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ema

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Everything posted by ema

  1. ema
    The one with the cow sign is Chung Dai kam. Hang Sun Oak is a bit more up scale, they have very good bbq too. For Bon Chon chicken, I usually get the soy garlic, the spicy is painfully spicy, even more spicy than most stuff at a Sichuan restaurant.
  2. ema
    I had the almond bubble tea at Lollicup (6204 Little River Tpke). The tea was not too sweet and the bubbles were nice and chewy.
  3. ema
    To Sok Jip (7211 Columbia Pike)-best seafood pancake ever and lots of banchan. Gamasot-(6963 Hechinger Dr)-I love their sul lung tang. Han Sung Oak (6341 Columbia Pike)-has very good bbq, flavorful and juicy. Chung Dai Kam (7215 Columbia Pike)-the only place that uses charcoal for their bbq. Its attached to To Sok Jip with a cow sign. Todam Soon Doo Boo (7133 Columbia Pike)-A brand new restaurant specializes in tofu stew. Its almost identicle to lighthouse tofu, but its cleaner, brighter, serves more banchan. Bon Chon Chicken (6653 Little River Turnpike)-If you never had Korean fried chicken, you should definitely come here. I took a friend from NYC here, and she loved it so much that she went on a Korean fried chicken binge when she got home. Her verdict was Bon Chon in Annandale still beats all the places in NYC. You can also try some Korean desert places afterwards The three big ones are Le Martin de Paris (7326 Littlr River Turnpike), Shilla (7039 Little River Turnpike), and Dolce (7203 Little River Turnpike). Dolce is the most upscale of the three.
  4. ema
    Fusion food to me is usually take some Asian food, incorporate hoisin, miso, soy, or ginger in the sauce, make the portion smaller, the presentation verticle, and triple the price. I have a hard time justify paying for Fusion food.
  5. ema
    I usually don't drink lagers, but the best lager I have ever had was Hacker Pschoor. I think its called Munich Gold and it had a very distinct buttery taste.
  6. ema
    I tried to replicate the haemul panjeon at home, but wasn't successful in it. When I put that much seafood in the batter, the batter got too soggy. Maybe it was To Sok Jip's secret batter that made it so good or maybe it was the crack. This place was already full at 5:00 PM on Saturday, so you can imagine what it will be like during peak dinner time. I think its possible for a late lunch or an early dinner on a weekend. Somewhere between 2:00-5:00 PM. Food also come out slow since they cook everything to order.
  7. ema
    I second that. I finally made to to To Sok Jip yesterday and I loved their seafood pancake. It looked almost physically impossible to put so much seafood into that pancake and yet the octupus was still tender without any rubber band texture. There were also seaweed in the pancake which gave it a unique sweeet flavor. I haven't had alot of kimchi jjigae before, but their version was the most flavorful I have ever had. It was tangy and very spicy. The menu was in English and Korean, but the lunch specials were written in Korean on a board. The entire restaurants smelled like fried fish and pickle, so I can see that it might scare away some non-Koreans. The quality and value of their food is unbeatable. I took the leftovers home and had two more delicious meals out of it.
  8. ema
    I have been wanting to try this hole in the wall place. The only problem is that the menu is in Korean only, and I am not Korean. Anyone being to the place and can recommend a couple of dishes? Thanks
  9. ema
    Starts to salivate. My avatar is a pic I took when I was in Shanghai branch of Din Tai Fung two years ago. I heard the CA branch is decent, but not as good as the Asia branches.
  10. ema
    It did taste like shrimp wonton noodles without the squid flavor. All Asian noodle soup, ramen, and pho are filled with MSG. That's why they are Mmm So Good.
  11. ema
    I ventured into Eden Center and promised myself to try a couple of small places inside the Eden Center. Hai Ky Mi Gia specializes in soup noodle. You get a choice of toppings (shrimp, mixed seafood, roast duck, roast quail, or pork), shrimp cracker, Chinese chives, tiny bits of rendered pork fat, and lettuce over yellow noodle or rice noodle, with the soup either laddle on top of the noodles or served on the side. The usual condiments of bean sprouts, hot sauce, and lime are available on the side. The result is a bowl of delicious warm Vietnamese Ramen that costs around $7.50. Nha Trang specialized in Nem Nuong Nihn Hoa ($7 for 4 rolls), these are summer rolls with lettuce, mint, grilled pork sausage, and crispy fried wonton wrapper served with a strange sauce that I can't decipher (bits of garlic, pork, and peanut in a sweet sauce).
  12. ema
    The menu was only one page long and had English translations. The Galbi we got had a nice flavor, but it was too tough compare to galbi from bbq restaurants. Since they specialize in soondobo, its wise to stick with that. You can choose between beef, mushroom, pork, seafood, kimchi, or clam soondobo. One of the old lady who work there spoke English well enough to answer any question you might have.
