I hadn't been to North China in 10 or 15 years. The last time I had been there, it was a better-than-average Szechuan place, but nothing terribly out of the ordinary.

About a month or two ago, I got a menu from North China in the mail, and I saw that they had a lot of more traditional dishes listed. We decided to try it.

We were in for a surprise when we arrived. The restaurant used to have two rooms; now it was down to one. And whereas the decor had been sort of upscale suburban, now it was much more bare-bones.

The food was outstanding. We had first-rate ma-po tofu, a very spicy shredded pork and chili appetizer, a sauteed squid dish with shredded pork and finely chopped greens, and a more conventional beef & mixed vegatables dish that was very well prepared. We didn't delve as deeply into the menu was I would have liked, because there were only three of us, one of whom was my son, who is more limited in his tastes than my wife and I. But there was lots of unfamiliar (to me) stuff to try. Fish stomach, anyone?

Although one visit isn't enough to base a comparison on, based on what we ate it wouldn't be outrageous to put North China roughly in the same ballpark as Joe's Noodle House. It's certainly a closer-in alternative if you're looking for non-Americanized Chinese food.

The address is 7814 Old Georgetown Rd.

Thanks for the report ngoldfarb. Nice to have Szechuan a little closer to home.

Welcome. Excellent first post.

Word is that North China changed hands last summer, and the new chef/owner was the (original?) chef at Hunan Palace in Gaithersburg. Should be promising, although I don't know how his Szechuan cooking is; HP was excellent back then, while NC hasn't been on my radar since I was a teenager.

I got some delivery from here last weekend and I was quite impressed with the quality, especially considering how average or just plain lousy City Lights and Foong Lin have become. I'm pretty pumped to make this my go-to Chinese delivery place, and also checking out a few more of the regional dishes they've added.

Maybe not so outrageous after all - according to their website their chef is, in fact, "Joe," original owner of Joe's Noodle House.

The web site suggests that the "Joe" is the chef from the *original* Joe's (before it was sold to the Sichuanese folks), specializing in Shanghai and Taiwanese food, not Sichuan.

So is it Hunan cuisine? Sichuan? Taiwanese?

Inquiring minds want to know.

As far as I could tell, the menu features dishes from all three. Gave this place a take-out try in hopes of the mouth-numbing ma la flavor way closer than Rockville Pike. Didn't quite happen - although what I did order was tasty. Made it clear I liked Szechuan style, spicy, with the red peppers. Got a dish along these lines with Beef that had great flavor, and some sliced carrots and peppers. Strips of beef were good, but not crispy (though wasn't advertised as such, I kinda wished they were). The dish did pack a punch - a deep heat that made me sweat, but not the mouth and mind numbing I was seeking. Also got the dumplings, which were tasty- flavorful meat filling, and just the right thickness and stickiness in the wrapper, as they didn't fall apart at all yet weren't too firm. The woman running the front of the house, Jenny, was very nice and helpful. I'll definitely be back to explore the menu...

that is kind of a strange name for a sichuan restaurant. good thing i read this post or i would have never pegged it as such!

I'd be up for a dim sum adventure there.

I was just thinking this was a good candidate for the Dim Sunday team!

They have dim sum here???? Please say so, because this will make my day!!!!

It's not Hong Kong style (from the carts) like New Fortune, Hollywood East, etc. More like the A&J mold.

Dim sum menu.

Does that say what I think it says? At the top of the dim sum menu, written in by hand!

Has anyone tried their dim sum?

Hah! I work right nearby and I was just looking at their menu the other day thinking "this place looks like it's a cut above your usual Chinese take out place" so I might have to give it a try soon.

Can anyone out there read simplified chinese characters? I think it says "xiao long bao"- soup dumplings. A restaurant that specializes in shanghainese cuisine that serves soup dumplings! Fingers crossed.

Kinda looks like it... xiao long bao on the right.

I tried their veggie dumplings and the crispy pancakes. The Pancakes were quite delicious, the dumplins were not so impressive.

Two of us tried North China today for lunch. The waitress (also one of the owners "Jeannie") waited on us and had spent years at Hong Kong Place in Gburg and chatted with us for awhile. Very nice, and very knowlegable. We treid three dishes, all were very good to great. A2 Mushroom, Din Bean Curd Skin was served cold with theskin wraped around cooked mushrooms. Tasted very fresh and was a nice size portion. E29 Ma Pa Tofu was light and medium hot. the red bean sauce was quite good with little to no oil. C2 Yellow Birds (Vegetables wrapped with dried bean curd skin) was the hit with both of us. Wonderful sautee greens with 5 of the "yellow Birds" on top. I wish I had order a second helping of the greens, they were that good.

