Eats - Chinese - Mandarin

Loon Wah Chinese Restaurant
1132 S Saratoga-Sunnyvale Road (near Hwy 85)
San Jose, CA
408/257-1642
Dimsum rating: ***-1/2
We went here for "Mandarin dim sum." Unlike most dim sum joints, there are few carts or servers with trays. You check off what you want on a sheet of paper, and it is made for you. One dim sum menu lists Cantonese dishes (har gow, su mai, etc) and the other Mandarin (green onion pancake, etc.). We had a sampling of both. What's odd about this place is the serving sizes are enormous, easily twice what you would normally get. Drunken Chicken was half a chicken, including the breast. Spicy wontons were a large bowl topped with a spoonful of peanut butter. Everything was quite good, and it was nice having a different list of choices. 07/02

Update 04/06/03: Went for the first time in a year, this time a bit later (1 p.m.) though the place was still packed. We ordered a mix of Hong Kong-style and Mandarin-style dimsum, plusa plate of gossamer Taiwanese rice noodles which I love. The spicy beef turned out to be cold, red-cooked brisket. I forgot that they served spicy wontons with peanut butter, although it wasn't mixed in so we ate it 50-50. The chiu chow-style steamed dumplings were good, although a bit doughy. The baked beef roll was good, similar to shaobing, but stuffed with the same brisket. I skipped most of the Hong Kong dimsum, mostly because I'm weary from eating su-mai, etc. every weekend. Overall, an excellent meal. Service was first-rate as it was before. They even lowered the blinds to cut the afternoon glare for us.

Updated 07/12/03: Went back with two friends for lunch and once again over-ordered. Servings are easily for six, even eight. I chose drunken chicken (not as winey as China B), steamed scallop dumplings, black bean spareribs, green onion pancake with egg, Taiwanese-style noodles, tendon with chili oil, sticky rice rolls, don tot. That would still have been too much, but my friend added potstickers, foil-wrapped chicken (which I hadn't had in ages), fried devils (you tiao), and a deep fried battered prawns appetizer. A few of these I'd never had. The green onion pancake with egg was off the Mandarin dim sum menu, and I don't really get it. It's a fried plain dough with a scattering of green onion and a scrambled egg smeared over the top. It's so heavy that you could eat two slices and nothing else. The sticky rice rolls (I don't know the real name for these, but they're you tiao covered with pork sung then rolled up in sticky rice ) were larger and fresher than at Happy Cafe. The don tot are halfway between new style cookie pastry versions and old style super flaky lard pastry versions (not a happy medium unfortunately). Polay tea was okay. Cost $63.

Updated 03/12/2006: I only went here because my friend Cevin wanted to go. The wait was almost 40 minutes, the food was so-so, and it was kind of expensive for dimsum ($114) for four. I won't be going back.

Mandarin Gourmet
10145 N. De Anza Blvd.
Cupertino, CA
408/725-8168
Overall: *
I made several mistakes when trying out this restaurant for the first time. A) I went with two white guys who aren't Chinese food fans, B) I didn't think to ask for a Chinese menu, not that it would have done me any good. Despite the classy building, this place is nowhere near the equal of the surrounding Chinese restaurants in Cupertino (some of which are right across the parking lot) in terms of food quality. Uninspired, insipid, cloying. Get the picture? Avoid it. 08/01

Silver Lake Restaurant - Closed :(

Wing's Restaurant, Mandarin & Szechuan Cuisine
131 E. Jackson St.
San Jose, CA 95112
408/294-3303
Overall: *
This is where we go when we want "old-fashioned Chinese food," which translates as kitchen kitsch: sweet and sour pork, potstickers, chicken chow mein, and corn starch soup. The best tables are in individual booths (with curtains) and the bill will be about the same as dinner at McDonald's. Japantown is a block away, so you can always run for sushi or Cuban food if you change your mind. 05/00

Zhao's Hot Pot
660 Barber Lane
Milpitas, CA 95035 (across from China Palace on the ground floor of that oddball octagonal building near 880)
408/383-0188
This is one of those tiny joints that I'll go to just so it stays open. Choose your meat or fish (we went with lamb and beef) then your veggies (the odd chrysanthemum is a good choice although strongly flavored) and other fillings, then make your sauce and start cooking. Can be as expensive or cheap as you want it, and they have those cool to the touch induction hotplates if it's too warm outside; the broth still gets boiling hot, but you aren't also dealing with a flaming heater. 04/2006