Tipping in Chinatown (Lucky Plaza Restaurant 新旺城酒家)

It's not that I'm some sort of cheap soulless asshole (okay... maybe just a little), but I hate tipping. I don't understand the point of it, and I doubt I ever will. Before everyone goes apeshit explaining how "tips are the only way a lot of waiters/waitresses make ends meet as single parents supporting their five kids when their spouses fail to pay child support," let me explain exactly what I mean - I think the current system of tipping is dumb. There are certain expectations I have when I go to a restaurant. I feel like good customer service is a fairly reasonable one. So why exactly do I have to pay extra on top of the bill for something that should inherently be included? Because the social norm in the US is straight demented. The way the system in Japan works... everything that goes into the meal - ingredients, preparation time, service, etc. - is already priced into final cost. Maybe costs at restaurants would be higher, but there'd be no awkward post-meal deliberation of how much to leave and no one would leave feeling jipped for paying for an awful experience. That would be just dandy wouldn't it?

It's bad enough that I basically have to dole an additional 20% just for sitting down in a restaurant, but there's something worse. Far worse. Like when restaurants automatically append gratuity to their bills (party of two if it matters). When they do that... it removes any incentive for the waitstaff to do anything and it also removes my ability to voice displeasure without being confrontational. That's not me. I sip Haterade™, but I'm not out to advertise that. Anyway, why am I bitching about tipping all of a sudden? Because it happened in the last place I'd ever expect it - in Chinatown, at a place called "Lucky Plaza Restaurant," where I got hit with a $5 tip on an $18 meal. Are you freakin' kidding me? That's almost 28%. If I'm paying that much then you best be wiping my ass after I use the bathroom too. What makes this even more ludicrous is the fact that the service straight sucked. When I asked to box stuff up to take home, some chick literally tossed takeout boxes on the table and told me to do it myself. That ain't worth a 28% tip yo.



I wish I could tell you not to go there because half the staff needs to chill their hormones, but I'd be lying if I didn't admit the food was actually pretty dope. Lucky Plaza's a Cantonese restaurant with a menu that looked pretty stereotypical of random diner places in Hong Kong. They like doing shit like roasting meat and putting over rice, frying up slick plates of oily noodles, and making various types of dumplings - all of which are awesome things. That said, their char siu fried rice (叉燒炒飯) isn't bad. It's basically one part oil, one part rice, and one part roast pork... a delightfully heavy dish that's moderately flavorful for its simplicity. The pork isn't so tantalizing that the dish becomes the epitome of all fried rices, but it's on par with generic places in Hong Kong. I feel like the act of simply replicating an "authentic" version is testament enough to how well this was made. It's something I'd probably enjoy infinitely more if I were drunk... that kinda thing.



Check that shit out. Glossy as a motherfucker. I'm probably not really the best person to ask about beef chow fun, because to me... the oilier it is the better it tastes. In my mind, there are few things in the world more sensual than rice noodles swimming in a pool of rendered beef fat. Aw yeah. Lucky Plaza might not be very good at refilling your water and junk like that, but at least they understand that oil is the key to making some sick rice noodles. Their version screams mediocrity, but given how difficult it is to make oily noodles taste any sort of bad, by default that makes it taste decent. Does that even make sense? Probably not. Peep this - similar to the fried rice, it's not a destination worthy dish, but if you're hungry and don't feel like waiting for the line at Wah Fung... it's not a bad consolation prize.



They also make soup dumplings. Eight of 'em for like $5. When you compare that to places like Joe's Ginger - and other places with "Joe" in the name - that seems pretty awesome (before they decided to tack on their asshat automatic tip I mean). To be entirely honest they're like everything else this restaurant does - good, but not life changing. Solid enough where you're impressed, but not so ridiculously awesome that you'd ever sell your firstborn for the recipe. Their soup dumplings have that stupid little nubbin of dough at the pinch point, and they don't possess translucently thin skins, but they are filled with a fairly surprising amount of soup. All for a super reasonable price... sort of. Plus if you think about it, most dumplings taste okay anyway. It's a meatball wrapped in dough... a pretty likable combination... even mediocre ones.

So yeah tl;dr time - Lucky Plaza makes pretty good food. They're pretty good at shit like roasting meats, stir-frying things with lots of oil, and making reasonably priced soup dumplings, but they need to chill the fuck out with their automatic tip (or step up their waiting game). That shit is ridiculous. I'd probably get food there again, but probably not eat there. Also, I still think tipping in the US is stupid.

Lucky Plaza Restaurant
81 Chrystie St, New York, NY 10002
Read more...

Food that looks like poo, but also tastes good (Shanghai Mong)

My Reese's peanut butter cup melted in the car... it looked like dog poop. Then I ate it. Cool story bro.

A long time ago, one of my best friends remarked that "most things that look like shit probably also taste good, everybody knows that." He might've been drunk when he told me that, so I didn't really think too much of his comment, just passing it off as another idiotic musing that really didn't make any sense. After all, as someone who likes taking pictures of food... aesthetics mean a lot to me. I don't like when people say they "taste first with their eyes," because it sounds dumb as hell, but it's kind of true. I refuse to believe anyone looks at a puke green colored slice of cake and thinks "shit, that looks delicious." Anyway, I've had a lot of time on my hands lately (what with the not doing anything), so I've also been spending a lot more time reading other peoples' food blogs. When I came across this post on Ben's Chili Bowl in DC, the first thing I thought was... "man, that looks like Vesuvius exploded out of someone's asshole straight onto a hot dog." Except... Ben's Chili Bowl is pretty damn famous for making some delicious-ass franks... so maybe my less than brilliant friend was actually onto something? Let's examine "foods that look like poo, but also taste good."

After putting more thought into the issue... a lot of foods that look like shit also taste fantastically awesome. Things like Snickers bars, uncooked brownie batter, pudding, half melted rocky road ice cream, dat sauce (bites lip) they put on 甜不辣, and yeah... chili. These things all look like the spawn of my dog's butthole, but I think they all taste pretty swell too. Maybe the converse isn't true, but things that look like poo do seem to taste good. Let's consider another example.



