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Thank you, Mr. Cutlets. This has been one of the most enjoyable Q&A's I've had a chance to read and, in a small way, participate in. I'm sure all eGulleteers join me in thanking you for your generosity and enthusiasm.

Ellen: Thank you for more wonderful, panoramic pictures!!!

Thanks for asking the question. As you can tell, Chinese food has been important to me for a long time, and it was nice to reminisce about those meals.

I can confirm that. I don't remember the Hunan Balcony before I returned from my 1975-77 trip to Malaysia. Ditto for the original Empire Szechuan. I don't remember all of the restaurant names you remember, though.

I never thought I was. My parents and I are all able to detect cod liver oil taste. Sometimes, kosher chickens have that taste too. It isn't treif, it's just bad. I often don't notice the taste when I'm having a chicken dish of some kind, but roast chicken really lays bare any blemishes in the meat. I understand that mass-produced chickens are fed cod liver oil because it induces greater muscle mass or makes them grow faster, or something like that. Maybe someone with more authoritative knowledge will speak up. P.S. Funny line!

Bux, you can't really be saying the New York Post isn't a paragon of ethical journalism, can you? That was the elephant in the room. You're the first to mention he's there.

Whoopie for you. No, I wouldn't know. I've been to Lugar once. Good meat for sure, but apparently unlike Mr. Cutlets, I prefer some kind of marinade or sauce on or accompanying my meat. I guess that's a heretical statement on this board.

Eddie, I'm not so sure I'm the best at describing why something was good. My most memorable (best?) Chinese eating experiences, in the order I remember them: (1) Pigeon and Peanuts at the Imperial Room in the Hotel Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur. We loved this Cantonese banquet restaurant back in 1975-77 and the proprietor, Mr. Lim, and his wife became friends of ours. We always started our meals there with this great dish, which was rich and delicious and had a wonderful consistency and subtle taste (which in this case is not a demerit!!). The pigeon was perfectly cut into small pieces and the texture of the dish was delightfully uniform. (2) Chili udang galah (lobster prawns) at a "home-cooking" restaurant in Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia. This was our favorite restaurant to visit in that then-small city from 1975-77. Again, the proprietress became a friend of ours. The shrimps were perfectly fresh - caught off the estuary a few paces away - and fantastic quality, with the great shrimp fat in their heads. One key to great food, of course, is great, fresh ingredients. The sauce was delicious. (3) Dim sum in the Guangzhou train station, July 1987. I don't remember everything I ate there (I do remember some terrific siu mai), but it was such a welcome meal. I had just arrived on a 33 1/2-hour train trip from Beijing and had a layover before taking another train to Shenzhen with Hong Kong as my ultimate destination. It was really good Cantonese cuisine and a nice variety at 7:30 in the morning. (4) Dim sum at Xin in the Concorde Hotel, August 2003. Again, wonderfully fresh ingredients. Terrifically tasty food, some showing obvious Malaysian character (spicy, in one instance with curry sauce). (5) Dim sum at the Star House, Hong Kong (June 1987). Great variety, fresh, delicious, interesting ambiance (the eating hall was the biggest I've ever seen). (6) A dim sum lunch I had at a hole-in-the-wall in the Chinese neighborhood in Bangkok (1975). I could never find the place again, but the combination of Thai and Chinese flavors made this one of the greatest eating experiences I ever had. I recall that there was some combination of fruit (lime?) and meat in their dumplings. (7) Steamed fish and asparagus with belacan at Restoran Oversea in Petaling Jaya, Malaysia (August 2003). I posted about this meal on the Other Places in Asia/Pacific board. Great fish, fresh out of the tank, perfectly prepared (steamed and served with brown sauce, ginger, scallions), combined with perfect thin spears of asparagus cooked enough to no longer have any raw taste but remain uniformly chewy in a perfect belacan sauce. Given what I ordered, the meal really could not have been any better. Honorable mention: (1) Eating at the hotel cafeteria in Hangzhou (I forget the name of the hotel, but it was to the south of Xi Hu). This again is a memory from my 1987 China trip. Hangzhou was my favorite place in China when I took that trip, and part of the reason was that the food was great. The food was great partly because it was in an agricultural region, so the produce was fresh and high-quality, and partly because the lake contains lots of freshwater fish and prawns. But what I most remember eating is Buddha's Delight. One of my travelling companions was a vegan, so she ordered Buddha's Delight each of 3 nights we stayed in Hangzhou, and the chef was creative and clearly used whatever vegetables were freshest that day. The dish was great every time. (2) Wuxi spareribs in a hotel restaurant in Wuxi. I forget the name of the hotel, but it was a Chinese hotel. The dish was delicious. (3) You'll note I haven't mentioned any meals in the U.S. But for sentimental reasons, I'd like to include a mention of Foo-Joy, my family's "Chinatown excursion" restaurant that used to be on Division St. between Bowery and Market in the 1970s. I loved their Ironside Beef in particular, which was delightfully broiled (I think), accompanied by expertly cooked broccoli (if I'm not very much mistaken) and had slices of canned pineapple and maraschino cherries on it. (4) Here is also where I'll mention the curried fishballs that I bought repeatedly on the Kowloon side of the Star Ferry in 1987. Delicious (definitely better than the ones available on the Hong Kong side, which weren't as tasty) and hit the spot. (5) Also worth remembering is the Hakka Pig Intestine Soup I ate in a little restaurant adjoining the bus station (of all places!) in Seremban, Malaysia, in 1976 or so. There are so many other meals I could mention, but I think I'll quit here for now.

