LA Chinese Restaurants

[eatingwitheddie]

LA has one of the most vibrant Chinese food scenes. You can drive forever through Monterey park and adjacent neighborhoods and see one restaurant after another, from fancy HK style dim sumeries to mom and pop places. What's really good these days? What's new?

[tissue]

No particular order:

Green Village- Shanghainese

King's Palace- Shanghainese

888 Seafood- Chiu Chow Seafood

Sea Harbour Seafood- Hong Kong/ Vancouver style seafood and dim sum

Embassy- nouvelle Cantonese

Din Tai Fung Dumpling House- Shanghainese steamed dumplings

Heavy Noodling- dao hsiao noodles

[hzrt8w]

Green Village- Shanghainese

King's Palace- Shanghainese

888 Seafood- Chiu Chow Seafood

Sea Harbour Seafood- Hong Kong/ Vancouver style seafood and dim sum

Embassy- nouvelle Cantonese

Din Tai Fung Dumpling House- Shanghainese steamed dumplings

Heavy Noodling- dao hsiao noodles

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L.A. is a big place. There are a dozen different cities in the San Gabriel Valley. It would be very helpful if we know the cities were these restaurants are in (or the major cross streets). Does anybody know? I am tempted to try some of these mentioned.

[Kiem Hwa]

I can only attest to places to eat Dim Sum (always and forever popular).

Of course, one of the best ways to judge a dim sum restaurant: how long is the line?

my favorite, in old China town:

Empress Pavilon

988 N Hill St Ste 201

Los Angeles CA

A few in Monterey Park:

Ocean Star

145 N Atlantic Blvd

Monterey Park CA

Empress Harbor (I think this is one I went to)

111 N Atlantic Blvd

Monterey Park CA

Sam Woo (The big one in Monterey Park)

If you like Chinese Buns, my favorite bun shop is in Gardena

Jade's Bakery

1354 W Artesia Blvd

Gardena CA

One of the best resources in LA for restaurant searching is Citysearch.com:

Maybe you can find those other recommended restaurants here.

I would only eat in places that rated above an 8.

http://losangeles.citysearch.com/find/sect...bar_restaurants

[Carolyn Tillie]

Tung Lai Shun

Tung Lai Shun

Tung Lai Shun

Ommmmmm........

[tissue]

Green Village- Shanghainese, San Gabriel Valley Blvd

King's Palace- Shanghainese, San Gabriel Valley Blvd

888 Seafood- Chiu Chow Seafood, Rosemead Valley Blvd

Sea Harbour Seafood- Hong Kong/ Vancouver style seafood and dim sum, Rosemead, Rosemead Blvd

Embassy- nouvelle Cantonese, San Gabriel, San Gabriel Blvd

Din Tai Fung Dumpling House- Shanghainese steamed dumplings, Arcadia, Baldwin

Heavy Noodling- dao hsiao noodles, Monterey Park, Garvey

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L.A. is a big place. There are a dozen different cities in the San Gabriel Valley. It would be very helpful if we know the cities were these restaurants are in (or the major cross streets). Does anybody know? I am tempted to try some of these mentioned.

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I have added the street and cities

[skchai]

I'm going to be be in Monterey Park in a couple weeks, so I was wondering the same thing. Would especially like to know people's picks in fairly usual restaurant categories, e.g. Muslim, Hakka, Shandong etc. that you can't get in most cities.

I ordered the book Finding Chinese Food in Los Angeles: A Guide to Regional Chinese Cuisines by Carl Chu, which I've heard a lot of good things about. It is a couple years out of date, but apparently has a lot of background material that your ordinary restaurant guides lack. He also has put out more recent, conventional, guide to Chinese restaurants in LA as well as NY and SF.

[russ parsons]

there is a new edition that came out several months ago. i think it's on amazon, but i'm not sure.

[Chris Amirault]

I just posted a few restaurant notes here, which include two raves for Mission 261 in San Gabriel and Mayflower in LA's Chinatown. Can't say they're the best of anything, but they were damned good.

[SteveW]

there is a new edition that came out several months ago. i think it's on amazon, but i'm not sure.

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The new editon is called Chinese Food Finder: Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley. As skchai mentioned, there's now editions covering SF & NY.

-Steve

[rjwong]

FYI Mon Kee's has been closed for remodeling since Dec. 2004.

I've only eaten there for lunch, not for dinner. I've read previous posts about Mon Kee's AND I've seen its high ratings in Zagat's. Go figure. Based on my luncheon experience, the food is not bad, but the decor really needed an overhaul.

I'll try and find out when they're going to re-open.