Black bean noodles. It's a Korean-Chinese thing. Since my grandfather was from Northeastern China... it's a childhood favorite, and pretty much what I grew fat on. Basically it's some sort of sauce derived from black beans (in Chinese cuisine it's often soybeans, 甜麵醬, or 豆瓣醬) mixed with ground meat, and sometimes vegetables, that gets put over noodles. If I had to find an equivalent in American cuisine, it's like mac & cheese. It's comfort food. I appreciate the ninja-edit on the menu, it's almost as if they added an advertisement that says "now w/pork!"

There's a few places you can get it in Manhattan... I know that Hyo Dong Gak makes a dope bowl of black bean noodles, but I've been wanting to try Shanghai Mong's for a while, so that's why I went. On a completely non-food related thought, whoever named their restaurant is pretty wack. I know in Chinese, 上海夢 (Shanghai Dream) sounds ethereal and peaceful and whatnot, but it also kind of sounds like one of those 很黃很暴力 (very erotic and very powerful) massage parlors.

Anyway, back to the food. Since Shanghai Mong is a semi-Chinese-Korean place, I wasn't entirely sure what to expect... the lighter, spicier, more pork focused version from China-r or the heavier, sweeter, more paste-ish variant from Korea.



Definitely more Korean than Chinese. Their version was... okay. The noodles were acceptably compliant (let the waitress cut them for you), and worked well enough as faithful sponges for the glorious sauce. Except the sauce wasn't entirely "fabulous!" Not nearly as thick as Hyo Dong Gak's, theirs was kind of like a runny poo. Kind of like when I feed my dog fried chicken. Not thick and paste-like at all. Flavor-wise it seemed pretty decent. Not too heavy on any particular flavor, it possessed a subtle sweetness that paired well with the pork, but let's be entirely honest... sweetened pork is a flavor that plays nice with pretty much everyone's palate (except for hippies and vegans). All in all, it's a fairly good rendition of jajangmyeon, but you could do better just next door at Hyo Dong Gak. Still, for something that looks like mudbutt, it's pretty damn tasty.
Read more...

Eating noodles, dumplings, and rabbits (E Mei Restaurant)

They say the first step to fixing your problems is to admitting you have them right? Well, I am a spicy food addict. I guess it's some sort of masochism, but I really enjoy torturing my taste buds with the sharp unrelenting stinging pain of capsaicin. I like sitting there without drinking water, squirming helplessly with my best "holy crap gotta take a shit this is painful" face. I'm not sure why. I realize in a lot of cases something that is overly spicy just masks the true flavor, but that's not what I'm talking about. I want something that builds in intensity because of my refusal to drink water. Do I regret it several hours later when that same "heat" reappears in the bathroom? Maybe. Is it worth it for that first pass from the top? Hell yeah.

I've been told E Mei is authentic Szechuan. I do not know. Like I said in a previous post, I don't actually know shit about Szechuan food... so I don't know what "authentically good" Szechuan food tastes like, but this was on the recommendation of another Asian, so I went. The 擔擔麵 (dan dan noodles) were decently good. Lots and lots of what seemed like refried ground pork bits were doused in a not-so-spicy sauce and lined with two sprigs of greens (so it looks healthier than it actually is). The presence of chili seeds and peppercorns was definitely there, but they played a much more aromatic role than a spicy one. Greasy and mild, the noodles were easy to stomach... that's about all there is to say. They're not worth trampling young children for, but they're worth ordering.



I'm sure some people are going to have ethical issues with me eating rabbit. "How can you eat them? They're so cute, fluffy, and innocent!" or "That's disgusting, rabbits aren't meant to be food!" Listen, if something tastes good, I don't really care how cute or revolting it might be. It's going into my mouth. I mean... if it's good enough for Kim Jong Il, then it's good enough for me. If you've never had rabbit, it's like chicken... but better. How can I qualify that statement when fried chicken is pretty much the greatest thing since... uh... non-fried chicken? Because texturally, rabbit is superior. Flavorwise, plain rabbit is as boring as plain white chicken breast, but texturally it's more resilient, more sinewy, and gamier. It's in general... springier? When tossed with a thin coating of chili oil and stir fried with peanuts and peppercorns you get a dish that starts off mild but builds into something that is fantastically spicy. After a few bites you'll still be tasting the flavor of the meat and smelling the peanut scent, but your mouth'll be begging for forgiveness. Screw that, the only respite my mouth got was when I had to spit out the occasional bone. Someone needs to breed a rabbit without bones. "Amorphous delicious eating rabbit" I shall call it.



These 紅油抄手 (hong you chao shou) tasted kind of like the ones they have in Taiwan - and I like those. Kind of thickly skinned, they're just plain ol' wontons sitting in a pool of fiery yet sweet chili sauce. Complete with small islands of chili seeds floating around inside! In this case, the fact that this dish is good doesn't hinge upon the requirement of having kick ass wontons, but rather that the flavor profile of the sauce doesn't overwhelm it. Having shoved my mouth full of spicy rabbit beforehand, pretty much everything would've tasted mild, so... I honestly can't really can't remember if these tasted good or not. I'm gonna say... probably?

That said, I'm not infatuated with E Mei (aside from the rabbit... goddamn that was good). It's not that they don't do a great job cooking all their shit, I guess it's just not my style of food. I can appreciate the use of peppercorns as an aromatic element, but everything kind of ended up tasting similar because of it. I guess that should be expected. Anyway, E Mei is a good enough restaurant if you're a fan of the genre, but I think I'll stick to the more familiar in the future. Unless I want rabbit, in which case I'd go back.
Read more...

