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You those of you who think you know true Sichuan food, you probably don’t, not unless you know the joys of the Chinese Peppercorn . A strange little dried plant that when eaten makes your whole mouth tingle and go numb, and when cooked correctly with spicy, and oily food makes for an amazing tingling combination that is addicting and can’t be beat. And Yunchuan Garden is a master of this Sichuan cuisine. If you like spicy food you owe yourself a trip to this little restaurant, though communication won’t be too easy, but it is worth the adventure, but be prepared to point to things at the menu, and be ready to drink tea, because getting water isn’t always easy.

The restaurant is on the west side of the Garfield in a little mall south of the 10 Freeway, but you pull in the middle of the buildings, or can go south and turn on the next street and park behind. The restaurant is usually packed, and every once in a while you will see a white person, but their are not too many of them.

My favorite Dish is the Fish with Special Sizhuan Sauce, which also is loaded with cabbage, or you can get it with beef, or with beef and fish, and all are delicious, but the beef is usually a bit overcooked and rubbery. This is an amazing dish, absolutely phenomenal. So tasty it is ridiculous, though you may want to get some rice to cut the heat from your mouth a bit, though it isn’t really that hot. It is a huge flavor though, it hits almost every taste bud. There are tons of chilies and lots of garlic.

Another tasty dish is Sichuan Dan Dan noodles. These are noodles in a spciy ground peanut and sesame sauce with quite a bit of garlic. These are delicious, and I liked them ever better when combined in a bowl with some of the Fish with Special Sichuan sauce. Delicious!

Another great dish, that came later so I didn’t take a photo of is the Spicy Pork Wonton’s. These are amazing. These are a bowl of pork wontons in the a spicy sichuan sauce, and what makes them so tasty is that in these wonton’s is an incredible sweet pork, which goes perfectly with the spicy sichuan sauce. A must have!

And then their is the sichuan potatoes, which are in thin strips, lightly cooked in oil with peppercorns and chili peppers. It is delicious, and different than any potatoes you have ever had. I enjoy this so much I have learned to make it at home.

Kelly and I also got some Lo Mein noodles, just in case the rest was a bit too spicy for Kelly, but in fact she handled it just fine, and while we had some of these tasty noodles, we ended up taking them home and eating them later.

Their is also a cold dish counter with some scrumptious edibles, though I haven’t tried them all because of being allergic to pork. My girlfriend does like the spicy wonton soup though, but I can’t have it because of the pork, but she assures me it is amazing.

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The menu has English on it as well, so you can usually get by, and point if necessary, and water may be necessary, it is for me.

If you like Spicy food you will love this place, as you have never had anything like it!

It has been years since I have been here, and it was just as good as I remember. This place is fantastic! Sure it isn’t the classiest restaurant I have seen, but the food is top notch, and gets made so quickly.

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After trying out Lug Gi a couple of weeks back, me and two of my friends went out to try Mon Land, which I have seen highly rated over at Chowhound. This place is right across from the big grocery store and mall (The Great Mall of China) with the big Sam Woo in it on Valley, and while it doesn’t have many parking places, you could always park in the mall (if you are willing to fight for your parking spots). Initial impressions were very good, as the place is quite large, and has indoor and outdoor seating, and the hot pot is put into an electric heater that is rescessed into the table, instead of being on top. Also for the Yin and Yang Pot, which has hot and spicy on one side and a tasty not spicy broth on the other, is actually bent in the middle so it looks like an actual Yin and Yang symbol, it is just too bad the food is not as good as at Lu Gi, and especially the hot pot is not nearly as spicy. (Sorry I forgot my camera, so no pics this time, but you can see some over at My Culinary Adventures).

In fact the spicy side is barely spicy at all, it is tasty, and I think I did find a Sichuan peppercorn in it, but it wasn’t nearly as spicy, and doesn’t come with the almost molten tofu that was so incredible over at Lu Gi. And the sauce isn’t as thick, in fact it seem they use the same soup base, as they filled our pot from the same kettle, it just me the extra spices they throw in that make it spicy, and it does have quite a few floating tiny red chillis and some nuts that I could not identify as well as whole cloves of garlci.

Their order form is better than the one at Lu Gi though, as it has English on it, so you don’t have to give your order to the waitress. We ordered one each of beef, pork and chicken, and then ended getting another order of each as well. We got some cabbage and some ah choy, deep friend tofu (almost buttery and delicious)and an egg tofu (also quite good, but with a much silkier texture), shrimp balls and fish balls (both of which like Lu Gi, get cooked, but don’t really absorb any flavor), as well as an onion pancake and a lamb pancake, and everything was quite good.

