Tokyo Fried Chicken Co. Soft Opening

Tokyo Fried Chicken Company is the successor to The Open Door. The restaurant still has the same owner and staff, but they decided to do a complete 180 on their previous food and theme. The restaurant is currently still in its soft opening stage.

 The chicken is similar to chicken karaage. It is marinated in soy sauce, ginger and garlic and fried in rice bran oil. Diners each receive a plastic glove for the chicken so that your hands don’t get dirty.

The fried chicken dinner set for two which comes with two legs, two wings, two thighs, steamed chicken rice,  pickled cabbage, and your choice of two sides. They offer regular sides and “premium” sides for an additional charge.

For my sides, I ordered curried creamed corn and mac and cheese. The mac and cheese was pretty tasty. There are also other unique items such as collard greens, truffle tater tots, truffle-butter edamame, and shisito peppers. 

 Each table has several different sauces to complement the chicken. There is the standard  ponzu and  spicy ponzu as well as the sauces they are testing out before their grand opening. I was given a yuzu sauce and a sweet and sour sauce. 

Although the chicken was succulent, I didn’t think it lived up to the hype. For me, the chicken had to be dipped in massive amounts of sauce to have flavor. The chicken alone was bland. Sauces should complement the chicken, not require them.  

For a two person set, it is approximately $25 without alcohol before tax and tip. Overall my impression of the restaurant was so-so. I was such a big fan of The Open Door, that maybe I would give them another chance. Plus, they have fried chicken skin, which sounds amazing. Also, TFC has imported popsicles from Japan. 

Happy Eatings!

R.I.P. The Open Door

122 S Atlantic Blvd
Monterey Park, CA 91754

Cantonese Goodness

New Lucky has long been a staple of excellent Cantonese cuisine. I’ve posted about their amazing geoduck done two ways before, and here are some of my other favorite dishes from here. New Lucky’s Winter melon soup is one of the best I’ve ever had outside of Asia. It can feed at least 10 people. Call to reserve your winter melon soup because they do run out! 

 Cold appetizer of spicy and garlic cucumber.

 Our winter melon soup!

 Our winter melon soup!

 Our winter melon soup!

 Salty duck yolk fried pumpkin sticks.

beef stew.

 Green bean pumpkin dessert. 

Chiu Chow dessert with ginko and taro. 

Happy Eatings!

415 W Garvey Ave

Monterey Park, CA 91754

I Ate Bambi

Ha Tien Quan,but there are many unique Vietnamese dishes at this restaurant that are not typically found at Vietnamese restaurants. One of the more fun bizarre food dishes I recently had there was Deer sate noodle soup. Yup, I ate Bambi. Sorry. 

Deer is very lean with minimal fat. It is more favorable. If you’ve never had deer, the closest way to describe would be that it has a similar texture to lamb, but tastes like a more flavorful beef.

Would you go have deer?

529 E Valley Blvd

San Gabriel, CA 91776

Go Big or Go Home! Brick Toast Edition!

My dessert last night. Go big or go home! A teddy bear brick toast with layers of ice cream, fruits, chocolate, and cookies scattered throughout the monstrosity! Can you hang?



534 E Valley Blvd
San Gabriel, CA 91776

Happy Eatings! 

Japanese Fusion Food

Bust out your wallet because this post is a little on the pricer side!

The Open Door is a small Izakaya-style (tapas/small plates) Japanese restaurant in Diamond Plaza. It can get pretty pricy, but if you love Honda-Ya or Furaibo, then TOD will absolutely blow you away. Seating is limited and TOD has some awkward hours. So beware! FYI, they’re only open for dinner. They're also closed Monday and Tuesday. Since Open Door likes to switch up their menu frequently, I like to pop in periodically to try out new dishes. Here are just some of the dishes I've tried. 

 Whitefish with Yuzu sauce 

 Oil seared scallop with chives, cherry tomatoes, and garlic. 

 Edamame Vichyssoise with uni and quail egg.

 Beef tongue carpa with chimichurri & crostini.

 Beef Tataki 

Tuna on crispy rice sushi. 