Non-Asians and Asian food suggestions (Dim Sum Garden)

Something I asked on Twitter last week... "Is it racist that I don't trust non-Asians when they make Asian food suggestions?" The answers varied. A few Asian people lol'd and told me they do the same. On the other end of the spectrum... someone suggested that it wasn't racist, but that it was ignorance. I won't try to deny that I have more than my fair share of idiotic views in life, but let me clarify what I really meant by this statement - I don't (generally) trust non-Asians when they preach about how deliciously authentic an Asian dish is i.e. don't trust whitey. Is that really so bad? It's not that I don't trust my non-Asian friends' perspectives on food. If you have good taste, you have good taste, but how can someone possibly comment on the authenticity of a dish if they have never had it from the source before? As I've learned from my engineering writing source... if you're just following fobs around, you're simply paraphrasing the source. Give credit where credit is due.

Last week I went with a friend to a small Chinese restaurant near Reading Terminal Market called Dim Sum Garden. The name is kind of deceptive, it's not so much a dim sum place in the traditional sense as it is a place that serves Shanghai style entrees and appetizers.

One of the things I most definitely wanted was 炸醬麵 (zha jiang mian), the Northern Chinese take on black bean noodles. DSG's version was super traditional - gobs of loosely strewn pork combined with a salty and slightly runny black bean sauce peppered with a hint of spiciness and sweetness. It was good, and to me... it was super authentic. My grandfather was from Northern China, ate this shit all the time, and cooked it for me all the time. See? I can say that because I've been there eaten the food, and have a direct comparison.



Shanghai shumai (上海燒賣) are apparently a sticky rice variant on normal shumai. Instead of gob of pork you get a gob of sticky rice with bits of pork inside. As much as I love rice, I think I enjoy pork more. I was not in love with this dish, but the texture was admittedly as interesting as anything I've eaten recently. See... I will not comment on the authenticity of this dish because I have no fucking clue if it's legit or not. I have never been to Shanghai, nor do I hail from there... so I will refrain from making assclown statements about whether it is "native" or not. They're fun to eat, I'll leave it at that.



We also got pan-fried dumplings (生煎包). These were, in fact, actually awesome. As good as most, and filled with more meat, than any I've ever eaten in Taiwan. The skins were super thin, borderline transparent, and they exploded with pork juices upon puncture. Again, I can make this statement because I know what the OG versions taste like, having sampled directly from the source.



What can I say about this? It's a cold dish of roasted pork (將肉). Flavor-wise it's pretty bland, you dip it in sugary soy sauce or vinegar soy sauce, but texturally it's fun to play with. The odd bits of cartilage make for curiously gelatinous nuances, adding a slight crunch to an otherwise plain cooking of meat. Twas good. Again, I have no clue where this dish actually originates, but it's something that was always on my table growing up... so I feel 100% validated in making asinine statements about it.

To conclude on this post which I'm surely to get bashed for... it's not that I completely distrust non-Asians when it comes to Asian food suggestions, I just find it ridiculous how often people make ridiculous commentary on things that they're completely oblivious to (I'm sure I do this too... and I hate myself for it). I mean, I'm sure an aeronautics engineer could explain to you how an airplane flies from reading books, but I wouldn't want them flying a plane. Similarly, you can tell me food is good, but leave out the commentary on authenticity unless you've hard the original for comparison. Until then, I'll continue to listen to Asians when it comes to Asian food.
Read more...

Kim's Dragon (a.k.a. why I feel bad for Drexel students)

Sorry Drexel kids, the truth hurts, but I'm just gonna put this one out there... your Chinese food trucks... they suck. Forreals. I like to consider myself a connoisseur of fine dining, by which of course I mean mobile kitchens that serve food of Asian origins, and I spend a fair amount of time trying out each of them, noting the subtle nuances that make each one special (for instance... like gratuitous usage of MSG). After exhausting the options available on Penn's campus, going from "Le Anh's" all the way to "The Real Le Anh's," I expanded my horizons and set out to explore Drexel's offerings. My process was simple, I picked the cart with the longest line of Asian people which happened to be Kim's Dragon (Not to be confused with Kim's Oriental... which actually makes me wonder how many people named Kim are going to open Chinese food trucks?).

First thing... the people in the truck aren't even Chinese (I tried ordering in Mandarin and was greeted with blank stares). That's not really something I can hold against anyone, since some of the best tacos I've had were made by Chinese people, and some of the best General Tso's I've had were made by Mexican people, but it just felt... unauthentic? Secondly, the wait time is absurd compared to Kim's Oriental, what would've taken 5 minutes there took more than 15 here. Efficiency fail.

The beef w/broccoli wasn't actually awful, but it also wasn't the dish you'd normally think of. The beef was a tad overcooked, but coming from the back of a truck, it's something I'm willing to overlook. The sauce however, wasn't the standard oil-laden soy sauce affair I've come to know and love. Their rendition was cloyingly sweet, clearly doused in sugar. Like I said, it wasn't awful, in fact, the penetration of the sweet sauce actually made for some damn good broccoli, but it clearly wasn't what I expected to get. It's a $4 experiment that I probably won't try again.



I also ordered a beef chow fun since I had a jonesing for noodles pretty badly. It's a hard dish to fuck up, in my opinion. It's basically soy sauce, a lot of oil, noodles, and beef... stir fry them together. Yet somehow, they did. Catastrophically. Sure they got most of the components in there, the rice noodles, the beef, and even the bean sprouts, but why in the hell is there broccoli... and a single string bean pod? That's not beef chow fun, that's what my mom does when she's cleaning her fridge... throwing random shit together and stir frying them. Then I thought... maybe looks are deceptive. Maybe this dish is spectacular in every way, and that broccoli and a single string bean pod added to beef chow fun was the next big thing!



Nope. That didn't happen. This was the blandest $4.50 I've ever spent. After disposing of the extraneous broccoli and single string bean pod, I went to town on the noodles, which were dry, stuck together, and were cooked with 沙茶醬 a.k.a. "Chinese bbq sauce." That's not what beef chow fun is about... at all. If you're unfamiliar with the sauce I'm talking it about, it's normally used to make dipping sauce for hot pot, not for stir frying noodles. Nice going Kim's Dragon, you failed at one of the simplest noodle dishes known to man. All you had to do was make oily noodles and add some beef to it, but you fucked it up good. Nice. To add insult to injury, the portion sizing... is kind of inadequate compared to Yue Kee or the other Kim's.

