China Dynasty

I am still lamenting the loss of Suzi's Chinese on South Lamar. Yeah, I know, it was Americanized Chinese food, but to me, their sesame chicken was gold medal material. South Austin clearly lacks for Asian food, particularly Chinese, Korean, and to an extent, Vietnamese. So it was with excitement that friends told me about their discovery of China Dynasty, in the HEB strip mall at Slaughter and Manchaca. (They don't have a website.)

We went on a recent Saturday evening, and at about 7:30pm, there were only a couple other tables occupied. Our waitress was friendly, though as a non-Asian, we weren't totally sure how much she really knew about the food, but she did put forth a good effort. We started with their spicy dumplings, which were really not spicy, but the sauce that's over them was really delicious. I think they were more like steamed pork wontons with a very lightly spicy, thin brown sauce poured over them; that sauce would have been good on a lot of things!

Then our main dishes came. In terms of eating the rainbow, we were not very successful, especially since you usually don't see brown in a rainbow! Fortunately, their sesame chicken dish was quite good; I'd give it a bronze or maybe even a silver medal. In comparison to Suzi's, I would reduce points for the size of the chicken pieces (these were cut fairly small), it was perhaps a bit sweeter than I recall Suzi's being, and then simply for location. This is way far south, even for me, whereas Suzi's was about a mile away from my house; it's not a quick, convenient trip if I suddenly get a sesame chicken craving.

We had spied a couple of duck items on the menu, and asked the waitress what "Eight-jeweled Duck" was, so she went to the kitchen to find out. The primary difference between it and the other duck dishes was that it's boneless, and comes with a sauce. We tried it. It's an extremely heavy breading, which once you get past that, does lead you to some meat. But I'll be honest, it could have been dark meat turkey for all I know; I am not 100% convinced we ate duck that night. The sauce was a notch or two up from your standard Chinese brown sauce, and it was very well-fried, as it did not appear greasy, but boy, that was some thick breading.

Egg Foo Young is not something you see on many Chinese menus, and my friends had tried it here before and liked it. If you're not familiar, EFY is an egg dish, like an omelet with stuff in it; in this case, I think there was cabbage, onion, and pork. It was a little hard to tell what all was in there, but you had your choice of meats, and I know we said pork. Sometimes EFY is prepared flat, like a disk, here, they were molded, so I imagine they were cooked in some sort of domed vessel, plated, and doused in more brown sauce. It's a fairly dense, hearty dish, and we couldn't finish it all. I think what gives it the "Chinese" feel is the sauce.

Overall, I'd say that China Dynasty had decent food, but not exceptional. It did scratch my sesame chicken itch for the time being, but didn't think about things when we ordered, and had too much brown sauce!

Next South Austin stop in my quest for good sesame chicken -- Hunan Lion, where I haven't been in years!

Pho Thaison

I had to run errands down in Southpark Meadows last week; I still bemoan the existence of this behemoth strip mall (Road Rash, as my mother would say). For those of you who weren't here in the late 1990s, Southpark Meadows was a somewhat remote, lovely, open piece of land where outdoor concerts were held. I saw Dave Matthews and Lilith Fair, and now I see Wal-mart, Super Target, and a ton of restaurants. *Sigh* 

Glad I looked at the map of SM before I left home so I could plan my errands. I find the signage and navigation down there difficult, especially when you're not real familiar with the area. Fortunately, Pho Thaison is on a corner with a big sign, so it's an easier landmark to find. A friend has told me about the location near Mopac and William Cannon; they actually have six locations in the Austin area!

At about 1 pm, there were a couple tables of patrons, but within 10 minutes, I was the only person in the restaurant. (I swear I didn't smell bad!) I ordered the B2 bun bowl to eat there, and a pork banh mi sandwich and C6, Singapore beef, to go.

