Grand Sichuan Restaurant - Chinatown, NYC

Boy, this is a long overdue post. I've been meaning to blog about this restaurant for the longest time, but never got around to it. I was going through some photos that we took during Chinese New Year earlier today and that reminded me about this restaurant. After the Firecracker Ceremony at Roosevelt Park, we were freezing and super hungry. So, we decided to walk south, towards Manhattan Bridge, in search of some food.
As we turned onto Canal St (from Chrystie St), I immediately saw huge two words jump out at me. HOT POT! Mind you, we have been standing out in the sub zero temperature for hours, so this was indeed a welcoming sight. Nothing beats some yummy hot pot on a cold winters day. I remember reading some reviews about this restaurant online and it received quite a number of good reviews. Looks like this is one of the few places in Manhattan where one can get some hot pot (most of the hot pot joints are located in Queens). So, we decided to head in and give this place a try.
We were quite surprised that the restaurant was rather empty (only 3 other tables were occupied) when we walked in. I am guessing cos it was a weekday and it was way past lunch time. Since there were so few people in the restaurant, the service was superb! After sitting us down, they brought out some complimentary Chinese tea and asked if we are having the hot pot or if we will be ordering from the regular menu. After telling them that we would be trying their hot pot today, they promptly began setting up the table for it.
Unlike many of the hot pot restaurants in Queens, Grand Sichuan is not a eat-all- you-can restaurant. They offer a variety of ala carte ingredients, ranging from seafood, various types of meat to vegetables and noodles. Most of the items cost between $3.95 to $7.95 per plate. I believe the most expensive item on the menu are crabs, which is $13.95 per plate. The only thing that I do not really like is having to pay $1.95 for a dish of dipping sauce. There are nine different types of dipping sauces available but having to pay $1.95 for sauce is just too much. Oh well, I guess nothing is perfect in this world :P
There are two different types of soups/broths that you choose from for your hot pot. There is the traditional spicy Sichuan flower pepper broth (mala) and the mild non spicy chicken broth. For those of you who cannot make up your mind, you can actually have both. You can opt to have a separator in the middle of your hot pot, thus allowing you to try both soups. Both Kevin and I are not really big on spicy stuff, so we stuck to the chicken broth. I must say that the chicken broth was really flavorful and delicious. There were some slices of tomatoes, spring onions as well as some Chinese herbs in the broth. Very very good.
Here are all the items that we ordered for the hot pot. I knowwww, that's quite a lot for the both of us but we were really really hungry. For the record, we didn't manage to finish everything so, we must really remember to order less the next time we head out to Grand Sichuan. We ordered some pork and beef slices, fish slices, mushrooms, wontons, beancurd skin, spinach, wheat noodles and pig intestines. Yup, you got that right. Pig intestines. In my opinion, it was really good. The intestines were already pre cooked in some soy sauce and then fried, so you just had to cook it for a bit in the hot pot. Really really yummy. Overall, we had a good experience in Grand Sichuan. The hot pot broth was very flavorful, all of the ingredients were fresh and the staff were really friendly. We will most definitely return in the very near future. If only we didn't have to pay $1.95 for a dish of dipping sauce. Ah well, maybe we should just smuggle tiny bottles of soy sauce in our pockets the next time we head over there :P

Grand Sichuan Restaurant
125 Canal St (between Forsyth St & Chrystie St)
New York, NY 10002
Tel: (212) 625-9212