Someone actually suggested that it was 'the best Chinese food in the city.' Not only is this an exaggeration gone astray, but it's downright silly (Chinatown is outraged). If they're not even the best Chinese food within a 5 block radius, how can it be the best in Philadelphia? Sorry Drexel, but if this is the best you can muster, I think I'll stick to my Kim's... the Oriental one. PS - It has Chinese people in it.
Read more...

More dishes from KOJA

I've written about KOJA before (see here, and here), but that doesn't expand on the full awesomeness of their little truck operation. On Friday's I don't really have a set schedule since I don't have class and have zero incentive to wake up to do anything, but you can say with 100% certainty, that sometime after 3 pm... I will be at the KOJA truck getting dinner. Not any other day of the week, just Friday. While this probably makes me sound neurotic and like some sort of idiot, there's a good reason. Sort of. On Fridays after 3 pm, something magical happens... like when the clock strikes midnight and Cinderella turns back into the bumpkin that she is, but in reverse... everything on their menu becomes $4.50, which is all sorts of awesome.

Normally everything on their menu is around $5.50... which, now that I think about it, actually isn't all that expensive, but... I'll take those savings any day!



The jap chae here is pretty good. It's not Koreana good, but it's pretty decent. Plus when it's $4.50, you really have very little to complain about. There's nothing out of the ordinary, it's just a really massive portion of glass noodles cooked with vegetables, served over rice, and with 2 fried dumplings. The dumplings kind of suck (never get them as an appetizer... ever), but when you give me carbs on top of more carbs for next to nothing... then we straight yo.



The pork bulgogi is actually one of my favorite dishes at the cart. I know bulgogi should technically be beef, but whatever... sweet beef is just too mild for me. I go spicy pork, because that's the manliest thing possible... or something along those lines. The pork isn't the tenderest cut, and the sauce could use some tweaking, but the main flavor profile is present. By which I mean spicy. If you ask them to cook it mild, it will actually be spicy. If you ask them to make it extra spicy, you will most likely be on the toilet and in pain. You have been forewarned.



More noodles! I was once told that I should get the noodle dishes here, since they'll pile them across all portions of the box without wasting any precious real estate for rice. True story. The beef sukiyaki yakisoba was decently good. The noodles were springy, the sauce was savory, with a subtle hint of sweetness, and the beef was appropriately tender, but the main point here is that there's a buttload of food for not that much money.

Basically, their food is alright at regular prices. Not something I'd go to as a default. On Fridays though... shit's on, and I'm always down for Korean-Japanese food (if it's after 3 pm).
Read more...

Lion's head noodles (麵對餡實小麵館)

One of the great things I appreciate about the Chinese language is the wit and subtlety within which it operates. Sure, in English, clever puns exist too, but you have to realize that within the lexicon of the Chinese language, homonyms are much more frequent, and idioms are just as abundant... so yeah. On that note, I'd like to mention a restaurant that I felt obligated to visit on the sheer cleverness of its name alone, 麵對餡實小麵館. It has the pinyin of 'Mian4 Dui4 Xian4 Shi2,' with characters that match a phrase that translates roughly to 'noodles done right with excellent ingredients,' but the more obvious phonetic translation would be to 'face the facts.' That's Sherlock Holmes level wit right there, but no amount of wordplay can save a restaurant from lackluster food.



Thank goodness they're pretty famous for their noodles too. Having no clue what the phrase 'in moderation' means, I started off with an order of 蔥油辣麵. Without giving any background, the literal translation is basically spicy oil noodles (similar to 擔擔麵, but with a thicker and less soup like sauce). Basically a sweet and spicy sauce is poured over a dish of hand pulled noodles, a giant handful of minced garlic is thrown on, and finally finished with a helping of cilantro. Freakin' phenomenal. For, I think, 55 NT (~$1.75) it makes for a pretty fulfilling meal. The hand pulled noodles were spot on in texture, and the sauce was absolutely sublime. Just sweet enough for you to look forward to coating each bite, but spicy enough for you to be slightly hesitant in doing so, it's truly the perfect tease. I probably would've been fulfilled having this alone, but then again... I knew this wasn't the star of the show here.



This is. The famous lion's head noodles. I forget how much it cost (maybe ballpark ~120 NT, but I'm pretty much pulling that figure out of my ass), but you know what? It doesn't matter. This dish was good enough to make the 蔥油辣麵 look like a sad consolation prize. If I had to explain, this was one of those instances where I really didn't care that I spent more than 100 NT on a meal (yes I'm a cheapskate). If you're unfamiliar with what lion's head meatballs are, have a quick read on Wiki. Basically, you're given a giant pot of noodles, cabbage, and two of these monstrous fried meatballs roughly 3" in diameter, all immersed in one of the richest pork broths I've ever put to my lips. Heavenly, would be the only way I can think to describe it. The post meal experience of licking my lips was as if I had just made out with strips of freshly fried bacon for several minutes prior. To a guy like me, that's pure bliss (yeah I'm weird).



At the end of my meal I was greeted with this awesome check. Or I guess I should say 'chit.' It's definitely true that Chinese is a beautifully complex language, but I guess it's no match for simple English haha.
Read more...

Ramen from a chain (甘泉魚麵)

Speaking of ramen... I just don't get it. It's not like there's not a lack of a market for ramen in America. People love it... from the rich, hearty broths, to the delightfully springy noodles. There's something for everyone when it comes to ramen (that is, unless you have some odd patriotic reasoning that prohibits you from eating Japanese food). So how come in Taiwan, they can have chain ramen restaurants, that can churn out consistently good ramen, while we have to settle for hit or miss ramen more often than not (a few select establishments notwithstanding)? Case in point? A joint called 甘泉魚麵 (Gan Quan Yu Mian), which can put more than a fair share of NYC ramen places to shame.

