Category Archives: Chinese

$$ Modest ($20-$40), Chinese, LEO's Eats, QuickBytes, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

We look back at 2015, and way back at Oriental House

We’re just a few days into the New Year, and most of you foodies are probably already tired of reading many versions of the same basic story about all the new restaurants that joined the metro’s culinary community last year. So let’s not do that.

I’d like to tip my fedora to Baby 2016, though, by pulling up for a wider view: Was there any consistent flavor in the boiling, simmering, seething stew of the city’s eats beat in 2015? Continue reading We look back at 2015, and way back at Oriental House →

$$ Modest ($20-$40), Chinese, LEO's Eats, Northeast Metro

New urbanism, same old Chinese in Norton Commons

There we were, Mary and I, sitting and chatting as we waited for our apps in the comfortably cozy confines of Tea Station Chinese Bistro. We sipped Tsing Tao beers and gazed out at the main drag of Norton Commons, the new subdivision with the old-time look, trying to figure out why this village somehow feels both appealing and a little creepy all at the same time.

Norton Commons was Louisville’s first large venture into the “New Urbanism” (or at least the first since St. James Court was developed in 1887). Hey, New Urbanism is cool! Something new, made to look old, compact and walkable, retro in style, quaint but, um, “safe.”

So what’s not to like?
Continue reading New urbanism, same old Chinese in Norton Commons →

$$ Modest ($20-$40), Chinese, Frankfort Ave., Clifton, Crescent Hill, LEO's Eats, New and noteworthy, QuickBytes

We eat 2,000 grains of rice at charming Bentuhua Teahouse

“I like rice,” the late, wacky stand-up comic Mitch Hedberg famously said. “Rice is great if you’re hungry and want 2,000 of something.”

This is funny because it’s a presumably true statement about a reality that we’ve probably never considered before, and yanks a laugh out of our bellies before we suddenly come up short with the obvious follow-up: “So what?”
Continue reading We eat 2,000 grains of rice at charming Bentuhua Teahouse →

$$ Modest ($20-$40), Baxter, Bardstown, Highlands, Chinese, Voice-Tribune review

Soup dumplings? Soup in dumplings wins at The Joy Luck

When I was a child, country-style chicken and dumplings wasn’t a thing in my citified family, but I wanted them to be. I would read about dumplings in children’s books and dream of tasting these succulent-sounding goodies.

“You wouldn’t like them,” my mother said, declining to make some for the family table.

Eventually I got to try some, and sure enough, Mom was right as usual. Thick rectangles of flabby dough, floating in chicken stew? Meh.

But that was before most folks in these parts knew of Chinese dumplings. Continue reading Soup dumplings? Soup in dumplings wins at The Joy Luck →

$$ Modest ($20-$40), Chinese, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries

Don’t expect ‘authentic,’ but the apps satisfy at PF Chang’s

I love Chinese food, and I’ve loved it since I was a little boy, when the only places you could get it in Louisville were the old Hoe Kow — then at Bowman Field, gone for years — and the sibling eateries House of Chen in Shively and Oriental House in St. Matthews. Only the last remains, and Grandma and Grandpa would probably recognize only part of its 21st century menu.

After all, back in those days when the Beatles and the Stones and Dylan were new, so was Chinese food. Well, not to the Chinese, who’ve been eating it for millennia, but certainly to folks in Louisville who were suspicious. Continue reading Don’t expect ‘authentic,’ but the apps satisfy at PF Chang’s →

$ Budget (under $20), Chinese, Northeast Metro, underSlideshowEntries

Tea Station’s simple pleasures warm the heart and tummy

We rolled up to our destination in the gathering darkness, and I found a parking spot at the curb out front. I turned, looked up, and … wow! This looks just like our old neighborhood in New York City! It’s a sturdy, three-story block of brick, not brownstone — visualize Queens, not Greenwich Village — with cozy lights in apartment windows on the upper floors, and busy storefronts opening on the street: a meat market, an Italian gelato shop and a family-run Chinese eatery.
Continue reading Tea Station’s simple pleasures warm the heart and tummy →

$$ Modest ($20-$40), Chinese, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries

Szechwan, Sichuan, hot or mild, Jasmine is fine

It didn’t seem obvious at the time, but looking back on it now, it’s clear that Louisville’s affection for gourmet-style and ethnic food skyrocketed when the first wave of Baby Boomers grew up. It must have been the middle 1970s when we suddenly realized that it wasn’t necessary to keep all our food from touching on the plate, and that there were more exciting things to eat than Mom’s steak and potatoes and tunafish casserole.
Continue reading Szechwan, Sichuan, hot or mild, Jasmine is fine →

$ Budget (under $20), Chinese, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries

Oriental House looks mighty good for its age

Think back to the days when Oriental House was new. One of the first Chinese restaurants in Louisville, it’s getting on toward 50 years old now. St. Matthews was just starting to sprawl when Oriental House settled in to its colorful quarters on Shelbyville Road back in the ’60s. The St. Matthews mall still had that new-mall smell, the Watterson Expressway had just inched around to US 60, and there were still plenty of potato fields around.
Continue reading Oriental House looks mighty good for its age →

$ Budget (under $20), Chinese, Commentary, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

A truly authentic experience at Peking City Bistro

chinese food on plate

“Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.” Not merely the intro line of the original Japanese “Iron Chef,” this fundamental hypothesis goes back to the French gourmet Anthelme Brillat-Savarin’s 1825 gastronomic essay, “Physiology of Taste.”

If Brillat-Savarin had examined my dinner at Peking City Bistro, he might have concluded I am a pregnant Chinese woman, a revelation that would come as a considerable surprise to both my mother and my wife.

Intrigued? Pull up a chair, and I’ll tell you the story.
Continue reading A truly authentic experience at Peking City Bistro →

$ Budget (under $20), Chinese, Commentary, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

Save Jade Palace for dim sum

I’ve reviewed the dim sum many times over the years, returning most recently to examine the chicken feet and other “challenging” specialties for a review in the Jan. 7, 2009, LEO Weekly. It is also a regular stop on our brunch circuit when I’m not reviewing.

But what’s Jade Palace like in the evening, when the dim sum carts aren’t rolling?
Continue reading Save Jade Palace for dim sum →