Thanh Da in Sunset Park

In the year and a half I had been working on my cookbook, I ate out much less than usual. Recipe-testing during the day meant that I always had leftovers for dinner, which piled up in the fridge, and I didn't like food going to waste. When I did eat out, it was usually for big events like friends' birthdays or just grabbing a bite in the neighborhood. This meant that for quite a while, I contributed much less to conversations about new restaurants, chefs, and talked-about dishes than a person in the food biz ought to.

As much as I love cooking at home, dining out has a big appeal. Being inspired by new dishes and new flavors is the biggest reason. I've had fabulous meals recently at Talde in Park Slope and Lotus Blue in Tribeca (opened by my friend Kian of Red Cook); the restaurants both had creative modern takes on Asian cooking and proved you don't have to rely on traditional recipes to serve up great Filipino, Chinese, and other Asian food.

The second biggest draw of dining out for me is nostalgia, for foods I've eaten while traveling abroad. Last night I went to the opening of Pok Pok NY, the New York branch of the popular Portland restaurant, and upon sitting down was immediately reminded of being in a night market in Thailand. Likewise, I was happy to eat lunch at Thanh Da in Sunset Park last weekend because it had been a while since I had a really good Vietnamese meal. (For some reason, good Vietnamese and Mexican food is very had to find in NY.)

BlogDiana KuanApril 20, 2012Brooklyn, Restaurants Comment

Fu Run in Flushing

Cumin-crusted lamb makes me weak in the knees. I developed an obsession for it years ago when living in Beijing. From lunchtime through late night hours, it was easy to find street vendors selling cumin-crusted lamb kebabs, which they would cook up right in front of you on a charcoal grill. I also made a point of eating out often at Xinjiang restaurants (run by the minority Uighurs), where you could satisfy your lamb cravings with even bigger lamb kebabs on 18-inch metal skewers.

So when I saw Robyn's post on Fu Run last month and her photos of the restaurant's famous "Muslim lamb chops", the restaurant seemed like a good excuse to not cook for one lunch out of the week, and instead head out to Flushing. Fortunately, Kian from Red Cook was also eager to try it, so we made an afternoon of it.

Last summer one of my go-to cheap light meals was the liang pi noodles ("cold skin noodles") at Xian Famous Foods, spicy noodle bliss for $4 a plate. This spicy bean noodle salad was about 10 times better, which is saying a lot. These chewy glass noodles made with mung bean and tossed with peanuts, cabbage, cilantro, cucumbers, and an amazing chili sauce were so light and refreshing that we both wanted to lick the plate. Yes, spicy food that as actually cooling and refreshing is a rare feat, but this salad definitely fit those qualities.

BlogDiana KuanAugust 14, 2011New York, Queens, Restaurants Comments

Dim Sum in Sunset Park - East Harbor Seafood Palace

I've been to Sunset Park plenty of times before for grocery shopping and eating, but have somehow missed East Harbor Seafood Palace, supposedly one of the best dim sum restaurants in New York. Robyn from The Girl Who Ate Everything wrote about it over a year ago, as did The Village Voice. So on President's Day, despite the sudden "wintry mix" in a week of good weather, and the wonky holiday train schedule, my boyfriend and I decided to forgo bagels in front of the TV and instead brave the longish trek down the Sunset Park.

Chinese restaurant names tend to exaggerate ("pagoda", "garden", "kingdom"), but the inside of East Harbor Seafood Palace was as palatial as you can find in New York. It had a large dining room with high ceilings, pleasant (re: not gaudy) decor, and most importantly, a decent amount of space between tables. (Of the 200 or so diners, there were approximately four who were not Chinese, if you like to judge authenticity by these ratios.) While waiting for our number to be called, I kept eyeing all the baskets of perfect-looking har gow that traveled from the dim sum carts to the tables. Twenty minutes had never seemed so long.

BlogDiana KuanFebruary 22, 2011Brooklyn, Restaurants, Sunset Park Comments

Nyonya - Malaysian Food in Chinatown

Living far away from family this year, I didn't celebrate the first week of Chinese New Year by going out for dim sum or another festive meal. I talked to my parents in China via cell phone, made some Sichuan wontons, and called it good. I took solace in the fact that 1) I've eaten many great CNY meals in the past, and 2) I'm constantly recipe testing for my upcoming Chinese cookbook, so every day is like Chinese New Year.