Fuck yeah, never have I ever... had spicy Szechuan pork ramen. For just 110 NT (~$3.75) you get a bowl of fantastic pork broth impregnated by chili oil. Hiding in the soup is fatty pork sliced so thinly that upon cooking, it actually curls onto itself, delicate cubes of firm tofu that just soak up the flavors, and a spattering of crunchy greens to balance out the overpowering nature of the spiciness. As for the noodles... they carry the consistency of extra thin hand pulled noodles, superbly springy and playfully chewy. No, this certainly isn't a bowl of ramen for the traditionalists, that is, if you can even call this truly ramen. What I do know, is that it tastes fantastically kick ass, with a certain feisty aspect that I normally associate with beef noodle soup, but with a lighter touch.



I forget how much the plain hakata ramen was... not that it really matters, in the end it's a matter of cents on the dollar. I felt obliged to get it just because excellent hakata ramen is a veritable white whale of mine. I don't think I'll ever find a bowl that can live up to my unrealistic expectations of creamy bone thickened broth and lightly charred pork glistening in fat. Theirs was good, nothing spectacular, but for no more than $4, there's absolutely no reason for any complaining. Basically, I didn't look very hard for good ramen in Taipei, but the ones I found were all pretty good.

Now that the food is out of the way, let me spew some useless opinions about ramen in the US vs. ramen in Taiwan. First point of contention... price. I realize this isn't exactly a fair fight, like David vs. Goliath, but come on. The average pricing is ~115 NT ($4) for a giant bowl of above average ramen. I consistently pay between $15-20 in NYC. If every bowl that I tried in America was undeniably incredible, I'd have no gripes. I mean, I can understand that location matters, but when you churn out something that's below the standard of a chain restaurant in Taiwan, and want to charge me 3x the cost just because you're in Manhattan? Sorry, that's just not cool. Now I know some people will tell me that I'm an idiot, and that I'm ignoring the fact that I paid $1000 for a plane ticket to gain access to all this food. This is true, but this is also my blog... so I'm going to ignore that tidbit and consider all else equal because I can.
Read more...

Mega bowl of noodles (建宏牛肉麵)

Do you ever think to yourself "I just wanna have as much food as possible, for as little money as possible, and I don't even care how crappy the restaurant is, or how mediocre the food is?" No? Well, I think people should think that way more often. Now I'm not saying that you should eat the mac & cheese that your grandmother added sprinkles to, because she can't read food labels (mmm... actually that'd be kind of cool), but to me, there's just too much pretentiousness towards food nowadays, and sometimes I just want to stuff my face on a budget. That's where 建宏牛肉麵 (Jian Hong Beef Noodles) comes in. Seriously, their big bowl of beef noodle soup is comically large.

Fuck yeah jumbo bowl of noodles. The way it works at this shop is that they serve 3 sizes, which appropriately enough are 小, 中, 大... with the prices being 65, 75, and 85 NT respectively. Curious as to how big the large bowl was, I splurged and gave in. For 85 NT ($2.70) you get a bowl about 30 cm across (yes I'm using metric), filled with 12 huge pieces of beef, which I actually counted, and a generous helping of noodles (both knife cut or thin are available). Here's the kicker, if you finish your noodles and still have broth, you can ask for more noodles. That works the other way too, if you have too much noodles and not enough soup... well refills on that. Crazy right? I'm not sure who exactly would even ask for seconds though, I can eat like a champ, and I didn't feel too hot after finishing. For reference... the spoon in the bowl is actually the over-sized metal Asian soup spoons. Epic bowl is epic.

Anyway, the noodles are nice and thick, nothing special, most certainly of no comparison to 良品, but there's a lot of them. The beef isn't all that tender, and is chock full of tendons, which probably need more time stewing in broth, but again... there's a lot of it. The broth, I think you know where this is going, mediocre, but lots. Summary? Massive quantities of food that would only rank as mediocre. Bonus points for giving me a carton of milk tea to wash down the noodles though.



See how crappy a store this is? It's located next to a beef butcher place, so it doesn't smell too crazy fresh either. When you're paying less than $3 for more food than any normal person could ever want to consume in a whole day, what do you honestly expect? I for one couldn't care less what it looks (or smells) like. That shit is awesome.

I apologize for the follwoing rant, but I really have to mention this. Originally I was just gonna write about a jumbo bowl of average beef noodle soup for super cheap, but I then I started thinking about stuff (which isn't really a good thing). Just... in my mind, there's too much food snobbery these days, and if there's one thing that truly bothers me about food writing (or even those who comment), it's the pretentiousness of dismissing a certain food because 1. it doesn't fit their particular tastes or 2. it isn't fancy enough for them. Screw that, people need to spend less time criticizing food and more time enjoying it.
Read more...

Scallion pancake rolls and noodles (北平鄉味)

When you take thinly sliced strips of beef, a thick sprig of scallion, a light brushing of traditional 甜麵醬 (not that awful bright orange duck sauce takeout places give you), and wrap it all inside a tastefully fried sheet of thin and crispy, yet chewy, scallion pancake, you end up with a dish called 牛肉捲餅 (niu rou juan bing)... which is basically the Northern Chinese equivalent of a burrito. Actually, maybe that comparison isn't the best. If you can think of how traditional Peking duck is served, sub out the thin paper like wrap with a deep-fried scallion pancake, and swap out the crispy duck with delightfully soft beef drenched in sweet sauce, then you'd get this. Whatever, I'm bad at making comparisons... I get it, but however you want to describe it, this shit is bananas.