  13. ema
    This new place next to Giants peaked my interest, so I decided to check it out during lunch. The location is kind of strange, its situated all the way at the end of a hallway, like some of the restaurants in the Eden Center. They specialize in tofu casserole and they serve it exactly like Lighthouse tofu, bubbling hot tofu stew, a raw egg on the side, and cooked rice in a stone pot. They also serve lots of fresh banchan, including a small whole fried fish with the casserole. Everything was tasty and a bargin for under $10. There are two flat screen TV in the restaurant showing mostly cheesy Korean variety show about cooking. Its a clever move on the owner's part to show Korean food porn to stimulate patron's appetite.
  14. ema
    The lobster special at Sampan is only $12.99 right now. You can get it with ginger scallion or pepper salt. Along with the lobster, we also tried the tofu cod casserole ($16.99) and Cantonese style beef ($13.99). The casserole had tender chucks of cod and fluffy fried tofu, all served bubbling hot in a casserole, delicious and comforting. The Cantonese style beef was too sweet, resembled more like an Americanized sweet and sour. The service is typical of most Chinese restaurants, had to flag down someone to get a water refill. Overall, we were very happy considering the location and the price of the food.
  15. ema
    Besides tender steaks at a reasonable price, the crab bisque at Ray's is fabulous. It's rich and creamy, with generous morsels of tender crab meat, definitely worthy of a soup nazi moment.
  16. ema
    The two appetizers we had here were really good (grilled baby cuttlefish and some kind of phyllo pastry with crab and cheese filling). I ordered a salt baked fish. I never had salt baked branzino before. I expected the meat to be tender with a slippery mouth feel like steamed fish in Cantonese restaurant, but it tasted just like a piece of lightly baked fish with a couple of salt crystals here and there, nothing special.
  17. ema
    Bistro Francais is not very expensive, maybe people felt like trying some of the fancier places during restaurant week. I also liked the friendly atmosphere, not stuffy and formal.
  18. ema
    Went to sampan for dim sum on Sunday. Most of the items were mediore, except the steamed pork rib with black bean was the best I have ever had. We also ordered the beef chow fun from a la carte menu and it was also very good. Bonus point for the addition of yellow chives in the chow fun. Considering yellow chives go for $10 per pound in Asian markets, it was a really nice touch. The large table next to us ordered everything off the menu and the crispy jumbo shrimp they ordered looked very tempting.
  19. ema
    I wish their menu is posted on the website. The site has been up, but its nothing more than just an announcement that they are now open.
  20. ema
    We went to the tasting room for lunch and decided to try the duck confit tart (its not really a tart, more like a flatbread), chorizo fennel mussels and frites, and five onion soup. The duck on the flatbread was a bit dry, the mussels were plump and flavorful. The fries came with horseradish mayo, bbq mayo, and mustard mayo, and were the same thin cut you get at Beck's, The five onion soup had a nice intense beefy flavor, although it could use more cheese on the crouton. Overall, everything was very good, but I was somewhat disappointed by the Belgium beers. Brabo has all bottled beers, unlike Beck, which always have several choices on draft. I asked if they plan to have some beer on draft in the future and they said no.
  21. ema
    I am in for honey pig.
  22. ema
    I got some takeouts for the first time last night and I am happy that I don't have to drive all the way to Miu Kee when I crave for Cantonese. Miu Kee is still better, but Canton cafe is so much closer. I ordered combination bbq dish (soy sauce chicken and crispy skin pork), beef with black pepper sauce, and chicken and salted fish fried rice. I liked the crispy crackling on the top and price was good too, at $10 per pound. The soy sauce chicken was on the dry side since they only gave me white meat. I needed a drumstick to properly rate the tenderness of the bird. The bbq dish came with two containers of sauce, a very light soy marinate and a hoisin sauce. The beef with black pepper sauce was tender, but the sauce needs more black pepper for a spicer kick. The fried rice was not good, almost nonexistent amount of salted fish and the chicken was dry. There were also some chunks of white rice in there indicated the rice didn't get a good wok fry.
  23. ema
    The food at Harry's tap is mediocre, but the bread basket they serve at the start of the meal is delicious. For lunch, I would be happy to just eat a basket of their sweet mini corn muffins. For brunch, the scones and biscuits are also super tasty, and instead of preserves, they serve it with a fresh strawberry puree.
  24. ema
    This place sounds good. I haven't seen live shrimp in any of the chinese places in VA. You also have to count in the labor of picking through the greens to get rid of the tough leaves. Pea shoots cook down to nothing, so a plate of cooked product is a huge basket when raw.
  25. ema
    I have only been there for the happy hour. The oysters were 75 cents a pop and the mussels were plump and garlicky. Blacksalt and Eve have the best mussels.
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