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dr.com 龍年 Table at 100 Degree Chinese Cuisine-Sun., 1/22 at 6PM


Ilaine

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It was quite a night. They took out all the four tops and every table was a round eight-ten top. We all sat at one and there were seven or eight other tables with one very large party of 70 or so people from Transamerica, a finance company, Chinese investment advisors, all very happy, as you might expect from Chinese people who advise Chinese investors these days. A full house of people of all ages, including many, many giddy and excited children. The laughter and glee made me feel really good inside.

The food, at its best, was spectacular. Best roast duck I ever had. Never had sea cucumber before and really liked it. I like gelatinous textures, and sea cucumber is that, and so are the rice balls in the rice ball soup, made from sweet, sticky rice flour, filled with sesame and peanuts, and a pleasant sensation. Either you like the chewy gummy texture, or you don't, apparently, and I do.

Husband is hovering over the keyboard saying "the lobster was spectacular, too, and the pork!". Personally, I ate a lot less of the meat and filled up on the seafood soup. That soup was good. Texture almost Iike congee, lots of minced seafood, probably shrimp, very savory. Husband says crawfish. I say shrimp.

But the duck was the best, on this we both agree. We've had their duck before but it wasn't like this. We want more of that duck.

We had a lovely time and enjoyed seeing our DR friends and hope to do it again. Thank you, Matt.

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This was a lot of fun. I found it especially gratifying to finally have some good Chinese food after all the crap I put up with in China for 2 1/2 weeks. The seafood soup starter and the roast duck were highlights for me. The only thing that put me off a bit was the starchy/gelatinous coating on almost every other dish, which seems to be a hallmark of American Chinese food, though this was definitely more Chinese than American. The atmosphere of the whole restaurant was delightful as was the company at our table.

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Clarification 1: starchy-like finish is a staple in Chinese cooking. Period. This is because we are taught to use corn starch as a thickener. It wasn't until I came on this board that I learned about rouxes, arrowroot and other types of thickeners. At home, we bought corn starch constantly. I wonder if it's a finer starch back home that we didn't taste it like we do here, though...

Clarification 2: glutinous sweet rice balls are usually filled with ground black sesame or ground peanut powder but not both. We had the peanut filling.

Clarification 3: glutinous sweet rice balls should never ever be gummy. The kitchen committed a faux-pas by overcooking them. The texture should have a hearty chew like mochi: sufficient gum, not too dry, takes on the slight flavor of its filling or soup. Eating that dessert was like eating mushy tapioca pearl balls. That was a fail.

Otherwise, the evening was nice, especially with the company. Many thanks to Don and TheMatt for setting it up and thanks to Ilaine's +1 and TheMatt for calculating everyone's portion that night...it was a comforting way to start the Lunar New Year.

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Clarification 1: starchy-like finish is a staple in Chinese cooking. Period. This is because we are taught to use corn starch as a thickener. It wasn't until I came on this board that I learned about rouxes, arrowroot and other types of thickeners. At home, we bought corn starch constantly. I wonder if it's a finer starch back home that we didn't taste it like we do here, though...

I wasn't referring to the sauce in the dishes, but the way they were coated before being cooked. From what I've read, and from my admittedly limited experience eating in China, such coatings are more typical of Chinese-American cuisine than Chinese. And even when they are used in the latter, they usually only give the food a light sheen rather than a thick coating.

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^ Then I'm really not sure what you mean Banco. Typical coatings used in Chinese home cooking are sweet potato and tapioca starches. Sometimes batters are flour/corn starch mixes, but I guess I really am not understanding...

Well, I took one look at TheMatt's pictures, and my first thought was how gloppy the food looked, quite honestly. I'm not sure he's talking about batters so much as saucing.

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