[rjwong]

FYI Mon Kee's has been closed for remodeling since Dec. 2004.

I've only eaten there for lunch, not for dinner. I've read previous posts about Mon Kee's AND I've seen its high ratings in Zagat's. Go figure.  Based on my luncheon experience, the food is not bad, but the decor really needed an overhaul.

I'll try and find out when they're going to re-open.

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Mon Kee's is still closed. I haven't seen any builders or construction workers around. I still don't know what's up. I'm still trying to find out. to be continued ...

[rjwong]

I went to Empress Pavilion in downtown LA with some friends this Sat. morning for dim sum. I was the only Chinese in our group. One friend with his wife & son never been to dim sum before. Another friend was teaching English in Hong Kong many years ago, so he spoke far more Cantonese than me (which is non-existent).

We arrived at the restaurant early, about 10 a.m. Good news: no problem getting a table. Bad news: All the really good selections came around at 11 a.m.

What did we have? the rolled noodles with beef, gai lon (Chinese broccoli) with oyster sauce, har gow, siu mai, shrimp toast, beef balls, hom suey gok, char siu bow (steamed), sweet rice cake (with the consistency of Jello). I wanted to order some yangchow fried rice but they don't start that until 11 a.m. When we were leaving, they had the roast duck and the jellyfish. And no dan tahts (egg custard tarts) to be found.

My friends enjoyed it. As for me, the limited selections tasted great. The carts didn't come fast enough, IMO. Having dim sum is no big thing to me, because I usually go to a different Chinese place where I can order out for takeaway.

Empress Pavilion is a good place to introduce people to a more traditional dim sum.

As for me, I think it's time for me to head out to Alhambra/Monterey Park for some "cutting-edge" dim sum, like New Concept.

[rjwong]

FYI Mon Kee's has been closed for remodeling since Dec. 2004.

I've only eaten there for lunch, not for dinner. I've read previous posts about Mon Kee's AND I've seen its high ratings in Zagat's. Go figure.  Based on my luncheon experience, the food is not bad, but the decor really needed an overhaul.

I'll try and find out when they're going to re-open.

←

Mon Kee's is still closed. I haven't seen any builders or construction workers around. I still don't know what's up. I'm still trying to find out. to be continued ...

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I've been checking off & on for a few months about Mon Kee. Finally, I was able to peek through one of the windows. The dining area in totally gutted right now. I was talking with a co-worker and he mentioned that it can take several months to get the correct permits to do some renovations on the place.

That's the latest update. Back to some more Chinese restaurants in Los Angeles, please??

[amandasmom971]

What's really good these days? What's new?

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The Empress Pavilion is really, really good!!!

[russ parsons]

let me second russell's suggestions of New Concept. they're trying a pretty brave thing here: the first chinese restaurant i'm aware of in southern california that is actually promoting the chef (his name is on the menu) and allowing him to do some creative things. the dimsum, in particular, is just amazing. get your bachelor's at empress pavillion and ocean star (i still do love them), but then go to new concept and see what the next step is.

[touaregsand]

I went to Empress Pavilion in downtown LA with some friends this Sat. morning for dim sum. I was the only Chinese in our group. One friend with his wife & son never been to dim sum before. Another friend was teaching English in Hong Kong many years ago, so he spoke far more Cantonese than me (which is non-existent).

We arrived at the restaurant early, about 10 a.m. Good news: no problem getting a table. Bad news: All the really good selections came around at 11 a.m.

What did we have? the rolled noodles with beef, gai lon (Chinese broccoli) with oyster sauce, har gow, siu mai, shrimp toast, beef balls, hom suey gok, char siu bow (steamed), sweet rice cake (with the consistency of Jello). I wanted to order some yangchow fried rice but they don't start that until 11 a.m. When we were leaving, they had the roast duck and the jellyfish. And no dan tahts (egg custard tarts) to be found. 

My friends enjoyed it. As for me, the limited selections tasted great. The carts didn't come fast enough, IMO. Having dim sum is no big thing to me, because I usually go to a different Chinese place where I can order out for takeaway.

Empress Pavilion is a good place to introduce people to a more traditional dim sum.

As for me, I think it's time for me to head out to Alhambra/Monterey Park for some "cutting-edge" dim sum, like New Concept.

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Let's go to New Concept together. The rest of the month is packed, sometime in July sounds good.

I love the traditional stuff, but New Concept has to be better than something Wolfgang Puck or Gordon Ramsay would do.

