Here's something you might be interested in.
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed
Big Screen — Movie commentary
Blurt — Music's inside track
Booze News — San Diego spirits
Classical Music — Immortal beauty
Classifieds — Free and easy
Cover Stories — Front-page features
Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes
Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts
Feast! — Food & drink reviews
Feature Stories — Local news & stories
Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore
From the Archives — Spotlight on the past
Golden Dreams — Talk of the town
The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it
Letters — Our inbox
Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites
Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans
Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists
Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news
News Ticker — News & politics
Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated
Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna
Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated
Poetry — The old and the new
Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers
Reading — The hunt for intellectuals
Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails
San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds
SD on the QT — Almost factual news
Sheep and Goats — Places of worship
Special Issues — The best of
Street Style — San Diego streets have style
Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves
Theater — On stage in San Diego this week
Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative
Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work
Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego
Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads
Your Week — Daily event picks
Clairemont Mesa's Blvd. Hunan food tested me
Outside the boundaries at Village Kitchen
Microblogging Crazy Raw Noodles — vinegar and pickled vegetables with ground beef and cold noodles.
When David and I agreed to join our friends Katie and Jordan for dinner at Village Kitchen, I was mildly apprehensive. This Chinese restaurant in Clairemont is known for its Hunan-style cuisine, and I wasn’t familiar with the region. The last time Katie and Jordan had urged us to try one of their favorite Chinese restaurants, it was Mongolian — turns out I don’t care for the dairy and animal fat-rich fare of Mongolian food. All I knew about Hunan food was that it was said to be spicier than Sichuan, with a focus on colorful vegetables and aromatic notes of smoke and vinegar.
I’ve often chided myself for not trekking further north on Convoy and exploring more of the Asian fare Clairemont Mesa Boulevard has to offer, so I was glad for the reason to break free. We were seated beside a wall, beneath a flat screen audibly displaying a Chinese TV soap opera. Because I don’t understand the language, the noise wasn’t bothersome, and seemed to mix into the background din of people speaking Chinese and the soft-rock piped in through speakers in the ceiling.
Interior of Village Kitchen
I was relieved to see that the menu (written in Chinese with English translations) contained photographs of the dishes. Similar to ordering sushi at Japanese restaurants, we were to place our order by marking the box next to each item (in both languages, but smaller) on a strip of paper that came with the table. And mark it we did. Katie and Jordan wanted to try new things, but they wanted to introduce us to their favorites. It was decided that we’d be ordering enough for plenty of leftovers.
Stone Pot with Lamb, super spicy
When the food began to arrive, we feared there wouldn’t be enough room on the table. The dish that took up the most space was the Lamb Stone Pot ($14.75). Somewhere between ground and shredded, the lamb was mixed with onion and chili. After a few bites, Jordan and David started wiping at their brows. I passed on this, but the guys placed this in their top three of the seven dishes we ordered.
Stinky tofu, heavy on the smoked flavor
I’d gotten the Sweet & Sour Chicken ($12.75) as a backup, but it ended up being a favorite of the table. More savory than sweet, with a pleasant kick.
My least favorite bite was the Classic Stinky Tofu ($11.75); this was the one plate that appeared untouched by the end of our meal. The smoked flavor was overpowering, and the vinegar made it taste like pickled bacon. Katie said she’d happily eat it the next day.
Perfect Pork Dumplings with a chive-soy dipping sauce
The Pork Dumplings ($7.75) pleased, and we all enjoyed the chives in salty dipping sauce, as they added brightness and a depth to well-seasoned pork.
Grandma's Braised Pork, served with bao buns
In a twist, the one thing we ordered for its name, Microblogging Crazy Raw Noodles, was a hit. Here, the vinegar and pickled vegetables paired with ground beef and cold noodles. My mouth was at first confused, and then alive with the rich and tangy-sweet blend of flavors and textures. We never did figure out what “microblogging” had to do with a cold beef and vegetable noodle salad,
Custard buns. If the word "mild" were a flavor, it'd be this.
