THE BITE: On a recent night I sat down for dinner at Chop Stix (3790 Nostrand Avenue, between Avenue Y and Avenue Z) with my friend Ned. Ned likes to joke about whenever someone eats in a Chinese restaurant that they spend a lot of time looking over the encyclopedic menu before ordering the same thing they always eat. Determined to prove him wrong, I suggested that we order the fried octopus leg appetizer ($6.95). We both laughed at my suggestion.
When the waiter came to take our order, I ordered Kung Po Chicken. Yes, I was trying something new; well, not exactly new, but not of my routine. When the waiter turned to Ned, he ordered his main dish, which was his default Chinese restaurant order, and then said, “and an order of the fried octopus.” This surprised me. I thought he knew I was joking with my suggestion.
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I’ll just come out and say it: I love Chop Stix. My girlfriend and I first tried their delicious food at A Taste of Sheepshead Bay event this past October, and their broccoli and chicken dish was easily one of the most memorable and satisfying bites we had that night. In light of that experience, it actually came as no surprise to me that Chop Stix made the New York Daily News’ list of the city’s best General Tso’s Chicken.
Chop Stix, located at 3790 Nostrand Avenue, is run by Chef George Wong and the Daily News tried to get at Wong’s secrets, but he wasn’t biting:
According to Wong, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, the secret to his General Tso’s chicken is the fresh snow peas, peppers, broccoli, baby corn and watercress he uses to accompany the dish. But it’s the sauce that is the most impressive. Wong won’t reveal what’s in it but admits that he lets it ferment for at least a week so “the ingredients mix in harmony.”
Keep your secrets, Mr. Wong, but keep serving up some of the best Asian cuisine in all of Brooklyn.
Photo by Lenny Markh
THE BITE: I like to eat where our readers send me. I’ve had some interesting recommendations in the past couple of years, but this is the first time I had a recommendation from a reader who also follows Serious Eats. Not only does he follow Serious Eats, he follows recipes from my friend and fellow food writer, James Boo. This elusive reader has such high regards for the lowly scallion pancake, he actually makes them at home using James’ recipe.
This reader, who will remain anonymous at his request, highly recommended the scallion pancakes at New Star Restaurant (2212 Avenue X – between East 21 and East 22 Streets) which happens to be walking distance from my home.
Oddly, I had never been to this restaurant. Of course, I had to go.
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THE BITE: This week the Bite breaks new ground and lets you take a peak into the sausage factory. Usually we spend the week sampling various foods for the Bite and try to only bring you the best the neighborhood has to offer. Today, we bring four of the neighborhood’s Cha siu bao offerings, better known as the pork bun, into the office for a showdown.
Let’s meet the four contenders..
- Bing Bakery – 1415 Gravesend Neck Road – $0.80.
- Bliss Bakery – 1412 Avenue U – $1.00.
- Good Family Bakery – 1317 Avenue U – $0.90.
- L & U Bakery – 1405 Avenue U – $0.70.
Before we get started, let’s set some ground rules here. One: this is not a definitive guide to Cha Siu Bao. Not every Chinese bakery in the neighborhood will be represented. There’e no bias here. These buns were purchased in the normal course of my day, while conducting other important business for Sheepshead Bites. If I passed a Chinese bakery, pork buns were purchased. Two: all of these pork buns were purchased on Tuesday afternoon around 3:00 p.m. A few of the bakeries were sold out of Cha Siu Bao by that time. Three: the Chinese Bakery owners and staff were not aware of this impending shoot out.
Once back at the office, all of the buns were weighed, sliced open, photographed and tasted. Now, here at the Bite, we’re not experts in Chinese food, but we know what we like. So here’s what we’re looking for: a light, chewy bun with a texture very similar to hallah. The pork filling should be tender, moist and bursting with flavor – after all, the diced pork is usually mixed into a syrupy mixture of oyster sauce, hoisin sauce, roasted sesame seed oil, rice vinegar, shaoxing wine or dry sherry, soy sauce, sugar and cornstarch. The bun should have a nice meat-to-bread ratio, with meat in every bite.
Read on to find out the results of the Buns Off Challenge!
Photo by Randy Contello
Kung Fu Tea – sporting some very cool signage – is now open at 1422 Avenue U.
The business is apparently a part of a local chain, and a quick Google search turns up locations around the city, including the East Village, Chinatown and Flushing – not to mention one of the dumbest Youtube videos of all time (we ain’t linking it).
The business opened last Thursday, December 15, replacing Best Stop Wireless.
Welcome back to The Bite, Sheepshead Bites’ weekly column where we explore the foodstuffs of Sheepshead Bay. Each week we check out a different offering from one of the many restaurants, delis, food carts, bakeries, butchers, fish mongers, or grocers in our neighborhood. If it’s edible, we’ll take a bite.
