Monday, May 28, 2007

Szechuan Garden

There are restaurants that claim they have Szechuan cuisine, and there are some that serve true authentic Szechuan food. Szechuan Garden (川香園)is such a place.

It's located 1275 East 8600 South in Sandy, which is at the northwest corner of 1300 East and 8600 South. The owner and head chef Meng "is one of the few highest-ranking masters in China. He has won the silver & bronze medal in National Cookery Competition in China. He is also a lifetime judge of the National Ranking chef test in the Szechuan Province." (Restaurants.com)

Stick with the front couple pages of the menu if you want real authentic Szechuan food... or ask for recommendations from the owners. There were dishes that I would not personally ever try, and I realized I might have been misssing out, but I would never eat rabbits, even though those spicy rabbit chunks are famous and popular among Szechuan natives and authentic Szechuan food connoisseur.

I ordered in Chinese, based partly on what the owner's wife recommended, so I'm not completely sure of their English names; We had the Happy Couple, pan fried cake, spicy thread noodles, and fish chunks in hot bean sauce. Interesting to say, except for the pan fried cake, these were all spicy dishes, but they were all different, and very flavorful, and NOT your typical "wow, it's soooo spicy! I can't taste anything!" sort of Szechuan food.

I question Szechuan Garden's location, but apparently it has enough followings it's doing all right. I'd recommend it to people who want spicy and very flavorful authentic Szechuan cuisine.

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