For 65 NT ($2) from a place on 和平東路 118巷, you can get the aforementioned pancake beef roll thinger. That's like Taco Bell pricing... sooo sick. A single Andrew Jackson could get me 10 of these babies! I suppose I could eat 10 of them, but I probably wouldn't enjoy it... it's nice to be presented with the option though. It is as good as it sounds (at least it sounds good in my head). The scallion pancake is probably good enough to be sold individually. Despite being no more than dough + scallions + oil, it manages to bring out the flavors of both the scallions and sesame oil without sacrificing one or the other in the process. The beef is soft and dry (to good effect), so when coated with a light layer of traditional duck sauce, there's a nice contrast in texture as well as a slight hint of beefiness. That scallion? Well it's kind of like a pickle, it's just there to be refreshing.



Yeah, I'm a fat ass, so what? I also ordered mushu pork cooked with knife cut scallion pancakes, also known as 木須炒餅. I also really love scallion pancakes apparently? Not quite as good the one from 一品, but it's also a way bigger bowl for 80 NT (~$2.50), which is about the same price, so hey... it's fine with me. Moral of this post? Hm... mixing scallion pancakes with just about anything is a fail proof combination. Fact.

Shh... I know I already wrote about this place last year, but it was good enough for me to revisit (multiple times), so it's good enough to write about again.
Read more...

Knife cut beef noodle soup (良品牛肉麵)

If I committed some God awful crime, was sent to jail, sentenced to death, and asked what my last meal would be... it would be a bowl of beef noodle soup from here. Yeah, it's just that good. Sure, Taiwan is a land chock full of 牛肉麵 joints... in fact, I don't think you can actually walk more than a block before seeing another noodle place, but there's something special about the noodles at Liang Pin that keeps me going back. Whether it's the spicy beef broth, the quality of the noodles, or the tenderness of the beef, this is the golden standard for beef noodles in my opinion.

Their spicy beef broth is stewed continuously for hours on end in a giant vat at the front of the store... I'm pretty sure this is done purposely to attract people in with the smell of beef, because the scent is spectacular. In what I can only describe as... sweet and rich, even the smell is oddly intoxicating. The beef? Just as good. While they don't give you the choice of tendons or not, theirs is always striped with tendons anyway, so all is good in the world. The meat gets simmered in the same pot of broth until it's just short of falling apart. In this jacuzzi of meat and soup, each lends the other flavor, almost to the point where both are identical in taste. It's a wonderful thing. When you couple that with this...



You get the perfect bowl of beef noodles. Yeah yeah... I know there's people that don't like thick knife cut noodles (and maybe you would after you tried these), but I absolutely adore them. Theirs are just the perfect thickness, just enough so the textural nuances of the noodles can be appreciated. They're chewy and springy, but at the same time, incredibly soft (if it makes sense, they kind of possess the characteristics of knife cut noodles and rice noodles). That's the only way I can describe it.

With every bite (and accompanying sip of soup), your mouth'll be confused on what to focus on. Is it the spiciness of the broth... the delicate texture of the noodles... or the rich flavor of the beef? It doesn't really matter, since everything melds together so well. Before you know it, you'll be left with an empty bowl of sadness. Sadness that you couldn't even really enjoy it, because you were trying to figure out what part was the best. Sadness that you have a ring of spicy beef oil on your lips and no more noodles. It's okay though, it's only 100 NT ($3). You can always buy more happiness.
Read more...

Knife cut noodles & scallion pancakes (一品山西刀削)

Oh, how I wish they did mushu remotely close to resembling this stateside. In the traditional meaning of the word, 'mushu' is nothing more than the combination of thinly sliced pork, wood ear mushrooms, and scrambled eggs, stir fried together. Sometimes they add in other greens for color or things like bean sprouts for sheer volume, but the basic premise stays the same... pork + fungus + eggs = happiness. When you cook it with noodles it becomes 木須炒麵, and when you make it with knife cut noodles, well then it becomes something of a culinary masterpiece... sort of.



Located on 永康街 (Yong Kang Street), there's a corner shop called 一品山西刀削 or 'Yi Pin Shanxi Knife Cut Noodles.' Barely larger than a studio apartment, this little shop is apparently pretty damn famous (LOOK AT ALL THE AWARDS THEY HAVE!). Having claimed several of the top awards during Taipei food festivals, I'm pretty sure they're most well known for their beef noodles, but hey, no one (not even me) wants to have that every day.

Their take on mushu knife cut noodles was pretty good. The flavors were all there... even the smokiness that stir fried oil needs to have. Egg and pork were perfectly balanced by the mushrooms, and even though they added in cabbage and carrots, nothing seemed inappropriate. The noodles were spot on, which is to be expected from a place specializing in knife cut noodles... thick and chewy, but not overbearing. All things considered, I would've loved this dish even more had they not also served this...



In one of those moments where you actually want to cry tears of joy because of food, you're greeted with a plate of mushu scallion pancakes... where the pancakes are cut up into strips of instead of noodles. This is actually all the proof I need that there's a higher order. You might be thinking, "Man that sounds dumb, who would want fried pancakes as a substitute for noodles?" First of all, me. Second of all, the 蔥油餅 is freshly fried, and is texturally sound. It's chewy, yet it peels apart into layers. It possesses the subtle scent of sesame oil, yet is flavorful because of the scallions. When mixed with that very same mushu... well, that doesn't sound so stupid after all eh? For 85 NT ($2.50), you can buy true happiness... so there.
Read more...

Hakka cuisine (桐花小吃)

Close your eyes (wait no, nevermind... you can't read if you do that) and imagine taking pork fat, rendering it in a wok over high heat, stir frying noodles in it, followed by a drizzling of pork broth over top of it. I'm probably trivializing the preparation process, but that's basically what it boils down to. In Hakka cuisine, 豬肉油麵 (pork + oil noodles) is a dish that's served at almost every meal. By taking thick cut pieces of plain salted pork and laying it on top of noodles glistening in fat, a simple yet incredible dish is created.