I love Gimme a Pigfoot! A lot of the early jazz artists recorded songs with food titles, such as Struttin' with some Barbecue (recorded by Louis Armstrong and His Hot Five). Other food titles from Hot Five albums: Big Butter and Egg Man, Cornet Chop Suey. If you check The Red Hot Jazz Archive, you can find a whole bunch of titles - many of them links to RealAudio files - of jazz up to the 1930s or so. These Louis Armstrong titles and RealAudio files for them can be found here. Blanco and Blanco have a show devoted to jazz and popular music from the first three decades of the 20th century on WNYE-FM in New York. Looking here, it seems like they've been reduced to only one hour, on Mondays and Tuesdays, but their show used to be a couple of hours long, and they once devoted an entire show to songs about chicken.

They also taste better. You like Purdue and Bell and Evans chickens? Doesn't the cod liver oil taste in them bother you? I believe that the only way not to get that annoying taste is to have chickens that aren't served feed with cod liver oil in them. And I think that means free range chickens.

But what did you do? (Tangent: The name of that soup sounds like a Porgy and Bess reference.)

I agree, Bux. I tend to think it's poor posting etiquette to solicit emails on a topic that is not private and makes sense to discuss publicly. But then, I'm not a media person, so I don't know how they think about these things.

Misgabi, how do you make a shrimp kebab? Do you finely mince shrimp and then fashion it into balls with some binding agent (eggs, flour?)?

Well, if kopi susu is served with anything other than condensed milk nowadays, that's news to me. In the 70s, kopi susu and teh susu were invariably served with sweetened condensed milk. But if we're going to comment on this tangent more, we'd better start a different thread on another board.

Welcome back, Ellen! When and to where is your next trip?

Selamat datang ke eGullet, kopi-susu! (That's Malay for "Welcome to eGullet, kopi-susu." Kopi susu is the Malay term for coffee with sweetened condensed milk.)

I love haw (short for hawthorne) fruit rollups, but I eat them more often as snacks than desserts.

I take your points. I haven't tried Gagnaire and certainly don't contest any of the points you've made. But I will say this: You sure don't lack for food at Grand Vefour! We were stuffed! In addition to your menu, not only do you get an amuse gueule, you also get petits fours, pates de fruit, and chocolates and a slice of the wonderful cake that's a Grand Vefour specialty (I think there was even more stuff I don't remember). The point about drinks being extra at Grand Vefour is an important one, though. The Champagne we had there was ambrosial, but it wasn't cheap, and had we all had a glass of wine with our meals, I think that would have increased the cost exponentially.

But it is something the customers at El Malecon do, often. I've been offered hot sauce without asking for it. To be honest, I don't always remember they have it if they don't offer it and I don't see it.

You're most welcome, nycrhythmdoc.

Popularity is rarely a good indicator of quality... Right. If it were, McDonalds would be the best restaurant in the U.S.

The best Chinese meals I've had were in Malaysia and Thailand, not Hong Kong, but that's probably just a matter of my preferring those types of Overseas Chinese cuisine to Hong Kong style. Hong Kong was excellent, though, and I had a terrific dim sum breakfast in the Guangzhou train station, too.

I haven't been there for close to 2 years, but had a very nice lunch that time. Enjoy yourself!! And please report on your meal afterwards, when you get the chance.

Just curious: Why don't you eat beef? Also, do you actually eat the hard white matter in fish eyes?

Oh, one other thing: There's a Dominican place right on the corner of Houston and Clinton - I think it's called the Clinton Restaurant or something. Anyway, in late July, I had some very nice mondongo there that comes in a red sauce. I think it cost $7.50 or $7 for a large plateful.