The B2 is grilled pork with a crispy egg roll over the vermicelli rice noodles; a kicked-up fish sauce is served along side. For $8, there was a LOT of pork, and it was really good. Sliced thinly, probably marinated, and then grilled, it's tasty. A little on the tough side, but the sweetness from the sauce, and the grilled flavors really come through. Egg roll was fairly bland, but not greasy, and the carrots lightly pickled.
When I got home, I unwrapped my other dishes. The banh mi was very large; ok, I know you can't tell from this picture, but it was probably a good 8 - 9 inches long! It's filled with the same pork and pickled carrots, along with some cucumber, jalapeno, and cilantro. It could have used a touch more mayo or sauce on it, but again, their pork is delicious. The bread was perfect for this kind of sandwich, because it was a bit crusty and flaky on the outer part, but not so it tears the roof of your mouth up. The banh mi do no appear on their regular menu; there was a sign holder at the table with a few banh mi offerings, and I think this was under $5 -- SO worth it!

Now for as good as these two pork dishes were, the Singapore beef fell short. Way short. I picked it because my friend has told me she really likes their Singapore dishes, but I couldn't remember which protein she usually gets it with. (Probably the pork!) I was a little hesitant to order it because it's on the "burning spicy" section of the menu. See all those red chile flakes in the picture? Got you nervous, huh? There was literally no flavor to this dish. And I ate it the following day, so you'd think the heat would have intensified a bit. Nope. It's basically beef with broccoli in a thin, (tasteless) brown sauce. I didn't eat much of it. And the beef was tough.

Pho Thaison was very clean (including the restroom), and the food came fast. Of the four people I saw who worked there, they were all Latino/Hispanic, not a Vietnamese or other Asian in sight. I asked how long that location had been open, and apparently it's been there four years. If you're in the Southpark Meadows area, it's definitely worth checking out, just stick to the pork dishes.

Tino's Greek Cafe

Whoops! I almost to forgot to write about this place..... and unfortunately, it was just THAT memorable! About ten days ago, three of us were getting together for lunch, and we needed someplace near Brodie and William Cannon, so Tino's was suggested. It's a little further south at Slaughter, at the northeast corner of the intersection.

There were no printed menus that I could see, just the chalkboard, which I found a bit hard to read. You go to the counter to order, and they serve it up in front of you, cafeteria style. One of my friends had said the gyro meat was good, so I decided to get that as part of the the combo plate. I asked the man working the line which sides were the best, and he shrugs his shoulders and says they're all good. Okay....so not really helpful. So by looking at the food (shoulda taken a picture), I choose the spanakopita, falafel patty, and meatball; and I had my choice of soup or salad, so I opted for the chicken lemon soup.

The soup wasn't bad, it definitely had some lemon flavor to it, and rather small bits of chicken. Would have probably enjoyed it more if it weren't 100 degrees outside! (But I picked it rather than the salad, because that was iceberg, under ripe tomatoes, and cucumbers, as seen in the plate below on the left.)  The gyro meat is a combination of lamb and beef (I wasn't sure, so I just called them to ask as I sat here writing this up), and was really quite good, especially with their nice, soft, pita bread. (One friend comes here to buy their pita, as opposed to going to Phoenicia Bakery, and I can see why.) The meat was tender and moist, with very good flavor. I wish I could say the same for the rest of the meal. The spanakopita (spinach and feta wrapped in phyllo dough -- the triangle in the lower right of the picture) was decent; not quite crispy enough for my liking, but not as soggy as it could be given that it had been sitting under the heat lights. The falafel patty was totally limp, no crunch to it at all, as you would expect to find, and the meatball really didn't have much taste to it, nor did it's tomato sauce. I tried a bite of my friends' hummus and baba ghanouj, both of which were decent, but nothing to write home about.

It also concerned me that they were storing paint cans next to the soda dispenser. In food safety and sanitation rules, that's a big no-no. Also, the bottled cleaner they were using to wipe down the tables had a very strong chemical odor to it, and while I guess it's good they were being liberal with it's application, one of my friend's is 30+ weeks pregnant, and there was a mother with a newborn at the table next to us. The smell from the cleaner drove us out.

So if you venture over to Tino's, and there are a couple locations around town, go for the gyro meat and pita, but skip the rest. Oh, and maybe get it to go.