Back in the early 1980s, I was working in a small architectural firm in the city. One of my duties was working out the public assembly plans for most of the Chinese restaurants in Chinatown. At lunch time or at the end of the day, the owners would treat me like an honored guest by rolling out their best dishes for me to sample. After my third restaurant or so, I noticed a pattern. On my first visit, the owners would offer me something safe, something they knew this white boy from Long Island could handle. By my third or fourth visit, I’d be feasting on the true delicacies of Chinese cuisine; jelly fish, chicken feet, shark fin soup, eel, stinky tofu, thousand year old eggs and things I still can’t identify.
One aspect of Chinese cuisine eluded me — the Chinese bakery. With so many restaurants offering me their best dishes, the store front bakeries of Chinatown held no appeal. My friends in the business told me to stay out — saying that the bakeries “were like our McDonald’s.”
I took them at their word — I stayed out. That attitude stayed with me for many years. It wan’t until recently that I even set foot into one of the many Chinese bakeries in our area. I admit it, I was a snob.
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THE BITE: We’ve covered Buffalo wings previously on The Bite, but we’ve never taken on “Famous Buffalo Wings” before. So today, we head to the outer reaches of Sheepshead Bay for the “best Buffalo wings on Staten Island. ” No, we didn’t actually go to Staten Island, we drove over to Marine Park. Confused yet? Hold on. It gets worse. I’ll try to explain it as clearly as I can.
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Welcome back to The Bite, Sheepshead Bites’ weekly column where we explore the foodstuffs of Sheepshead Bay. Each week we check out a different offering from one of the many restaurants, delis, food carts, bakeries, butchers, fish mongers, or grocers in our neighborhood. If it’s edible, we’ll take a bite.
This week The Bite samples one of the most suspect meal deals around – the “lunch special.” You know the meal I’m talking about. Soup or egg roll, pork fried or white rice and an entrée. It’s ubiquitous to the Chinese restaurant industry. High-end or low-end restaurant, it doesn’t matter. Somewhere on the menu, you’ll find the “special lunch menu.” Oh, some places change the offerings a little bit by adding soda or salad as options. More health conscience establishments may add brown rice, but its all the same.
Join me now as I take on Mr. Tang Coney Island Kitchen’s “Special Luncheon Menu’s” Orange Chicken, with pork fried rice. At Mr. Tang’s, the offerings are soup or soda, pork fried rice or white rice and the entrée. I usually go with the spicy dishes, so Orange Chicken ($5.35) was my choice. No soup for me! A diet coke completed my meal as it was 90 degrees outside and Mr. Tang’s dining room wasn’t air conditioned.
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And now for something completely different...
Welcome back to The Bite, Sheepshead Bites’ weekly column where we explore the foodstuffs of Sheepshead Bay. Each week we check out a different offering from one of the many restaurants, delis, food carts, bakeries, butchers, fish mongers, or grocers in our neighborhood. If it’s edible, we’ll take a bite.
Take a moment to re-read that last line of The Bite’s intro blurb. “If it’s edible, we’ll take a bite.” When Robert and I conceived of The Bite, it wasn’t to be just prepared foods served at restaurants and cafes, but also bottled and canned goods and other assorted comestibles unique to the area’s ethnic grocers. So, with more than a dozen great reviews of traditional foods under our belt, I began harassing Robert to try something a little more… fringe. On a visit to New York Mart yesterday, I told him that if he wanted to keep his job he’d eat and review whatever I bought him. To warm him up to the idea, I said I’d eat it, too. Below is his writeup. My thoughts are in parenthesis. – Ned.
Find out what we thought about the canned roasted eel we purchased from New York Mart.
Welcome back to The Bite, Sheepshead Bites’ weekly column where we explore the foodstuffs of Sheepshead Bay. Each week we check out a different offering from one of the many restaurants, delis, food carts, bakeries, butchers, fish mongers, or grocers in our neighborhood. If it’s edible, we’ll take a bite.
Avenue U west of Ocean Avenue has a reputation among the foodies of NYC as being Brooklyn’s “Mini China Town.” Only Sunset Park’s “China Town” surpasses our neighborhood in size, but I believe our restaurants and markets are much better. Maybe I’m biased?
Stroll along the avenue and you’ll find Chinese bakeries, markets, stores and restaurants. Many of the store signs are in Chinese, leaving this guilo wondering what wonders await inside.
Today I followed my nose and stepped into L & U Cafe for a quick bite – a Cha Siu Baau or BBQ Pork Bun. Hmm, did someone say BBQ?
BBQ Pork – Who could ask for more?
