Great, t’anx!
I told a friend who works close to Capital Seafood about it. She ate there and said the food was tasty.
Also, she has food allergies. Her highest allergy is to shrimp. She said that it was easy to communicate with the employees about which foods did and didn’t contain shrimp.
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I’ve never been to a dim sum restaurant that didn’t have this dish. It’s one of my husband and my favorite so we almost always order it.
Why are you so fond of taking pot shots at the Westside? I’ve had way more “challenging” food than chicken knees on the Westside: snake sake, live sushi, bitter melon, yak milk cheese, shiokara and natto to name a few.
You commonly see a fried shrimp roll that matches the pic? My knowledge of SGV dim sum menus is hardly encyclopedic (and I normally don’t look for fried shrimp rolls), but that specific prep actually doesn’t look very familiar to me at all.
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Fried? I’ve never seen it fried period.
@chandavkl’s photo isn’t very clear, but I’m assuming that it is this dish. If it is the same dish, yes I’ve had it at pretty much every dim sum place I’ve visited. It’s always tasty, but my favorite version is at Elite.
Nanbankan serves chicken leg bone cartilage which I assume is the same as chicken knees. Nanbankan has been open and serving pretty much the same menu for decades.
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No, that’s a completely different dish. I think the fried shrimp roll is one of those dishes that wouldn’t make it on a dim sum cart and can only be served off of a menu. I’m thinking places like Elite, Lunasia etc. might have this dish.
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I don’t eat at dim sum restaurants that serve from carts.
Which explains why you’re more familiar with the dish than people who eat dim sum from carts.
I used to eat at a cart place until I realized that the food all tasted like old frying oil. The dim sum restaurants where you order from a menu have much fresher food to my taste.
One of many advantages of menu over cart. Can you imagine what a fried shrimp roll might be like after sitting for 30 minutes in a cart criss-crossing the dining room? Ditto for some of the more modern, creative dim sum offerings. And restaurant owners love menu dim sum because the aisles don’t have to be as wide to accommodate the carts so they can shove more tables in the restaurant. Nevertheless there are some dining purists who think carts are the only way to go because it’s such a tradition–a tradition that goes back all the way to the 1970s.
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I’m not a fan of tradition for tradition’s sake. For me, if something can be improved I’m all for it.
My first exposure to dim sum was Man Fook Low restaurant. My parents used to take my brother and me there when we were children. It wasn’t specifically a dim sum restaurant, but they had some dim sum dishes. This would have been in the 1960s/1970s. I don’t think they had carts, but this was a long time ago and we all know how memory fades.
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You’re right, it wasn’t a dim sum restaurant. Rather, back then (say pre-70s) dim sum was an auxiliary item and places like Man Fook Low had a take out window where you could take home your purchases in one of those pink boxes. Also if you’re talking 1950s and 1960s, there weren’t a whole lot of varieties of dim sum either. Offhand the only Man Fook Low varieties I remember when I was a kid was the giant steamed bbq pork bun, ha gow, siu mai and I believe the sticky glutinous rice pastry.
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I remember the pork buns. I quit eating meat in 1972 (when I was 12) and I was born in 1959, so I would have been eating at Man Fook Low in the 60s/early 70s. We didn’t use the take out window. There was a very nice waitperson named Alfred or Albert. Whenever possible we sat in his section.
I tried looking at on-line menus but often couldn’t find accompanying pics. They might have some variation of paste-like filling that’s been deep fried, but I would be surprised if they had the exact same version you had.
To all: friend and I are going for dinner tonight (11/16). Is there generally a wait at this place for dinner?
You might be interested in this 10 year long discussion thread about Man Fook Low that ran on the old Chowhound board.
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We have a fave place in Seattle that is carts but some things are prepared to order, i.e., hot fried items.