[rjwong]

Today, I went over to New Concept in Monterey Park. I read about it in the LA Times and finally, I got there by around 10:30 a.m. The traffic wasn't too bad for a Sat. morning. It wasn't crowded. It's a small place (about 200 seats), compared to the other dim sum places (600-1000). There were no carts being pushed, unlike the traditional dim sum restaurants. I ordered from a menu (in Chinese) that I marked off. Fortunately, they had a separate menu in English translation so I knew what I was ordering. There were a few small tables for 1-2 people. That made me feel comfortable, being the solo diner this time. Parking was easy. New Concept has its own location, away from the mini-malls & plazas where parking is at a premium.

I ordered seven items: har gow, shiu mai, shark's fin dumplings, crab meat dumplings, hollow vegetable (water spinach) with fermented bean curd sauce (foo yue), jelly fish & vegetable wrap, and egg custard (dahn tat).

I really liked the water spinach with the foo yue. The shark's fin dumplings was quite colorful in its green wrapper. The har gow, shiu mai & crab meat dumplings were sized very nicely & tasted fine. The jelly fish wasn't firm enough for my taste. The vegetable wrap was okay, nothing more than a tag-along for the jelly fish. The dahn tat was just perfect.

Overall, the meal was pretty good. I had a wonderful dining experience. Mind you, their restaurant rating is a "C". If the rating does concern you, you may not want to go. Based on my observations, I didn't notice anything wrong with my food or with the front of the house. Without the carts rolling around, it made the place less hectic, more relaxing. And I didn't mind that.

Edited June 19, 2005 by rjwong (log)

[rjwong]

After work today, I decided to have dinner in Chinatown before I take the bus home.

Normally, I eat at Sam Woo's on Broadway, your basic Chinese diner (well, I call it that). The roast duck hanging in all of its glory. Crabs, lobsters, fishes & shrimps all swimming away in the tanks waiting for an appointment with destiny. But not tonight. I walked a few doors up the street to Yang Chow.

The front windows of Yang Chow are tinted, so you can't see inside. It does create a certain mystery. I finally enter through the doors into the restaurant and was seated. This is strange. The place setting has two plates, a 6-inch on top of an 8-inch, with a folded pinkish cloth napkin above the plates, a tea cup, chopsticks, ... and a fork! I look across the dining room at the other diners and ... and I'm the only customer who's Chinese! I'm not joking. I'm not hyping this up.

I ordered two dishes: the slippery shrimp (Yang Chow's signature dish) & ma po tofu (Bean curd with ground pork in a spicy sauce).

The shrimp tasted pretty good with its crunchiness & spicy/sweet sauce (go to their website for more details on this dish). The ma po tofu included soft tofu, some ground pork & way too much sauce for my taste. And hardly any chopped green onions to at least spruce the dish up a little bit.

The steamed rice came in one rice bowl, not a container of rice. The service was fine. My water glass kept getting refilled.

Now I understand why one co-worker really likes this place: Yang Chow definitely caters to a more ... uhh ... non-Chinese, non-Asian clientele. Mind you, that is not bad, just different. It is a little pricier, though. So, I'll be heading back to my Chinese diner of Sam Woo's.

[hzrt8w]

.... This is strange. The place setting has two plates, a 6-inch on top of an 8-inch, with a folded pinkish cloth napkin above the plates, a tea cup, chopsticks, ... and a fork!  I look across the dining room at the other diners and ... and I'm the only customer who's Chinese!  I'm not joking. I'm not hyping this up. 

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Yeah, I have seen that kind of setting before. I used to work as a waiter in a Chinese restaurant in San Diego. The owner was a Chinese-French later immigrated to America. It may be an European-oriented set up? The idea is to serve the appertizers or salad - yeah, "Chinese" chicken salad - to the customer, then remove the small plate on the top. The big dinner plate will be used for the main course.

Must be cultural differences. In Hong Kong you will not find settings like this. Mostly in restaurants in Hong Kong, they give you a small bowl (with a Chinese ceramic spoon). I mean really "small". The size of what Americans consider "a cup". No plate at all. The modern ones now provide a small plate and then put the small bowl on top. You are not supposed to scoop your food on the plate. The plate is for "holding bones" only! A bit more courteous than spitting on top of the table cloth.

[rjwong]

After work today, I decided to have dinner in Chinatown before I take the bus home.

Normally, I eat at Sam Woo's on Broadway, your basic Chinese diner (well, I call it that). The roast duck hanging in all of its glory. Crabs, lobsters, fishes & shrimps all swimming away in the tanks waiting for an appointment with destiny...

Wait a minute!! This is how I started my previous post!!

Well, this time, I did go to Sam Woo's on Broadway. I ordered a live crab (about 2 lb.) from the tank. The crab was cooked with onions, green bell peppers, and black bean sauce (dow see). I also ordered some beef & broccoli (that's Chinese broccoli, gai lan) with some steamed rice.

