UCLA Daily Bruin Reports Cavalry Rescuing Northern Cafe

Article says extra employees hired. Also some more interesting background.

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Spelling police here: You don’t mean the place where Jesus was crucified, right?

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Interesting, article says they make dumplings in-house, not at central location per @ipsedixit. Less of an excuse for when the dumplings aren’t that great
?

Now, that would be interesting. A new restaurant called Calvary & Golgotha.

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I didn’t make that up. It was from the Eater article that you linked to in the other thread about Northern Cafe.

From the Eater article:

When stepping up to the counter to order, it won’t take long to figure out the focus. Right below the restaurant’s exposed wood rafters, you’ll see a series of photos of the dumpling making process. Northern Cafe sells 10 varieties of dumplings that are hand-made at the owner’s Temple City restaurant, which has a larger kitchen.

Oops, sorry. I actually glossed over that part of the Eater article and just remembered you mentioning it in the other thread. My bad.

Worthy of divine intervention


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 and most happily, I report an UPHILL alert for Northern Cafe in Westwood Village. As it relates to the original thread title: Consider them rescued (and thriving). This place gets busy!

The oft-ignored Beijing beef pie AKA ‘Peking meat pie’ here (beef rolls gets much more hype) is, for me, pretty much SPOT ON in flavor, both in the crust and the filling. Damn good eats.

AND the egg and chive pancake is likewise trip-worthy for brunch. I took 2 orders of this stuff home just so I can heat it up for breakfast.

The management is keeping the place clean, and service is good too. They’ve added a “cold appetizers” display, and all cash transaction are 5% off.

This, along with the rise of Little Fatty, all mean there is now very little reason for us lazy Westsiders to go to ROC Kitchen anymore for our non-SGV fix for this sort of Chinese fare.

It’s all too often we report downhill slides on this site; I’m elated to be bucking the trend here.

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excellent stuff
I went the first week and was underwhelmed but there has been a major improvement.
Peking meat pie and pork/fennel dumplings were excellent.
Also new to me on this visit - you gotta love the table-side Lao Gan Ma Chili w/black beans

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If only they would sell chili crisp.

A very tasty bowl of beef noodle soup at Northern Cafe in Westwood.

The cucumbers were good, too. This place is so inexpensive, and it is packed on Monday at lunch. I like it more than Qin West.

So is this place serving a combination of Sichuan and Taiwanese food? I’m still trying to figure out which dishes come from where.

Don’t waste you time trying to decipher provenance of the dishes there.
It is a decent, generic noodle/dumpling house with some dishes from many parts of China.
But nothing is really Sichuan, Taiwanese, or Northern.

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Regional lines are blurring. That’s the topic of my next article coming out in a couple of weeks.

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Yes. Said much more succinctly than I did.

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I am very much looking forward to that article.

Agree on there being no need to ponder the minutiae regarding origins and ramifications of éș”食 (roughly translated: noodle, or wheat-based, foods). Just be thankful it’s on the Westside, and that it’s authentic-tasting, scrumptious chow. For the past few months, Northern Cafe has been batting cleanup on my regular rotation. I often bang bang it with Lamonica’s next door.

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How much of that is cashing in on the Sichuan trend?

More about demographics, though there are multiple causes.

Yeah. I like the Crispy one with Peanuts better than the Black Bean they carry!

–Dommy!