb Ribs. We’d be all set for passover, because this was more like lamb bone and chilies. It was tasty, but there was merely a hint of meat on them thar ribs.

2004 Saxum Syrah James Berry Vineyard Bone Rock. Parker 93-98. Made from a blend of 85% Syrah, 12% Grenache, and 3% Mourvedre, there are 500 cases of the 2004 Bone Rock James Berry Vineyard. It possesses a saturated ruby/purple color along with tight, restrained aromatics of blackberries, blueberries, and flowers, good acidity, fleshy, full-bodied flavors, and fine elegance, delicacy, and finesse … rare for a wine of this size and intensity. It will drink well for 10-12 years.

Corn. Chinese succotash!

2003 Pax Cellars Syrah Walker Vine Hill. Parker 94-96. The inky/purple-tinged 2003 Syrah Walker Vine Hill is a 552-case cuvee produced from a 12-year old vineyard planted on a southern slope in sandy goldridge soils. One of the estate’s silkiest, most opulent efforts, it is a stunning, enormously concentrated 2003 that tips the scales at 15.2% alcohol. Nearly 100% stems were utilized during its fermentation. A saturated purple color is accompanied by a massive blast of blackberries, cassis, and white flowers in this full-throttle, super-concentrated effort. There is a meaty-like richness in the mouth, as if one were chewing the wine rather than drinking it. Enjoy this impressive Syrah during its first decade of life.

Fried Pork Dumplings. These were the real deal. The filling was great and meaty. The covering was THICK!

2004 Dumol Syrah Jack Robert’s Run. Parker 95. The terrific, dense purple-colored 2004 Syrah Jack Robert’s Run is a 200-case cuvee that spent 18 months in French oak. Notes of melted tar, roasted peppers, meat juices, blackberries, and cassis emerge from this full-bodied, rich, flavor-filled, intense effort. Enjoy it over the next 10 years.

Hand-made noodles with preserved meat. Basically like pasta fresca with vegetables and sweet salami. Fabulously yummy though.

2006 Pride Mountain Vineyards Merlot. Parker 86. There are 5,000 cases of the 2006 Merlot, a blend of Sonoma and Napa fruit that includes 12% Cabernet Sauvignon. Its dark ruby/purple color is followed by subtle aromas of road tar, mocha, and sweet cherries, medium body, and austere, aggressive tannins that attenuate the finish. Drink this 2006 sooner rather than later as I do not believe the fruit is sufficient to hold up to the structure.

agavin: not sure we opened this, but it was on the table.

Dan Dan Noodle. You still it up. There was chili oil at the bottom. This is a pretty classic rendition. Quite nice with a little bit of heat.

Bok choy. Standard Chinese vegetable.

1997 René Renou Bonnezeaux Cuvée Zenith. 92 points. Opened and served immediately. Dark yellow to gold color in the glass, clear hue throughout. Nose of apricots, honey and a bit of tangerine. Dash of honey on the palate up front followed by a bit of lychee. Pretty light and somewhat nimble on the palate. Medium acidity, light to medium body. Drink over the short term, maybe the medium term.

Spicy Shrimp. Similar prep to the “ribs.” You ate the shells and that was fine, they were cooked down to a nice sweet crunchy state. A bit of peppercorn in here too. Very nice.

Shrimp fried rice. Classic.

2005 Domaine Huet Vouvray Moelleux 1ère Trie Clos du Bourg. VC 97. Light golden yellow color; almond, green apple, lanolin, white pepper, wet wool nose; rich, structured, deep, ripe apple, peach, mineral, almond, tart pear palate; long finish.

Cumin lamb. Here’s where all the meat went! These chunks were succulent and tender.

Beef fried noodle. More noodles, but again “hand-made” and again very good.

Food was extremely tasty at JTYH, and extremely reasonable. The feast was $28 a person with a huge tip. We didn’t actually get the “knife cut” noodles though (even though ordered) instead getting three types of the “hand-made” (which are more like a handmade spaghetti). I would have liked to try their knife cut, which are thicker and shorter (probably the same dough). I’ll just have to come back.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

or more crazy Hedonist dinners here!