The crab tasted wonderful. Mind you, it's a lot of work eating crab because of the shells. So, I took my time, enjoying the crab & alternately eating the beef & gai lan as well. Fortunately, I didn't have to use the crab-cracker. So my fingers weren't too messy from the crab and the sauce.

Regularly, I order one dish, like chow mein or chow fun or one of the clay pots. I've been eating there on a semi-regular basis for a few years. The bill comes to under $7-10 (including tax & tip). And it's a 15-minute drive from my apartment, quite convenient. There may be better places over in Monterey Park, Alhambra, et al. Mind you, for the price, the convenience and authenticity, it's Sam Woo's for me!

[herbacidal]

.... This is strange. The place setting has two plates, a 6-inch on top of an 8-inch, with a folded pinkish cloth napkin above the plates, a tea cup, chopsticks, ... and a fork!  I look across the dining room at the other diners and ... and I'm the only customer who's Chinese!  I'm not joking. I'm not hyping this up. 

←

Yeah, I have seen that kind of setting before. I used to work as a waiter in a Chinese restaurant in San Diego. The owner was a Chinese-French later immigrated to America. It may be an European-oriented set up? The idea is to serve the appertizers or salad - yeah, "Chinese" chicken salad - to the customer, then remove the small plate on the top. The big dinner plate will be used for the main course.

Must be cultural differences. In Hong Kong you will not find settings like this. Mostly in restaurants in Hong Kong, they give you a small bowl (with a Chinese ceramic spoon). I mean really "small". The size of what Americans consider "a cup". No plate at all. The modern ones now provide a small plate and then put the small bowl on top. You are not supposed to scoop your food on the plate. The plate is for "holding bones" only! A bit more courteous than spitting on top of the table cloth.

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I doubt it's cultural differences as much as greater attention to detail in Hong Kong and also, at any place higher end, a need to give you more for your money.

So you get more things per person, as well as people doing more for you and generally more attentive.

Of course, I also think that service could have ben improved at the higher-end places I was at, although they were in Guangzhou, not HK.

Anyway, the two plate thing is probably an extension of what some places did/do for banquets (at least here in Philly), with removal of the top plate after one of the courses, with its bones, sauces, etc.

[hzrt8w]

Regularly, I order one dish, like chow mein or chow fun or one of the clay pots. I've been eating there on a semi-regular basis for a few years. The bill comes to under $7-10 (including tax & tip). And it's a 15-minute drive from my apartment, quite convenient. There may be better places over in Monterey Park, Alhambra, et al. Mind you, for the price, the convenience and authenticity, it's Sam Woo's for me!

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For a few minutes, I kept thinking you got your crab and beef+gai-lan for under $7-10 (including tax a& tip). Where can you find restaurants like that!?

Sam Woo is my favorite place too in my days of living in the Los Angeles area.

[yakiniku]

Thanks to the eGulleteers, we ate really well on our recent trip to LA.

We got a great meal at Mayflower (in downtown Chinatown)--next door to MonKee which is <I>still</I> undergoing renovations (they were disassembling the awning when we were there). At Mayflower we had the lobster special, which is lobster quick fried in garlic, ginger, and green onion; yee mien; and sauteed peashoots (dou miao).

We had great dim sum at Sea Harbor Seafood on Rosemead Blvd in Rosemead--and another interesting meal at New Concept on S. Atlantic Blvd in Monterey Park. We admired (but didn't actually enjoy) the sweets at New Concept--they seemed pretty different to anything we'd had anywhere else. But the baked char siu bao were fantastic, light, almost delicate. They were the lightest bao we'd ever had--but they were the first thing we ate, and set a standard the rest of the meal didn't quite reach.

We had really good dimsum in a surprising place--a restaurant in Irvine that looks like it's a converted TGIFriday's. It's <A HREF="http://www.russellsseafoodpalace.com">Russell's Seafood Palace</A> 1818 Main Street in Irvine. We had an excellent dan tat (I'm not really a fan, but this was tasty) and delicious jook with preserved egg.

(We also had a very entertaining meal at Soot Bull Jeep in Koreatown, but I guess that doesn't really belong in this topic--since it's a Korean restaurant!)

Thanks to all who gave advice here!

Edited July 27, 2005 by yakiniku (log)

[Pan]

[...]We had really good dimsum in a surprising place--a restaurant in Irvine that looks like it's a converted TGIFriday's. It's <A HREF="www.russellsseafoodpalace.com">Russell's Seafood Palace</A> 1818 Main Street in Irvine.[...]

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