pfftchang

Got a very generous gift card for PF and haven’t been there since a “company function”.  So being short on cash, B & I went on a Sat night.  We waited for over 30 minutes for our table.  There were a lot of large parties, weddings looking gathering, families, company functions, etc.  The servers and hostesses dressed in proper black were friendly enough.  It just was unnerving to NOT see a lot of Asian staff nor Asian guests at a restaurant with clearly an Asian name — maybe it should be called PF Clan, or PF Clam, or PF Calamity, or PF Can’t, or PF Rasmussen, whatev…

The restaurant is called a Chinese Bistro.  Really?  I see the terra cotta soldiers and the giant horse statue (had to face his backside while waiting for our table – isn’t that a little non-fen shu-ayed?), there’s some mural type thing on the length of the wall and giant lantern like fixtures dangling from the ceiling (don’t want to be under those during an earthquake).  So Chinese Bistro means you get your “Asian” decor from Macy’s right? or World Market? or a museum shop?

We decided to order from the pre-set dinner for 2 menu.  Appetizer – salt and pepper calamari, soup – one of each – hot and sour soup and egg drop soup, main course – spicy chicken, pepper steak and we side ordered spicy green beans, dessert – carrot cake and strawberry cheesecake (very Asian dishes, I’m sure — the Empress Dowager had a hankering for Tiramasu, we hear).

Calamari (squid) was from Gorton of Gloucester, until you added the salt and pepper powderly mixture onto the little bands of squid (didn’t look like squid at all – more like narrow pieces of clams – so as to not offend the white folks, I guess.  No tentacles!).  These were served on a pile of crisped deep fried white noodles.  Those were fun and tasty to crunch.

Soup was adequate, but not the hot and sour wasn’t hot or sour enough.

Main course – we got our 2 bowls of white steamed rice which had some dried crusty parts to it having sat under the light too long, I guess.  The chicken had a flavorable deep fried outer crust, but the chicken inside was dry bland white meat pieces.  Serving size was adequate for 2.  String beans were good, but I don’t think the cook stirred it completely – there were beans that had no spices at all in more than one or two random bites.  What happened?  The peppered steak was the best of the 3 dishes.  It had a black bean kind of taste with bell peppers.  The meat was over cooked and very dark (which means it wallowed in marinade forever). 

Dessert was fun and delicious, but not very Asian at all.  The server came with a tray of glass cyclinders filled with plastic dessert.  The novelty was fun, but I felt that it didn’t seem very Asian.  Maybe some green tea ice cream?  lychee over vanilla ice cream would be nice?  But tiramasu? cheesecake? chocolate decadence? carrot cake?  red velvet cake?   I went along with the choices and had the carrot cake and  B asked for tiramasu but they were out (which meant the folks that go to this restaurant are tiramasu types – if you know what I mean), so he had the strawberry cheescake.  It was fun to eat these and the presentation was cute – with tiny spoons to get every last tidbit from the cocktail glasses.  One good thing is that the desserts were the right size after a big meal.  We ate it all.  The bill came out to be pretty hefty — about $35 per person which included oolong tea (which you can’t share), 2 non-alcoholic beers and 2 root beers.

The server offered only one glass of water, was a little befuddled since she seem to be assigned quite a few tables.  The clientele was varied, different ethnicity, little kids, young-ish career types, swingles, large gatherings and smaller groupings, lots of families (which shocks me since the food is not cheap), but not a lot of Chinese people. 

So FP, or CT, or MF, whoever you are, you found a niche, but it’s not a Chinese niche.  It’s more like what white people think Chinese are about, terra cotta soldiers, lanterns, chopsticks, and, oh yeah, food.  “If Yan can cook, so can you, PF!”

Why we still like cowboys

I'll serve you all coffee anytime.

Randomly netflix’d this movie and was treated to the best western I’ve seen in a long.  Ed Harris has always been a favorite since “The Right Stuff” and Viggo, who doesn’t swoon just saying his name.  Since Aragorn, I’ve renewed my allegiance when we saw “Eastern Promises” (even if they didn’t include the sauna fight scene) to Viggo. 

Back to Appaloosa, good cinematography, framing (see above), historic authenicity, characters, details, details, acting, plot, and just a lot of sheer enjoyment.  Didn’t feel there were any shortcuts here.