Note: No credit cards, cash only

Chinatown - Harrison, NJ

We have heard so much about Chinatown (the restaurant, not the neighborhood!) in Harrison but we never got around to checking it out up til a few weeks ago. From the reviews that we read, it seems that Chinatown serves some of the best Chinese food in this region, outside of Chinatown (the neighborhood, not the restaurant :P) in Manhattan, of course. We have probably driven past it like a million times and every time we go by, I would say that we should go check it out. When we finally decided to have lunch there one Saturday afternoon, you can imagine my excitement. At last we get to see if this place really lives up to it's fame.
Chinatown is a so called fine dining Chinese restaurant that also serves Japanese food. Located on Harrison Avenue, it's smack right in the center of the busy strip of restaurants and pubs in Harrison, NJ. Parking can be a problem, so be prepared to circle the block a couple of times to find a spot. Also, if there is a NY Red Bulls game going on that weekend, traffic can be really bad. It's really close to the Red Bull Arena, so try not to head out there whenever they are playing a home game.
I didn't manage to take any pictures of the interior while we were there, so I stole one off Yelp. With deep red walls and dark colored furniture, there is definitely an upmarket feel to the place. The ground floor consist of smaller tables and benches for walk in customers and the top floor is reserved for private functions (they have enough room for a quite few of those huge Chinese style round banquet tables).
After taking our order, they brought out a small plate of complimentary snacks for us to munch on, while waiting for our food. It reminds me of the crunchy chow mien from those Chinese take out restaurants. Of course, this is not that oily and way lighter. Rather addictive, I would say. Dipping those crunchy pieces of fried dough into the plum sauce that comes along with it makes it even yummier :P
For our appetizer, we shared an order of Pan Fried Pork Dumplings ($4.95 for 8 pieces). It was rather good. A little bit too oily for me, but yummy none the less. The filling tasted more like what you would get in a Japanese gyoza but the skin of the dumpling is of course Shanghainese style. It would have been totally awesome if it wasn't that oily.
After looking at the menu for a bit, something told us that the portions will be pretty large. So, we decided to share a noodle dish and a meat dish. There were quite a number of noodle dishes to choose from and we finally went with the Shanghai Pan Fired Noodles ($10.95). As expected, the portion was indeed huge! Pan fried noodles topped with a generous amount of beef, chicken, shrimp and a variety of vegetables in a thick brown gravy. The taste? Well, it was good. I wouldn't say that it was extraordinary or one of the best noodles that I have ever had, but it wasn't bad. For $10.95 a plate, it's definitely not cheap. I think I can get something equally (or maybe even better) as good, at probably half it's price, if I were to randomly enter any of the restaurants in Chinatown, NYC.
We initially wanted to try the Peking Duck but they only had it in full size. That would be way too much for us. Even half a duck was a little bit too much. Anyways, we settle with half a roast duck ($12) instead. Our server told us that it's actually the same thing except that the Peking Duck comes minus the bones and they serve it with some pancakes. Oh and of course the price is different too. I believe it's $28.95 for the Peking Duck and it comes with 8 pancakes. The duck was rather good. Nice crispy skin and more importantly, it didn't have that gamey smell that sometimes comes along with duck dishes. The only downside was that it too was a tad bit too oily :(
Our total bill came to $31.94 (not including tip). In my opinion, I feel that it's a little bit steep for lunch. All we had were some dumplings, noodles and some duck. The food was alright, but definitely not something I would shout about. Maybe I was expecting too much (due to all the raving reviews), who knows. However, I do not think that we will be returning in the near future. The next time we are in the mood for some authentic tasting Chinese food, I'd rather just hop onto the train and head out to Chinatown in Manhattan :P

Chinatown - Harrison, NJ
218 Harrison Avenue,
Harrison, NJ 07029
Tel: (973)483 1504
Web: http://www.njchinatownrestaurant.com

New Paris Restaurant - PJ, Malaysia

My family back home in Malaysia eats out almost everyday. Both my parents work and ever since my grandmother (she was the one that used to cook for us everyday) passed away more 10 years ago, we have been more or less eating out every day. You can imagine the headache of trying to figure out where to go to for dinner, every evening. There are times when we don't even know where to go to anymore. However, there are a few restaurants that the whole family enjoys eating at and New Paris in SS2 is one of them. In fact, we go there so often, it's like an extension of our kitchen! :P
Paris Restaurant started off as a humble little shack, selling super yummy home cooked dishes and rice. The food was good, the price was affordable and the service was really fast. It soon became really popular and they expanded from that little shack to their current location. Hence the new name - New Paris Restaurant. New Paris today is no longer a humble little shack. In fact, it's far from that. Taking up four shop lots and I believe four stories high, they definitely have come a long way. However, a few things still remain. Their good food and really fast service. They really put a new meaning to 'fast food'. I have no idea how they do it but you can see dishes just coming out from the kitchen at lightning speed! :D Totally amazing.
One of our favorite dishes from New Paris is their Home Made Tofu (RM12 = US$3.90). It is one of their signature dishes and a favorite among their regulars. Silky home made tofu deep fried and then topped with some soy sauce and minced meat. Very very yummy. As a little girl, Ashley would only eat this, whenever we go to New Paris. It was her absolute favorite dish! I believe it is still one of her favorite dishes up til today.
The Chinese believe that in every meal, there must be a balance. A little bit of meat, a little bit of vegetable and a little bit of rice. This is the mandatory vegetable dish. Truthfully, I am not really into vegetables (I am currently trying my best to grow to like them more and more :P). However, I totally love this vegetable dish. Stir Fried Spinach with Garlic (RM9 = US$2.90). A simple but yet flavorful dish. Another family favorite.
Ahhhh another 'must order' whenever we have dinner at New Paris. Their curries totally rock! We would usually order vegetable curry but today, we ordered Fish Curry with Vegetables (RM25 = US$8) instead. Really really good. It comes piping hot in a metal bowl. Large chunks of fish with green beans, eggplant, okra and onions. I could eat this everyday, its so good. All I need is a bowl of rice and some of this curry. That would make me a very happy girl!
Now, this is the main attraction! Deep Fried Pork Knuckles (RM38 = US$12.30) with a side of plum sauce. Check out the crispy skin! It's so so sinfully good. Of course we do not order this everyday (really high in fat content and pretty unhealthy). It's so good, I only wish that we could though. Unless of course we are all looking to get a heart attack from clogged arteries in the near future, this dish is only ordered occasionally as a special treat. I highly recommend this dish and it's one of my all time favorite dishes in New Paris.
Mmmm mmmm mmmmmm, look at all the empty dishes. There are rarely any leftovers whenever we go to New Paris. It's not because their servings are small (on the contrary, actually) but it's because their food is oh so good! Our dinner for 5 people came up to a total of RM102.40 (approx US$33). Not too bad at all, considering that we had a huge serving of pork knuckle and curry fish. Oh I love new Paris, oh yes I do!