Found near the Taipei Main Station, 桐花小吃 (Tong Hua Small Eats) is a restaurant that specializes in　古早味客家菜 or 'old style Hakka cuisine.' Places in Taiwan like to say they serve traditional or old style stuff, but those few words have really lost all meaning in the past few years, since everyone's been using it. In any case, their oil noodles are nothing short of spectacular. While the pork on top is nothing to write home about, the noodles themselves are a revelation. Plain noodles that possess a certain 'springiness,' are well coated in a layer of pork soy broth, pork fat, and adorned with fried bits of garlic and scallion. The flavor starts muted, but after a few bites, you're left with light spiciness in your mouth which is accompanied by the guilt of pork flavor on your lips. There's another aspect to the flavor than that... one that I associate with old Chinese person cooking... that I can't really explain in words. If you've never tried Hakka food before though, let me say this, start with this dish.



I also got pork chop over rice. Uh, this was pretty disappointing actually (which is my general impression of Hakka food). When I ordered the pork chop, I was expecting a grand piece of pork, glistening with a mix of a sweet glaze and oil from frying. When I ended up with 3 strips of measly pork, it was an absolute and total let down. Coupled with the fact that they delivered the salted pork pig fat oil noodles first... well, it was sure to be down hill after that. Basically, the 3 strips of lean pork are served in a slightly sweet broth over a rice and sauce mixture that's eerily similar to 魯肉飯 (lu rou fan). What I got was basically a glorified bowl of soy sauce rice. Anyway, long story short. Pig fat + oil noodles is mega awesome. Soy sauce rice + stingy serving of pork is not.
Read more...

Stir fried noodles and rice balls (人和豆付)

In what can basically be summarized as a stir fry of thick rice noodles, beef, scallions, and bean sprouts... 乾炒牛河 (gan chao niu he) is pretty one of my favoritest foods in the world (so much that I'll make up words to describe how much I love it). When I was younger (and refused to touch any sort of seafood or vegetables), it was pretty much the only item on the menu that I'd accept at dim sum places. Yes. I was very stupid as a kid (which isn't to say I've improved much on the intelligence, but I'll eat pretty much anything now). At a restaurant called 人和豆付, which translates to 'Friendly Tofu,' I was mesmerized by the picture of their noodles on the glass outside... I knew I had to order it.

Ha, actually I'm lying... I'm pretty sure the only reason I walked into this restaurant was because I wanted a place to photograph my egg tarts. I'm really glad I did though, their take on this dish was superb. I know, the dish has like 4 parts to it. How can anyone really screw something like that up? Well, it's not so much about screwing it up, it's about achieving the right flavor. I suppose I could throw some beef and scallions in a pan and add noodles, but I doubt it'd come out right. When it's properly executed, gan chao niu he has a certain 'smokiness' aspect of flavor. Combined with delicately sliced thin cuts of beef cooked just barely to completion, chewy, yet light, strands of wide rice noodles, and topped with ever so fragrant pieces of spring scallions and bean sprouts, a truly well prepared gan chao niu he is something that I can't even begin to describe. And they did it just that well. Way to go 'Friendly Tofu.' I think it was like 30 HKD (~$4), which is well worth the price of ecstasy methinks.



They also had rice balls. In my mind I was thinking of the HK spin on Taiwanese 飯團. Except it wasn't. It was just a fried cruller that was dipped in some sort of soy broth and rolled inside of sticky rice with a few shreds of pork floss. Except... their sticky rice smelled like feet. Did I really just pay 10 HKD ($1.25) for foot flavored rice? I thought maybe they just messed up royally with my order, but my mom explained that, what I described as the odor of foot was just how they're prepared in Southern parts of China. Well then. Duly noted. I will not be having any more foot flavored rice balls. I'll stick with the semi-sweet, yet savory, Taiwanese variety...
Read more...

Sorry, more beef noodles (濟南牛肉麵)

This'll probably be my last entry that deals with beef noodles for a long while. I'm sure most people who look at pictures read my blog are pretty sick of the beef and carb heavy content, so that's probably a welcome relief. To be completely honest, I'm kind of sick of it myself. Despite how truly awe-inspiring (yeah I said it) a bowl of really good beef broth and noodles can be, having it all the time can ruin the experience as well. Too much of a good thing I suppose. Anyway, as of this post, consider me officially on hiatus from beef noodles. That said, prior to my self imposed embargo, I did manage to go to one last restaurant I feel justifies a post on its own. Enter... 濟南牛肉麵 (Ji Nan Beef Noodles). Onto the words that describe the food and whatnot!

A small shack located on the street behind my apartment (as expected by the name... 濟南路), barely larger than my dorm room from last year, houses this old mom'n'pop shop started in 1976. The smell of beef is overpowering, and wafts to the end of the block and across the street. Upon walking in, the menu is simple... more or less simplifying to 10 different varieties of beef noodles with varying cuts of beef. For 110 NT (~$3.25) I got the default order, seen above... a small beef noodle soup with thick noodles (the choice is yours whether you want thin or thick). The noodles are clearly not made in house, but they're good enough for the purpose of being satisfying and non-distracting. The beef is fall apart tender, and the broth carries with it all the juices that were present in the meat. The experience after finishing the meal is even more sublime, as you're left with an oddly satisfying thin layer of flavorful oil coating your lips that just... lingers. Despite not doing any one aspect spectacularly (like the noodles at 良品), it does everything adequately. While I don't know if it's one of the best bowls of beef noodles I've ever had, it certainly made me happy at the time.
Read more...

我家涼麵 (My Family's Cold Noodles)

Another gem I found near the main campus of NTU, on 汀洲路 (Ting Zhou Road) was a small shop called 我家涼麵 or roughly translated as 'My Family's Cold Noodles.' They're a small shop that has no more than 4 tables inside, and specializes in... as the name would suggest, cold noodles. Not to be confused with Korean 냉면 (naengmyun), Chinese cold noodles are almost always served with sesame paste sauce (sort of like tahini), sliced cucumbers, and most likely bean sprouts. I, however, haven't eaten 涼麵 made in a restaurant since, well... ever. My grandfather had always said that cold food prepared in Taiwan was unhygienic (probably true), and would most likely have me crying on the toilet bowl (definitely true). I walked in bravely, with absolute determination to finally try some cold sesame noodles.