I did not try Grandma’s Braised Pork ($14.75), but this was among Katie’s favorites from prior visits. My only disappointment was dessert — we’d gotten egg custard buns, and I was hoping for something along the lines of the buns I’d get at Jasmine or other dim sum restaurants. Instead, the dough here was fluffy, but mostly tasteless texture of the bao buns that came with the pork, filled with a slightly sweet custard. We soon discovered that adding a piece of the saltier Sweet and Sour Chicken to the bun made for a sweet and savory finish to our meal.
Here's something you might be interested in.
Clairemont Mesa's Blvd. Hunan food tested me
Outside the boundaries at Village Kitchen
Clairemont Mesa's Blvd. Hunan food tested me
Outside the boundaries at Village Kitchen
Microblogging Crazy Raw Noodles — vinegar and pickled vegetables with ground beef and cold noodles.
When David and I agreed to join our friends Katie and Jordan for dinner at Village Kitchen, I was mildly apprehensive. This Chinese restaurant in Clairemont is known for its Hunan-style cuisine, and I wasn’t familiar with the region. The last time Katie and Jordan had urged us to try one of their favorite Chinese restaurants, it was Mongolian — turns out I don’t care for the dairy and animal fat-rich fare of Mongolian food. All I knew about Hunan food was that it was said to be spicier than Sichuan, with a focus on colorful vegetables and aromatic notes of smoke and vinegar.
I’ve often chided myself for not trekking further north on Convoy and exploring more of the Asian fare Clairemont Mesa Boulevard has to offer, so I was glad for the reason to break free. We were seated beside a wall, beneath a flat screen audibly displaying a Chinese TV soap opera. Because I don’t understand the language, the noise wasn’t bothersome, and seemed to mix into the background din of people speaking Chinese and the soft-rock piped in through speakers in the ceiling.
Interior of Village Kitchen
I was relieved to see that the menu (written in Chinese with English translations) contained photographs of the dishes. Similar to ordering sushi at Japanese restaurants, we were to place our order by marking the box next to each item (in both languages, but smaller) on a strip of paper that came with the table. And mark it we did. Katie and Jordan wanted to try new things, but they wanted to introduce us to their favorites. It was decided that we’d be ordering enough for plenty of leftovers.
Stone Pot with Lamb, super spicy
When the food began to arrive, we feared there wouldn’t be enough room on the table. The dish that took up the most space was the Lamb Stone Pot ($14.75). Somewhere between ground and shredded, the lamb was mixed with onion and chili. After a few bites, Jordan and David started wiping at their brows. I passed on this, but the guys placed this in their top three of the seven dishes we ordered.
Stinky tofu, heavy on the smoked flavor
I’d gotten the Sweet & Sour Chicken ($12.75) as a backup, but it ended up being a favorite of the table. More savory than sweet, with a pleasant kick.
My least favorite bite was the Classic Stinky Tofu ($11.75); this was the one plate that appeared untouched by the end of our meal. The smoked flavor was overpowering, and the vinegar made it taste like pickled bacon. Katie said she’d happily eat it the next day.
Perfect Pork Dumplings with a chive-soy dipping sauce
The Pork Dumplings ($7.75) pleased, and we all enjoyed the chives in salty dipping sauce, as they added brightness and a depth to well-seasoned pork.
Grandma's Braised Pork, served with bao buns
In a twist, the one thing we ordered for its name, Microblogging Crazy Raw Noodles, was a hit. Here, the vinegar and pickled vegetables paired with ground beef and cold noodles. My mouth was at first confused, and then alive with the rich and tangy-sweet blend of flavors and textures. We never did figure out what “microblogging” had to do with a cold beef and vegetable noodle salad,
Custard buns. If the word "mild" were a flavor, it'd be this.
I did not try Grandma’s Braised Pork ($14.75), but this was among Katie’s favorites from prior visits. My only disappointment was dessert — we’d gotten egg custard buns, and I was hoping for something along the lines of the buns I’d get at Jasmine or other dim sum restaurants. Instead, the dough here was fluffy, but mostly tasteless texture of the bao buns that came with the pork, filled with a slightly sweet custard. We soon discovered that adding a piece of the saltier Sweet and Sour Chicken to the bun made for a sweet and savory finish to our meal.
Comments