Still, it was nice to finally have a Chinese meal outside of my apartment after a long hiatus of not doing so. Last night I went with Kian (of Red Cook) and his partner Warren to the opening of our friend Magda's photo exhibit near Chinatown. Afterward we wandered over to Nyonya on Grand St., It's part of the Penang restaurant chain that's pretty popular along the East Coast. I've eaten at the Boston branch numerous times, and occasionally find myself with massive cravings for their roti canai with curry chicken dip, so I was pretty excited to try Nyonya.

BlogDiana KuanFebruary 11, 2011Chinatown, Manhattan, Restaurants Comments

Soupy Dumplings and Pan-fried Bao at Nan Xiang

Since coming back to the US, I have had a hard time finding pan-fried pork buns, called shenjian bao in Chinese.

In Shanghai, they were available on practically every street corner. Like the more widely known xiaolong bao (called "soup dumplings" in English), sheng jian bao is also filled with ground pork and piping hot soup. But unlike its steamed counterpart, sheng jian bao is panfried until crispy on the bottom, then topped with sesame seeds and chives. They're so juicy that you have to bite into them carefully, or risk having hot broth spray out onto your shirt or at your dining companion across the table, neither of which are good ways to begin a meal.

A couple weeks ago I headed out to Flushing with Kian to try Nan Xiang Xiao Long Bao. Fortunately, this place has no relation to the overrated and overly touristy Nan Xiang mini-chain in Shanghai. This Nan Xiang is a plainly adorned, two-room restaurant that draws a huge lunch crowd. We ordered a handful of dishes, one of my favorites being stir-fried glutinous rice cakes with seafood. If you like your starch dishes chewy, this is one to try, and even better topped with shrimp and fish. The texture of the rice cakes is similar to that of knife-cut noodles, or maybe even gnocchi.

BlogDiana KuanDecember 1, 2010Queens, Restaurants Comments

Chinese-Jamaican Food in Brooklyn: De Bamboo Express

Every once in a while I get an craving for greasy Chinese food that's different from what you can find at your everyday takeout stand.

Some of you may remember my Caribbean-Chinese party from two years ago. The theme had been inspired by the wee bit of my childhood that was spent in Puerto Rico and the hybrid dishes I remember eating at Chinese restaurants there, like chicharrones de pollo and pineapple shrimp. I had also added some Jamaican influences as well, including jerk chicken wings and a cocktail made with hibiscus tea. It was a fun event, but needless to say, Caribbean-Chinese food never became a steady part of my diet.

Flash forward to 2010. Today I found myself in Prospects Lefferts Gardens at De Bamboo Express, one of the two or three Jamaican-Chinese restaurants I know of in the city. Objective: a cheap but filling lunch.

BlogDiana KuanAugust 19, 2010Brooklyn, Global Chinese, Restaurants Comments

Kunjip in Koreatown

I don't really know why I don't go to Koreatown more often, other than the fact that many of the restaurants there can get pretty pricey. But for months I had been craving bibimbap, which has been an obsession since my trip to Korea two years ago. I especially love the crackling sound of the rice when the bowl arrives at your table and you quickly mix the raw egg on top with all the meat and vegetables in the burning hot stone bowl. And the six or eight side dishes that come with every entree.

Last week I met up with Kian from Red Cook at Kunjip on 32nd St. I'm not sure if it has the best bibimbap in Ktown, but certainly one of the most affordable. We spent under $30 including tip for lunch for two people, for a smorgasbord of food. Other than the above bibimbap with ground beef and vegetables, here are a few more reasons to go.

The spicy tofu and vegetable soup. Unlike with most bright red Korean foods, this isn't going to burn your throat. It comes with the bibimbap and a few other lunch specials.

Like with any Korean meal, you get a bunch of little banchan (small dishes), including two types of cabbage kimchi, dried squid, fermented soy beans, spicy tofu, and jicama.

BlogDiana KuanJuly 20, 2010Manhattan, Restaurants Comments

Grand Sichuan Redux

Maybe this post should be subtitled "How I feel about Grand Sichuan after living in China and teaching Sichuan cooking for a living."

While I had never in love with the Grand Sichuan chainlet around New York, it had always been a dependable source of cheap, tasty, and spicy food. It was also a source of fond memories. A year after college, having finally escaped the suburbs of Boston, my earlytwentysomething self had spent the first summer in the city exploring every single recommendation from a battered copy of Time Out's Cheap Eats issue. At the time, it was my bible. Grand Sichuan seemed to be the go-to Chinese restaurant outside Chinatown, so I dutifully tried all the locations, from St. Marks to Hells Kitchen to Murray Hill. That summer, like all others in New York, was unbearable. Eating sweat-inducing dishes like Chongqing chicken and mapo tofu in an air-conditioned environment was, really, the only way to eat spicy dishes in 95-degree humidity.

