3 Taiwanese Dishes Worth the Trip into Flushing

Getting my friends to come on food adventures in Flushing is like pulling teeth. Most of them live in Manhattan or Brooklyn, and are very proud of the fact.

"I don't do outer boroughs," says one.

"I don't leave the Upper West Side," says another.

"Why take the train for Chinese food when you can just get it delivered?" asks a third.

Since my life revolves around food, I probably have a distorted view of how far the average person should go for an ideal bowl of noodles or enlightening dim sum. (Queens residents, you're lucky.) Most of my trips on the 7 train are spent all by my lonesome, catching up on the New Yorker or, in the absence of reading material, fastidiously checking email on my phone. So I was pretty excited when Kian of Red Cook suggested we head out to Flushing in search of some restaurant a Taiwanese friend recommended that may or may not have an English name. Sold!

BlogDiana KuanMay 25, 2010Flushing, Queens, Restaurants Comments

Why is Chinese food in San Francisco so disappointing? Also, thank you, Xi'an Famous Foods

This $4 plate of liang pi noodles ("cold skin noodles") single-handedly made up for all the bad Chinese food I have eaten in the past eight months.

First, a tangent. I spent eight months living and working in San Francisco. Apologies in advance to those in the Bay Area, but really, it seemed impossible to find great Chinese food there. Decent? Yes. Good? Occasionally. Downright atrocious? Far too common.

With such a big Chinese population, San Francisco should theoretically have Chinese food to rival Vancouver and New York. But what I found was mostly watered-down cooking, and too many restaurants advertising themselves as Chinese-Thai-Vietnamese-Sushi (what's up with that?) And yes, I also visited the purely Chinese restaurants, and quite popular ones at that.

BlogDiana KuanMay 14, 2010Flushing, Manhattan, Queens, Restaurants, San Francisco Comments