NORTHERN DELICACY REVISITED

Pork in Bean Sauce Noodles. Rating: 6/6
Perfectly pulled hand-made noodles. The texture is awesome! These are my favourite in Metro Van. I like their version of Pork in Bean Sauce because it’s not too “beany” if you get what I mean.

LIN CHINESE CUISINE

Orange Peel Beef.  5/6

Panfried Pork Buns.  6/6
The Panfried Pork buns were so good.  The pork filling is like the kind you get in xiao long bau.  However, the bun is like the yeast-risen steamed fluffy buns, but panfried on the bottoms so that you have a soft and fluffy texture on top, crunchy caramelized bottoms and juicy savoury pork filling with soup dribbling all down your chin.  They do indeed retain the soup well and I really enjoyed this version.

GOLDEN GREAT WALL RESTAURANT

Shanghai Noodles.  This is why we keep coming back to this restaurant.  Stomach and my two daughters love this restaurant’s version of the dish.  There is good flavours, nicely textured noodles, “wok hei”—which is a wok’s high heat which creates the nice natural caramelization that is so sought after by cooks.  Plus, the dish isn’t soggy from too much cabbage.  Instead they employ pieces of fresh spinach.  There’s ample strips of pork tenderloin too.    Cakebrain’s rating:  5.5/6

NING TU RESTAURANT (Shanghai)

Ning Tu’s Beef Roll:  5/6  I would order this again.  I would have liked more scallion and hoisin, but I liked the texture of the wrapping and the meat was thinly sliced and quite delicious.

Peking Duck: 2 courses.  I’ve broken down the elements of the dish… 1st course:  The Peking crepe skins were soft:  5/6

Duck skin was very good: 5/6.  You place a piece of skin, a piece of scallion and hoisin sauce on the Peking crepe.  Wrap it up and eat.  It is a delicious combination of flavours.  Decadent too.

NORTHERN DELICACY

Orange Peel Beef with steamed buns:  5/6. 

I think this is an impressive dish.  The beef was very tender.  The dish is hot and spicy with dried red chili peppers and the numbing Szechuan Peppercorns. It also is sweet but the dried orange peel is barely detectable.  I would have liked more orange to come out.  There was plenty of sauce so that if you had buns you could sop them up.  Unfortunately, my girls ate all the buns.  They said they were good!  I suppose this would go really well with lots of rice. 

The Bean Sauce with Pork on Handmade Noodles was excellent.   6/6!

LIN’S CHINESE CUISINE

Dan dan noodles with Meat Sauce.  Rating:  6/6

This is one of my favourite versions of dan dan noodles.  I am no vegetarian and always ask for the deluxe with meat sauce.  The noodles are smooth and have good bounce.  Good bounce? maybe that’s not what I mean, but it’s not exactly “bite”.  They are not al dente, yet still a little springy.

PEACEFUL RESTAURANT, W. BROADWAY

Green onion pancake.  Rating:  4.5/6

GOLDEN GREAT WALL

Xiao long bao. 6/6
Excellent skins and plenty of broth inside!


Gailan with garlic.  Rating:  5/6 
Gargantuan trees of gai lan.  Pretty good garlic flavour


Dan dan noodles.
A heavier spicy peanutty broth.  This one is okay but very rich tasting.  Rating:  4/6


Green onion pancake.  Rating:  5/6
Yummy, oniony goodness.  A favourite place for this version of the dish.


Shanghai noodles.
Excellent flavour and you can taste the wok’s fiery power here. Unfortunately, the pic is fuzzy because the kiddies were scrambling for the noodles. I barely got a shot in. Rating: 5.5/6

Golden Great Wall Szechuan Restaurant is located near the Holiday Inn on W. Broadway.  The restaurant is on the corner and there is ample free parking (if you know about it) in the parkade attached to the Holiday Inn.  You have to remember to tell the host at the restaurant what your licence plate is.  There is also metered parking on the streets and various other pay lots around the area due to the proliferation of medical buildings.  As well, there is good access by transit because it’s located along bus routes on W. Broadway.

We primarily come here for lunch and for the Shanghai Noodles, green onion pancake and Xiao Long Bau. 
I have had dinner here and must say that the authentic Northern dishes are my preference over the Cantonese style ones.  I like eating lunch here rather than dinner  because we like the good dim sum type Northern dishes, such as the dumplings and the breads.  I personally like deep fried Mantao (steamed bread) dipped in condensed milk.  It’s so good!