I will try to but together a $20 dollar Tuesday over the summer. Jeannie said she would work with us to do a special all Chinese menu.

And a good time was had by all...

We took up 2 tables at North China this morning and a good thing... we needed all the room we could possibly get for the multitude of plates that came out of the kitchen.

I'm sure I'm leaving something out but if memory serves correct, the plates held:
- Steamed Buns (delicious if a bit of a thick wrapper but it held lots of soup!)
- Chinese crullers and sesame flatbread
- Sweet Soymilk
- Taiwanese-style meat pie (didn't get to try this one but it looked interesting with its transparent outer casing)
- Mushroom in Bean curd skin (favorite of Daniel K's daughter!)
- Smelt with peanuts (a surprising favorite)
- Roasted duck
- Spicy pork with chili pepper (hot, hot, hot!)
- Crispy chicken - Taiwan style (quite nicely done - best with the accompanying basil leaves)
- Crispy squid - Taiwan style (split decision - some folks really enjoyed, some found it a bit chewy - either way, good flavor)
- Hamburger - Taiwan style (didn't try this one either as I was already pretty satiated but those that tried it enjoyed it!)
- Jelly fish
- Crispy intestines (my first time with crispy intestines - it was... OK. Not as "Fear Factor" as I had thought)
- Sausage - Taiwan style
- Leeks steamed dumplings
- Cold seaweed
- Fried noodles with Chicken, Beef and Shrimp
- Pea shoots (simply prepared, very delicious and a nice counterbalance to the other dishes)
- Very smelly tofu (I'm not sure what the real name of this dish is but you could smell it from across the room!)
- Sesame balls

Anyone else that attended, please feel free to jump in and provide your opinion on the dishes... or any that I missed!

On a personal note, many thanks to everyone for a warm welcome to my first Rockwell event. I'm looking forward to joining for many more!

Kat6185

Thanks for the report, Katy!

Other dishes I remember:
- Radish Cake
- Chicken Roll
- Oyster Roll
- Oyster Pancake

Overall, I thought the meal was quite good, though there were a few misses (jellyfish, oyster pancake, radish cake, meat pie, seaweed). You can't really compare to Hong Kong-style dim sum, but it is a reasonable comparison to A&J. While I still prefer A&J, there's very little overlap in the menu, so I can still enjoy both places. As I've had nothing but mediocre Chinese food in Bethesda, this is by a long margin the best Chinese food in Bethesda.

I agree that the xiao long bao skins were a tad thick, but the dumpling was very tasty, and since EACH one had soup, these are probably the golden standard for soup dumplings in the DC area right now.

Total after tax and tip was $20/person, quite reasonable for the large quantities of food we all threw down!

Great report, Kat. Is that really all from memory? Remarkable.

Ahhh... wish I could take credit but I cheated a bit and used the online menu! :-)

Great to meet you today - looking forward to the next event(s).

Also add to the list:
- Scallion pancakes (hand written on the menu as crispy pancake)
Unexceptional compared to the sheer perfection of my mother's, but even so... these were undersalted.

Was surprised at how the stinky tofu stink was quite in line with the one for the crispy intestines. Fried in the same oil? Thought it was interesting how scallions were tucked inside the intestines though.

In the balance of what we ordered at least, I don't necessarily think A&J is a complete comparison, since things were more weighted toward the Taiwanese end of things than the northern food spectrum. Felt more like a conglomeration of A&J and some of the first page items at Bob's.

Thought I would also note the daughter of the family working there was quite sweet and helpful.

How was the stinky tofu? Better than Bob's? I've got to check this joint out. I was judging a mock trial all day Sunday, dang it.

It was very intense. Much stinkier than Bob's. I know I can't eat as much of it as I can at Bob's.

Took my aunt and uncle here for lunch today. Aside from a number of things we had the previous time I went for dim sum, we tried the oyster noodle soup, and the fried tofu noodle soup. I didn't really think the overwhelming thinness of the noodles matched with the thick oyster soup, but according to my aunt it is quite traditional. I did like the broth a lot, which was greatly enhanced by the addition of coriander. The fried tofu noodle soup was really enjoyable, with a nice fragrance and really good fried tofu - creamy and flavorful.

how does the place stack up against its competition?