Yet, as somewhat of a stickler for authenticity, I was always irked by Grand Sichuan's highlighting Shanghainese xiao long bao on the menus. The long list of Cantonese dishes, "Diet" dishes, and Americanized stuff like Orange Flavored Chicken didn't help, either. While each trip ended with me and my companion(s) stuffing our faces and delightfully bringing home leftovers, something still felt amiss.

BlogDiana KuanJune 4, 2010Manhattan, Restaurants Comments

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

Moo Goo Gai Panini

Hankering for a sandwich while in the East Village last week, I stopped at Marco Polo Café out of sheer curiosity. The tiny shop on St. Mark's bills itself as "Asian-Italian New Cuisine." The menu, on the other hand, reveals its Asian influence to be entirely Chinese. So, in the spirit of this blog, what the heck.

The restaurant is the product of a Sicilian-American and mainland Chinese husband-and-wife team. So, naturally, you can order dumplings and buns, or pasta, like bison meatballs over penne. (Unlike another Italian-Chinese partnership I wrote about last year, whose menu was completely Western.) But...what's so interesting about a seemingly schizophrenic food selection?

Well, the restaurant does try to fuse flavors on a few of the items. I decided to forgo the Dumplavoli, which, while having a catchy name, is merely a plate of five raviolis and six dumplings.

BlogDiana KuanMay 10, 2010Manhattan, Restaurants Comments

Yun Nan Flavour Snack - The only Yunnan Spot in New York?

The last time I ate Yunnan food was over two years ago, back in Beijing. It is not for lack of trying.

In the US, Cantonese, Sichuan, and Hunan food are ubiquitous. Northern Chinese, Shanghainese Xinjiang, and Fujianese are making headways into cities. But as far as Yunnan restaurants are concerned, the LA area can claim four. In all of New York's five boroughs, there is just one.

For anyone new to Yunnan cuisine, the southwestern Chinese province is most well-known for their Cross-the-Bridge noodles. It consists of bowl of boiling broth that arrives at your table with about seven or eight raw ingredients (including eggs, chicken, fish skin, sprouts, etc), which the waiters will then theatrically dump into your broth as quickly as possible so everything cooks table-side. The round rice noodles themselves also cook with the other raw ingredients, and the flavors come together brilliantly if the broth is hot enough. (If the broth is merely lukewarm, that is another, more unpleasant, story.)

Yun Nan Flavour Snack out in Sunset Park does not serve Cross-the-Bridge noodles. Rather, it serves very basic but comforting bowls of beef tripe, ground pork, and fried pork noodles, using the same silky rice noodles that are a tad more plump than spaghetti. Everything is cooked to order.

BlogDiana KuanApril 19, 2010Brooklyn, Restaurants Comments

Vegetarian Food Gone Wrong

BlogDiana KuanJuly 28, 2009Beijing, Restaurants Comments

Karaage! - Japanese-Chinese Fried Chicken

BlogDiana KuanJune 10, 2009Culinary Culture, Global Chinese, Restaurants, Shanghai Comments

Lan Fong Yuen - More than Great Milk Tea

I have written before about Lan Fong Yuen, the food stall in Hong Kong where pantyhose milk tea was supposedly invented. Sure, it's crowded, gets a lot of tourists, and makes you wait just to snuggle next to strangers. But I love that they still make their milk tea the old-fashioned way, by straining it through stocking-like nets. I also love that everyone can watch. Though the tea guy usually moves so fast that I haven't been able to get a better photo than the one I took in 2006.

At least I can console myself with some nice food close-ups. The pork chop bun up top is one of Lan Fong Yuen's specialties. Pork chop buns (a burger with a fried pork cutlet) originated in Macau, but in the past few decades have become standard cha chaan teng fare in Hong Kong. I still like the Macanese version better, since the bread is a crusty Portuguese roll instead of a sesame bun. But the pork matters most. If I'm in the mood for something fried, juicy, and porky, the wrong bread will not deter me.

Have you ever tried Hong Kong-style French toast? This is another greasy comfort food favorite. Forget whole grain or rye or other healthy brown breads. This one is puffy Chinese white bread dipped in an egg wash, pan-fried, and smothered with butter, peanut butter, or sweetened condensed milk. Lan Fong Yuen's is rich, but tame in comparison.

BlogDiana KuanMarch 9, 2009Hong Kong, RestaurantsComment