Naturally I chickened out. I know, I know, their 'thing' is cold noodles... how could I order anything else!? Dunno, I took a look at the menu and ultimately ordered a serving of Chinese style 炸醬麵 (black bean noodles) and also an order of 紅油抄手 (Sichuan style wontons). I don't remember the cost of all this, but I think the final bill was under 100 NT ($3). The black bean noodles, pictured above, were kind of weird to me since they had contained cabbage, and way more chunks of preserved tofu than I'm normally used to. The sauce was sweeter than I expected as well (I'm used to a flavor dominated by spicy and salty elements). Not to say that it was all that bad, it was just... different. To be honest, it was a nice change from most of the noodle places I frequent.



As for the 紅油抄手, I enjoyed this dish quite a bit. Midtown people might think of Sichuan style wontons as those from 'Grand Sichuan,' which is to say, bathed in a pool of chili oil... inviting only a second of pleasure prior to a world of pain. The Taiwanese variants seem much milder, with the sauce being sweetened, and sesame oil based. With the heat of the chili oil taking a backseat to other flavors, the bite-sized dumplings get to shine. The skins probably aren't made in house, but they're adequately thin, and do just enough to hold in a fairly large chunk of pork. All in all, it's a wonderful blend of sauce, pork, and wonton skin. Sigh, if not for sheer embarrassment, I would've drank the remnant sauce at the bottom of the saucer... that's how good it was.

Oh yeah, the only reason I walked into such a crappy shop to begin with? I fell in love with the name on the sign from halfway down the street.
Read more...

南陽哨子麵 (Nan Yang... er, noodles)

Let me preface this entire post with... "if you're expecting something awesome or new, prepare to be disappointed." I didn't set out to look for this place... actually, I wasn't even trying to find a place to eat actually. I was supposed to be running an errand or something for my grandmother, but I'm easily distracted by lots of things that other people would consider pretty dumb. When I saw a sign that said there was some sort of dish called 乾麵 (gan mian), which loosely translates to 'dry noodles,' for 15 NT (that's less than 50 cents!), the allure of endless bowls of cheap noodles called to me. I scoped out the place to make sure that there were enough people inside, and surely it was packed, then I walked in to order (I've always been told if enough Chinese people collect in 1 place, then there's probably something worth waiting for). Anyway, onto the food!



I felt really silly (and cheap) for ordering a bunch of orders of dry noodles, so I also added a 牛肉湯麵 or basically an order of beef noodle soup without beef. This shop is apparently somewhat famous for their different varieties of noodles, so I asked for the 版條 (ban tiao), which is basically really wide and thin rice noodles. The large bowl, which is seriously big costs 60 NT (just a shade under $2), and is a value driven dish. The broth is nothing special, and kind of watered down. The noodles are made in house, but could easily be confused with the prepackaged variety. All in all, there's nothing incredible about it aside from the size of the bowl. Have I mentioned it's insanely huge? For the price though, I could see the appeal to college and HS kids. This place is located right next to a bunch of tutoring places after all.

As for the dry noodles, that's the picture at the very top. For 15 NT you get a small dish of 油麵 (you mian) mixed with a combination of 魯肉汁, otherwise known as minced pork sauce, bean sprouts, and a dash of what is most likely sesame oil. This was definitely better than the beef noodle soup dish, and if I could go back in time and redo my order, I would just get like... 4 orders of this. Again, nothing to write home about (wait... what's this post about then?), but it's 50 cents! I don't think that'd get you a side order of bean sprouts in NYC.
Read more...

永康刀削麵 (Yong Kang Knife Cut Noodles)

Ignore the post title, what I really meant to call it was 'place where they pull funky ass knife stunts like whoa.' Having just gotten off the plane 4 hours before, I did what any sensible person fighting jet lag would do. I went and got a haircut. Oh, and I went to get food. Actually, I was told that I looked homeless, and forced to get a haircut, but anyway, I spent my time musing what I'd get for lunch. Realizing that I was sitting on 永康街 (Yong Kang Street), I thought about what there was... soup dumplings, meh, not today. Beef noodles... soup was probably a bit silly given the temperature. Ultimately, I decided on the little shop in the corner that specialized in knife cut noodles, appropriately named 永康刀削麵 (Yong Kang Knife Cut Noodles).



Why? I'm not really sure. I didn't really want plan on getting noodles at all. I had actually planned on getting small burgers, and a side of shaved ice. When I saw these 2 dudes slicing the hell out of giant balls of dough though, I was completely mesmerized. Now, I tried to take a picture, I swear, but when said men with knives turned and gazed at me with eyes of fury, I decided it was probably a poor course of action. In any case, I ordered a small 炸醬麵 (bean paste noodle) which was 55 NT ($1.50) and a small 牛肉麵 (beef noodle) which was 110 NT ($3) to sample. Yes I realize I completely contradicted my previous statement of soup being too hot, but I wanted to try it. Let me summarize this meal quickly. Noodles, out of this world. Cut to the perfect thickness despite the rapidity of the cuts made by said crazy men with knives. Texture was spot on, with just enough resistance to make you question whether or not the center would be cooked through (which it always was). The bean paste sauce was pretty generic, nothing awful to detract from the noodles, but nothing spectacular either. The beef noodles were more of the same, mediocre broth, overly tough and rather tasteless beef. Have I mentioned the noodles are out of this world though? Okay, so obviously that seems like a mixed bag in terms of my opinion, but here's a shocker... the noodles are good enough to outweigh all the negatives of the complementary pieces. Do yourself a favor and just get the beef noodle soup sans the beef. It's way cheaper, and you still get those sensual strands of carbohydrates... mmm~.

Oh yeah, why is the a picture of a cup at the top you might ask? I dunno. I just liked the fact that it had the characters that represented something akin to 'peace' on it. It seemed appropriate in a noodle shop.
Read more...