Text 28979, 79 rader
Skriven 2015-07-13 08:23:00 av Michael Loo (1:18/200)
Ärende: chinese adventures 957
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Well, I'm not in China (and in fact no longer where
this restaurant is located either), and the main
adventure was dining with my brother.

So he wanted to go out, and he's tumbled to the fact
that I like Chinese food and feel it represents good
value, so in deference to the fact that we went to
"his" suggestion last time, he took me to what had
been my countersuggestion this time. Sichuan Jin
River, where I expect decent, sometimes great, food
at usually decent but sometimes excessive prices.

Jonathan has this thing about dumplings and always
tries to get multiple orders unless there's pushback
from me; this obtains whether an order is $4 or $8
and whether it offers 4 or 8 pieces or somewhere in
between. And though he always politely asks if I
want to share, if the answer is affirmative, that's
an excuse to order more. Whatever. There's also this
song and dance that I don't understand about if I
order one main dish, he will order two sets of
dumplings, and if I order two, he will just get one,
which sounds reasonable except that I always order
one main dish, and he orders one as well.

This time I said I'd take one dumpling, and he could
have the rest, so after some back and forth, he agreed
to get only one order.

The dumplings were thick of skin and okay in taste,
and one was plenty, especially insofar as I didn't
ask for my usual hot oil to jazz things up - I had an
hour coming up on the subway and didn't relish the
thought of my stomach rumbling the entire time.

For mains, he got that Cantonese standard of beef and
broccoli, an odd choice given that the place serves
the most authentic central Chinese food in town, and
ordering Cantonese food is sort of silly if not a
downright insult to the cook. Doesn't matter, as any
kid in town can make beef and broccoli. This version
was made of beef tossed in baking soda, a standard
cheat, and properly done broccoli, i.e., cooked over
extremely high heat for a very short time. Jonathan
complained that the beef tasted like shrimp (he has
a phobia about shrimp). I pointed out that the baking
soda treatment, which he should have expected here,
lends a vaguely spoiled and perhaps fishy taste to
the meat; after which he ate more without complaint
but ceded the last several pieces of beef to me.

My choice was braised short ribs with baby taro, which
I wondered beforehand would come as beef or pork. They
were pork ribs, fairly meaty, sawn in half so as to
render them short. Their sauce was a relatively
light-colored and unsalty soy-based broth heavily
thickened with cornstarch and seasoned with what was to
me a strange combination of star anise and cinnamon.
It was a big dish, so I let Jonathan eat as much of it
as he wished, and he ended up eating more of my dish
than his own, which was fine. He opined that the ribs
were beef; bear in mind that these ribs were the size
of ordinary pork ribs and their taste, though somewhat
obscured by the spicing, distinctly piggy. He also
thought the taro was indistinguishable from potato;
bear in mind too that taro has a completely different
taste from potato, and its texture is mushier and
powderier both, and it has little hairlike things in it.
If we didn't look so much alike, I'd have imagined that
he was unrelated to me altogether. I don't like to
think I'm related to someone with a tin palate. The
insane part I don't mind so much.

We spent, rather I spent, about $50 on this meal, and
though there was enough food for 4, we walked out having
emptied the plates and without doggy bags.
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