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Eats - Chinese - Hunan
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Hunan Education Continues
My page for Hunan Chinese food now shows up first in Google when you search for "muslim hunan," and now I know why.
Timothy, a visitor to my site, gently informed me that my definitation of Hunan food as "Muslim Chinese" was inaccurate, so I moved them all to a new page under "Muslim Chinese." Timothy wrote:
"Hunan Home in Mountain View serves (obviously) Hunan regional food, but isn't Muslim. I've also seen other Hunan or Sichuan/Hunan restaurants that aren't Muslim. Hunan is also a big rice growing region, which is at odds with the wheat-heavy cuisine served in places like Fatima and Darda. Other Muslim Chinese restaurants include Eastern House (Campbell), Peking Eastern House (Fremont), New Ma's (Mountain View), Ma's (somewhere in the San Jose area). There is another Fatima in Cupertino."
Here's more information on Hunan and Muslim Chinese (mostly taken from www.china.org.cn):
Chinese Muslims are called Hui, and are China's largest ethnic minority.
There are four major minority groups in Hunan: the Miaos, the Tujia (largely assimilated by the Miaos), the Dong, and the Yao. Trivia: Chairman Mao Zedong was born and raised in Hunan.
Hunan cuisine has three styles of cooking from areas around the Xiangjiang River, Dongting Lake and the west of the province. The Xiangjiang River cuisine is the most popular one, with four characteristics: tasty, savoury, hot and sour. The suan dou jiao rou ni, or sour string bean cubes with smashed meat reflects the four tastes at the same time.
Characteristic dishes: Sweet and Sour Chicken, Orange Beef, Crispy Duck, Dongan Chicken, Peppery and Hot Chicken (Hot and Spicy Chicken), Lotus Seeds in Sugar Candy
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Hunan Home's Restaurant
4880 El Camino Real
Los Alto, CA
650/965-8888
Rating: ***
Went here to try non-Muslim Hunanese food, which is described
in the sidebar. We had to order very, very quickly since
the kitchen was closing, so I went for squid with vegetables,
a spicy chicken dish, and cold beef flank. The squid was
tender and fresh. The chicken was as spicy hot as any Sichuan
dish. The sliced cold beef flank was dry and not as good
as Silver
Lake's.
The restaurant itself is simple and clean.
We showed up at around 1 p.m. and has to order literally
in a minute before the kitchen closed. Lesson: show up on
time for lunch. 07/03
Update 10/04: I return
for dinner, this time with my friend Greg, who is pretty
particular about what he eats. Note to self: do not order
the giant clam special without asking the price first because
you will end up with an astronomical bill. We paid about
$75 for dinner for two, which is a lot considering we only
ordered three dishes. We had the aforementioned giant clam
dish, which was good but not great, the cold meat appetizer
which again was okay, a shrimp dish which was fine, and
some veggies which were okay. Do you see a trend here.
I don't think we'll be going back soon.
Hunan Gourmet
163 S. Murphy Ave.
Sunnyvale, CA
408/739-8866
Hours: Sun.-Thurs., 11:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. and 5-9:30 p.m.; Fri. & Sat., 11:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. and 5-10 p.m.
Rating: **
I've wanted to try this place for awhile. It turns out that they also serve Shanghai-style food here. We ordered xiao long bao, which were a bit thick-skinned, but actually not bad. We had simmered fish tails with an unctuous brown sauce, which was perfectly cooked. The sauce was a bit strong on the five-spice, but the fish was so delicious it didn't really matter. We also had a slightly tough dish of Hunan lamb which was strongly spiced with cumin. Service was a bit cool, although the manager was very friendly. 08/03
Hunan Taste
998 N. 4th St
San Jose, CA 95112-4939
(408) 295-1186
I know a lot of people like this tiny restaurant,
because I keep getting email about it. Four of us went for lunch. All I can really
remember is the smoked pork, which they do on the spot in the kitchen. It's fabulously
smokey. Everything else we ordered was just so-so, but then I'm not sure what
dishes are truly Hunanese. 08/04
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