The onion pancakes were tasty, though not nearly as tasty as the ones as Dumpling House, but the Lamb ones filled with a Lamb burger was quite tasty, and I would certainly try those again.

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The place is pretty good, with tasty food, and good service, and is much larger than Lu Gi, but I liked the Hot Pot itself much better at Lu Gi, so we will have to make a trip back before it gets too hot.

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Located in a strip mall at the North East Corner of Valley and New, though you must enter off of Valley. And this place is popular, so the parking lot will fill up, and you may need to try and find street parking. I have wanted to try Sichuan Hot Pot for some time, since I heard about it from my crazy ex girlfriend, and even more so once Kelly and I saw Anthony Bordain go when he was in Sichuan China. And then I read about some places to go in Los Angles at ChowHound and wanted to try one, but it wasn’t until I read about LU Gi at LA Food Crazy that Kelly and I called our friends and decided to make a night out of it. This place is rather small, and we had a large party of 9, which barely fit at a long table (really barely), though they do have one big round table, but you must make a reservation for this (and they do speak english here, so you should call if you are going to have a large party). The place is small, but the waiters are very helpful, and will fill out the order from (which is completely in Chinese). They give you water, and have beer and wine and will serve you quickly and efficiently. And the place is pretty cheap. With tip it came out to $16 each slip between 8 people. Well worth it, and I will certainly try it again.

Went again with 3 of us total this time, and ordered too much food, though it was damn tasty, and we did make a major dent. And Kelly really was impressive with how much hot pot we ate. This place is amazing.

Some of the meet and veggies before they were put in the pot.

3 Shots of our overfull hot pot.

On LA Food Crazy’s recommend, and because we had some people who can’t hand Sichuan hot we decided to try the Yin and Yang bowl. FOr our table we got two big pots filled with boiling liquid, but split down the middle, one side with Sichuan Hot Pot, a spicy mix of red chili oil and sichuan peppers and garlic that looks much like molten lava, and the other side has a nice sesame broth for those who either can’t handle the spice, or want to temper it a bit.

Now I had to do the ordering an I admit I messed up a bit because I did not order cabbage or enough veggies, but you can order just about anything, from Tripe to pork belly. We ordered 3 plates of thin sliced AAA beef, 2 orders of thin sliced chicken, and an order of pork. We also got some beef balls and shrimp balls (all very dense and not too tasty), an order of spinach and about 3 bowls of noodles. Next time I would order cabbage, mushrooms and some more veggies too.

The sesame broth was way too bland for me, but could be improved with a bit of the spicy broth.

The spicy broth was quite tasty, and includes some tofu that is so damn spicy it was spectacular. My biggest complaint is that for being called Sichuan Hot Broth it didn’t have any chinese peppercorns in it, and I love that spicy and numb feeling that peppercorns give. I still liked the spicy broth, in fact it was quite delicious, but would have been better with peppercorns in it. To make it even better a bit of rice vinegar into your bowl of broth, which adds an amazing zing to the delicious meat.

I highly recommend the spicy broth, and am a huge fan of Sichuan hot pot, and will keep trying different ones. I love Sichuan spice! Delicious! Of course you have to be ready for the inevitable burning diarrhea that will come the next morning, especially if you drink some of the delicious broth, but the pain if worth pleasure!

On the second trip I ordered way too much food for 3 of us. I got 2 orders each of the grade A beef, 2 orders of pork and 2 orders of chicken, and I must say I like the Beef and Chicken the best. We also got an assorted plate of fish balls, some tempura, spinach, cabbage, watercress, noodles, taro root, and some strange tied noodles. And the food was amazing, and so damn tasty. This place is just delicious. The broth is spicy and as tasty as can be. I can’t recommend this place more highly.

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I was introduced to this restaurant by my ex girlfriend whose father from Sichuan would only eat here when he was in Los Angeles. Tonight I went with my girlfriend, her sister and her father to this restaurant to have some excellent Chinese Seafood. Now while everything is good, the crab with house special sauce is the best and a specialty. It has like a deep friend garlic and ginger with chilies in it, and the crab is battered and you rip it apart with your fingers and teeth and spit out the shells. It is the best way I have ever had crab for all time. Well tonight we did better, if by a larger expense.

Usually a dinner for 4 is something around 60-70 with quite a few meals, this place is very reasonably priced. Sure it is Chinese family style so the place is one large room that is packed with people at either small 4 sided tables or 2 different sizes of round tables, the largest with lazy susans on them to spin the food around.

Tonight Chelsea ordered the King Crab, which I think was a Snow Crab, but cooked in 2 ways. One was legs with the shell cut on both sides and steamed with garlic sauce, and the other was the house special sauce, which I could eat all night long. This was the single best crab I have ever had, and was over 6 pounds. And the problem being is it cost well over $100 just for this crab, in fact it was more like $150. Now it was amazing, but it had some sticker shock.