New Paris Restaurant - PJ, Malaysia
62-64 Jalan SS2/72,
47300 Petaling Jaya,
Selangor, Malaysia
Tel: (603) 7955 9180, 7955 0186

Palm View Seafood Restaurant

After a whole day of sightseeing, we headed back to the hotel to rest up for a bit before dinner. My parents and Ashley went down to the beach for a swim and also to redeem their welcome drink from the poolside bar (I believe it was some Lemongrass drink). Kevin, who was still trying to recover from jet lag, was totally knocked out cold and I spent the remaining afternoon surfing the net in our nice A/C room (the jet lag didn't really bother me but I was having a tough time adjusting to the heat). It was good just to relax! :D

By the time we finally got ready to head out to dinner, it was pretty late in the evening. We decided to return to Pantai Cenang and try another one of the seafood restaurants there. There were quite a lot to choose from but we ended up going to Palm View Seafood Restaurant. I guess we were attracted by the bright lights and red lanterns :PJust like all of the seafood restaurants along Pantai Cenang, Palm View Seafood has a host of different live seafood to choose from. Since we didn't get our crab fix from Orkid Ria the night before, we were really looking forward to some yummy crabs that night. The lady told us that a new fresh batch of crabs just arrived and she brought us to a back room to pick out a few. I guess that was the first mistake of the night. When the waitress brings you to a 'special room' to pick out seafood, you know that it wasn't going to be cheap!

The waitress also kept on 'promoting' the mantis prawns. She said that it was very fresh and they just brought in some new stock earlier that day. So we agreed to go take a look at it. While we were out there choosing our seafood, we changed our minds about the mantis prawns and said that we would like regular prawns instead (cos the only way they would cook mantis prawns is to steam it and we wanted butter prawns). The waitress wasn't too happy and gave an excuse that the kitchen was too busy and they won't have time to make butter prawns, so we should just get the mantis prawns instead. We know that it's just an excuse because, A: how can the kitchen be too busy? The restaurant wasn't even half full and B: mantis prawns cost about 3 times more than regular prawns! So, if she were to sell us regular prawns, she would make less money. In the end, we didn't really want to argue with her and picked out a few mantis prawns. Check out the size of the prawn!

So, apart from crabs and mantis prawns, what else did we order? Well, we ordered a plate of sea scallops cooked with shark fin (yes I do eat shark fin and I'm not ashamed of it!), shitake mushrooms, garlic and superior stock. It was pretty good actually. The stock was really sweet and yummy.

We also shared a plate of Hokkien Fried Noodles. It wasn't as nice as the noodles from Orkid Ria but it was alright. They used a lot more dark soy sauce and there wasn't as much shrimp and meat in this noodles. I guess it could have been worse, so no complains here.

Ahhh the controversial mantis prawns :P It was steamed with Chinese herbs and topped with cilantro. It's funny that they should call it a prawn. In my opinion, the meat tasted more like a lobster instead of a prawn. This dish was pretty good too. You couldn't really taste the Chinese herbs (it just enough to compliment the prawns) at all and the meat was firm and fresh.

Here we go. The piece de resistance! Sweet and Sour Chili Crab. Mmm mmm mmmmm. We have been waiting to eat this for the longest time and boy, I'm glad we were not disappointed. We finally got our dose of crabs! The crabs were indeed very fresh and the sweet and sour sauce was good too. Definitely worth the wait. Generally the food in Palm View is pretty good and the seafood is fresh. You just have to be careful when ordering. If not, you will end up with a really big bill at the end of the night.The waitresses would just try and push the most expensive dishes. So, do not get swayed by the waitresses, order what you want to eat and not what they try to 'recommend'. With that in mind, I'm pretty sure you will have a good meal in Palm Ville Seafood.

Palm View Seafood Restaurant
Lot 1584 Pantai Cenang,
Langkawi 07000,
Kedah
Tel: (604) 955 9008