Report: (DFW) Asian Lunar New Year Dinner

[Richard Kilgore]

First Annual Asian Lunar New Year Dinner

Saturday, February 9th, 2008 - 7:00 pm

Kirin Court Chinese Restaurant

221 W. Polk St., #200

(Central Expressway & Main Street, S.E Corner)

Richardson, Texas 75081

$35, included tax, tip and $5 contribution to the eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters.

We had a great time last night at Kirin Court. It was good to meet some local members of the eGullet Society for the first time. The conversation largely revolved around the high quality and authenticity of the food, and people's experiences eating in China and Malaysia, as well as around the DFW area.

The restaurant worked well with us to make this a great meal. We successfully adjusted the menu a bit in order to maintain the same cost per person. Thanks again to Kent Wang for selecting the original menu. His choices were terrific.

Asian Lunar New Year Dinner Menu

Appetizer

Boneless Pork Back

Soup

Seafood soup

Main Dishes

Peking Duck

Vegetable Special New Year Fa Cai

Whole Fish - Flounder

Salt & Pepper Shrimp

Whole cold Chicken

Dessert

Almond Cookies

Tea

Chrysantimum Green Tea served with Rock Sugar

Thanks to Jeff Meeker who took photos of the dishes.

Thanks to everyone attending, we raised $35 for the eGullet Society.

Everyone agreed we should do this again next year, so note your calendar for the Second Annual Asian New Year Dinner tentatively the second week of February 2009.

[jsmeeker]

Here are the photos.

Seafood Soup

Boneless Pork Back

Peking Duck being carved

Peking Duck served

dumplings (or are they better called buns?) for the duck

Whole cold chicken

Whole fish -- Flounder

Salt and Pepper shrimp

Vegetable Special New Year Fa Cai

I have no pictures of the pot of tea or the cookies.

[Kent Wang]

Boneless Pork Back

Was this just deboned, or did was it chopped up and then pressed back together?

Whole fish -- Flounder

Did yours have roe?

Vegetable Special New Year Fa Cai

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Looks like just a bunch of mushrooms, and no fa cai algae? But the mushrooms do look delicious.

Congratulations on a successful event. Kirin Court is definitely quite authentic.

[yimay]

Peking Duck being carved

Peking Duck served

this duck makes me drool

[Richard Kilgore]

Kent - The boneless pork back appeared to be debonned, chopped and then pressed.

The Vegetable Special New Year Fa Cai did indeed have the algae in it, but was on the bottom so you can't see it in this photo. Among many very good dishes, this was my favorite.

I don't think there was any roe served with the fish.

Yimay - Yes! The duck was terrific. And the shrimp may have been the best shrimp I have ever eaten.

[jsmeeker]

I don't recall any roe with the flounder. The pork was boneless. Also, it was served chilled/cold.

It's funny that you mention the mushrooms for the Vegetable Special New Year Fa Cai, Kent. When they brought out the dish, I looked at it and thought "mushrooms". Richard consulted his printed out menu that he brought, and we concluded that it was the "Vegetable" dish. We asked one of the servers what it was. She simply replied "oysters" This confused us a bit, as we were looking for our "vegetable" dish. So, we sent it back, thinking we had the wrong thing.

Some time passed and we asked about our missing vegetable dish. Well, they brough back the same dish. This WAS the "only on New Year's" special. And those aren't musrooms. Those really are oysters. And they were ontop of slices of pork. The algae (we were told it was "sea weed") was on the bottom. Also included was some bok choy.

This was actually a very tasty dish. I'm glad we got it back after initially rejecting it.

[yimay]

I don't recall any roe with the flounder.    The pork was boneless.  Also, it was served chilled/cold. 

It's funny that you mention the mushrooms for the Vegetable Special New Year Fa Cai,  Kent.  When they brought out the dish, I looked at it and thought "mushrooms".  Richard consulted his printed out menu that he brought, and we concluded that it was the  "Vegetable" dish.  We asked one of the servers what it was. She simply replied "oysters"  This confused us a bit, as  we were looking for our "vegetable" dish.  So, we sent it back, thinking we had the wrong thing.

Some time passed and we asked about our missing vegetable dish. Well, they brough back the same dish.  This WAS the "only on New Year's" special.  And those aren't musrooms. Those really are oysters. And they were ontop of slices of pork.  The algae (we were told it was "sea weed") was on the bottom.  Also included was some bok choy.

This was actually a very tasty dish. I'm glad we got it back after initially rejecting it.   

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sweet. i think all vegetable dishes should come with oysters and pork slices.