Two sashimis in one! Uni on scallop sashimi. 

 Salmon sashimi.

Clams.

 Fried soft-shelled shrimp.

Japanese shishito peppers. 

 Bone Marrow.

 Pork belly – which came with a little fried pork skin on top.  It comes with a poached egg which you need to mix and pour over each piece.

Beef Stonepot Rice.

Yes, The Open Door seems a little out of place in Monterey Park perhaps, even to the point of being a tad pretentious for the San Gabriel Valley. They also have Happy Hour for cheaper prices!

If you like watching the game, then this may be perfect for you. They have a good happy hour, decent parking, and allow  you to store your unfinished bottles of alcohol. I loved how they had typical tapas dishes for the people in my party that didn’t like to try anything out of the ordinary and more of the unique dishes for the more outrageous eaters like me.

122 S Atlantic Blvd

Monterey Park, CA 91754

I'm Featured on Huffington Post. Take a Look!

A preview of the video. I promise that it's all sorts of crazy. 

(Click to see the video for 'How to Eat a Xiao Long Bao').

Huffington Post also picked up the video and wrote an article about it. Click here to read it! Thanks for watching and reading!

Happy Eatings! 

Dongbu Live Fish

 Dongbu Live Fish is a small, family-run restaurant located in a small Rowland Heights strip mall. The specialty at Dongbu is hwal uh, which refers to the Korean-style sashimi.

Upon entering the small restaurant, you see live fish and other sea creatures swimming in saltwater tanks. Although Dongbu’s menu is filled sushi and other items, the star of the show is the live halibut sashimi. It comes in four sizes from x-small to large. The XS is $65. Don’t trust the size! It is a lot of food since it comes with multiple other dishes. An XS could probably feed three people.

 Our meal started with quail eggs, edamame, and an array of Korean condiments to accompany our appetizers. Next came soup and salad. The salad was like a cole slaw with a sweet vinaigrette sauce. It also had roe and halibut and tossed inside as well. The star of the show of course is the freshly caught halibut. It is served on an ice platter. The sashimi tastes extremely fresh. We also wrapped the halibut in the lettuce leaves provided.  Accompanying the halibut platter were eight additional dishes. The raw abalone was a bit chewy. The naengmyeon aka cold noodle was one of my faveorites. It had salmon, halibut, fruits, and cabbage all mixed in with a kick of spice! 

Next they brought out baked mussels with imitation crab. We also had shrimp and fried sardines as well. The macakrel was grilled really nicely. The skin was perfectly crispy. The meal ended up another bowl of soup. This soup to end the meal was a spicy fish soup.

The service was exceptional. The entire family was so nice and accomdating. Despite the small parking lot, there are a few spaces reserved for Dongbu customers so make sure to check before you go parking across the street. Enjoy!

18785 Colima Rd.

Rowland Heights, CA 91748

Hot Pot for Chilly Nights!

My good friend visiting from San Diego insisted on going to Boiling Point. She loves that place! Unfortunately, by the time she got to my house it was already 7:30 pm and we knew that the line for BP would be going out the door.

It’s getting chilly these nights so what better way to stay warm than with some hotpot?

I took her to Lu Gi in San Gabriel instead and we ended up quite happy with that decision. Yes it was more expensive thanBP or Jazz Cat, but it was nice having a more traditional hot pot versus the individual pots since those are preset with ingredients.

 The sauces

 The garlic scallion was my fave!

 ribeye

 pig's blood

 rice cakes

veggies

quail eggs and fish dumplings 

We got the ying yang broth with half spicy and half non-spicy. We chose ribeye, rice cakes, quail egg, pork blood, fish dumplings, veggies, and some other small appetizers here and there. The total came out to $38 for the two of us, which also included 3 drinks.

There are an abundance of different sauces at Lu Gi. By the end of the night, our table was filled with more sauces than actual food! I absolutely loved the garlic and scallion sauce! Yum! I drenched all my food in that. 

Happy Eatings!

539 W Valley Blvd

San Gabriel, CA 91776