This place also has excellent fish, and we had some fish with black bean paste which was quite tasty, though I don’t think quite as good as the whole fish I have had her previously, which have stewed in their own juices.

We also had some Chinese broccoli steamed in wine, which was excellent, and Kelly’s father had fried Oysters in Oyster sauce which were huge and quite tasty.

This place is amazing, and some of the best seafood I have ever had, literally the best Chinese Seafood I have ever had, and probably the best I will ever have in the US.

Previously I have also had duck and duck tongue there (a little chewy for my taste, but still good), and the whole pigeons are excellent and tasty.

This place is amazing and well worth checking out. Sure the menu is in Chinese and English, but they also have a menu with photos. Just make sure you get the crab with the house special sauce, which is absolutely amazing.

Hours of Operation: 11-9pm closed on Tuesday CLOSED!

THE HORROR, MY FAVORITE DUMPLING PLACE IS GONE! NO MORE DUMPLINGS OR ONION PANCAKES OR CUCUMBER OH NO!

GOOGLE MAP A bit of a ways away, but so worth it. I am allergic to pork, so I only get the chicken dumplings and Kelly (my girlfriend) says that the Pork Dumplings are tastier as they have less vegetables in them, but I am perfectly fine with my amazing Chicken Dumplings, and my ex who introduced me to the place thought the same. These are so tasty, and so delicious, that it is well worth the trip. If you like dumplings you will have to check this place out. And this Northern Chinese restaurant is also famous for it’s noodles.
This is the sign you will see when driving North on Rosemead, so be ready to turn in. A little rice vinegar, and some chili peppers, and these dumplings are superb. An amazing taste!
This time Kelly and I also tried the Noodles in a soup with beef, shrimp and veggies and freshly made noodles. Damn was it tasty. Fresh made noodles just taste so much better. Neither Kelly and I were too dextrous when it came to getting the noodles out of our bowl into the smaller bowl, though a waitress showed us hot to cut them with a spoon, it was still quite difficult, but well worth it.
We also ordered an onion pancake that was absolutely fabulous, and even better when dipped in some rice vinegar and chilli mix. Each order comes with a small plate of Kimchi, as this Northern China style restaurant is very popular with Koreans (Even the menu is in English, Chinese and Korean).
They also have some great appetizers, vegetables and tofu that is amazing. YOU MUST TRY THIS PLACE!!!

These are some shots of the building, not much to look at, but it sure is delicious!

Went again today with Kelly, and damn are the Chicken Dumplings delicious. And Kelly had a Dumpling soup, which was huge and she loved (though it had pork so I could not try it).

This is the fresh cucumber in tangy garlic sauce, which is light and tasty, sweet and garlicky, quite delicious.

Here is the free Kim CHi that comes with your order.

These are the Pork Dumplings.

Here are the amazing onion pancakes.

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My girlfriend had always wanted to try this place, that is often listed as one of the best Chinese restaurants in Los Angeles. And I must say it is a place that people who haven’t had real Chinese food might actually like, but true lovers of Chinese food will find this much like any Chinese take out place across America, except maybe without the MSG.

Yes the place looks nice, and everyone is dressed nice, and the food isn’t too expensive, but not good Chinese food. The food was unimpressive, not spicy at all, and reminded me of something that should have been on a pupu platter, which I am pretty sure no Chinese has ever heard of (it is an assortment of Oriental Appetizers, though not real Chinese food at all, and usually heated with a little sterno heater).

If you like real Chinese food stay away, if you like what white people think is Chinese food, this may be fine cuisine.

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This Hong Kong style seafood restaurant is fantastic. It not only the best variety of any dim sum place I have ever been, but the service is really top notch, some of the best I have ever had at a dim sum place. You can’t go wrong with this place, though you may want to go early as the lines do build.

Different from most dim sum places, not only are their an abundance of dim sum carts that travel around, but their are also the most helpful waiters I have ever seen. They will take you order for individual dim sums and bring them to you (ask for a dim sum menu), and they even refilled out ice water without us asking. This place has amazing service and is totally reasonably priced. I couldn’t recommend it any more, it is spectacular!

And they have a abalone dim sum, that is around $5 for 3 pieces that is probably the best piece of dim sum I have ever had. WOW!

Went with a huge group this last weekend, about 13 or 14 of us, and we just stuffed ourselves on excellent Dim Sum (though still didn’t see the abalone), and after eating and eating and eating, the bill came to like $11 each with tip! Damn that is a good deal. You just can’t beat this place, but you might want to think about parking on the street so you don’t have to deal with the parking lot, which is always very, very full! (02/05/2006)