Mangosteen Preview – Fresno

During spring break, my friend asked me if I wanted to help taste test her cousin’s/uncle’s (Asian family structures are convoluted) new restaurant, Mangosteen, which is taking over the former Kim’s Vietnamese space. When posed with a question concerning free food, how can I answer with anything other than a “HELL YEAH!”? I guess I could say “I would be positively delighted!” But I wasn’t feeling particularly dainty. So hell yeah to free food it is.

While I thought this would be some awesome free multi-course feast of tasting, we were only presented with two dishes: jiggling(?) beef and drunken chicken. While it wasn’t the feast I expected, I was still happy to get free food. Besides, I had already had one lunch less than 2 hours before this tasting, so the belly was already bursting before I even arrived at Mangosteen.

Anyway, since this meal was free, and the restaurant is still tweaking its recipes, I’m not going to comment on the food. But there are pictures!

Perhaps this dish was called “shaking beef” and not jiggling beef. Yeah…that sounds less gross than jiggling.

Drunken chicken.

Mangosteen opens towards the end of April. Check it, yo.

Also, does anyone know what happened to the owners of Kim’s? Rumor has it that they’re planning to reopen in another location.

Post Test: Mental Winter Vacation Starts Now

“I ordered a large pizza and ate it by myself.”

That’s how my friend celebrated after finishing the test. My weekend was also similarly exciting, but sadly, it didn’t involve eating whole pizzas in one sitting (that sort of pick-me-up belongs in the week leading up to the test–I did eat three pies by myself in the few weeks before the test). No, this weekend was split up into blocks of eating, drinking, and recovering from the ginormous bouts of intense pain after eating and drinking. Many of my friends also merrily suffered through the same tortuous post-test weekend, but let me recount what I ate this weekend.

Friday. I don’t remember what I ate. I do remember drinking copious amounts of free beer at Sam’s and then Buffalo Billiards. Sort of. I will NEVER drink Bud Light Lime ever. Again. Even if it’s free. And now that I’m recalling that painful night, I’m pretty sure we went to McDougal’s for dinner. That fried chicken probably helped dampen the alcohol poisoning.

Saturday. I woke up with a headache. I sat up with an even bigger headache. And then I stood up and probably had a subarachnoid hemorrhage. I sat around drinking Gatorade until the pain dampened. Then I went to the Asian Cultural Festival with Noi. For some reason, I expected a lot of people my age there, basically something similar to a party without alcohol. And then I remembered that in the outside world, people outside of the 18-30 age range exist. I’m glad I didn’t show up inebriated.

I wanted to go because I thought it would be a good opportunity to sample food from different restaurants, effectively killing 10 birds with one stone. And while there was food, they were all homecooked, so I can’t really buy this food when I want, unless those families are reading this and willing to deliver homecooked food in return for compensation. Any takers? I sampled a lot of meats on sticks, a couple versions of rolls, and a stew–all from different Southeast Asian Nations. It’s all a mishmash now, but I did enjoy the “chic on stick.” It’s almost as good as Hotdog on a Stick.

The afternoon eating Asian foods was followed by another night of more drinking. Surprise, surprise.

Sunday. I woke up in the hurt box again. My experiment seeing if beer or liquor caused more pain ended in a draw. They both hurt. But it didn’t matter. Sunday was gonna be big: Noi was hosting a Thanksgiving potluck, and from what we talked about Saturday, I knew it was going to be a proper feast. I at a granola bar and hot pocket for lunch. At dinner, I knew I was going to probably consume an excess of 4000 calories.

The spread of food was quite impressive: two turkeys, one ham, cornbread dressing, sweet potato casserole, etc. Thanksgiving staples, for sure. However, we had appetizers first before we could eat dinner. There were dips galore–artichoke and cheese, and cheese and rotello–and bruschetta with cucumber and hummus.

The food was glorious. I love Thanksgiving; it’s my favorite holiday of the year. It’s even better when I can have multiple Thanksgivings. I gotta give big props to the Noi and the Barton house for putting on a delicious meal.

I know I didn’t talk about how the food tasted, but that’s not the purpose of this post; there’s not point talking about the merits of homecooked dishes if you can’t go out and buy it, right? Meh. I’ll talk about Boundry if you want to know how food tastes. I’m gonna go lie down and drink some more water.

Los Angeles Day 3: Kickin It Oldschool

On my third day, I hit up a couple places that I used to frequent while in college. My friend Donna picked me up so we could get some food and catch up on the past couple of years. The first stop was LA Chinatown–the one in downtown, not Monterey Park–for a giant bowl of pho at Pho 87. Pho 87 is hole in the wall with great tasting and unpretentious food. It was packed with out-of-Chinatowners even at 2pm on a Sunday afternoon, a testament to its deliciousness.

Since this would be my only Vietnamese meal for a couple months, I did as I did at Santouka: ordered a dangerously large amount of food. I started with a bowl of their special pho, which came with a variety of cow parts that reminded me of anatomy for some reason: tripe, tendon, flank, meatballs. And unlike the brown-water broths normally served in Nashville, the soup here exuded flavor which could only come about from hours of brewing no less than a dozen different ingredients.

I also ordered egg rolls for the both of us, but somehow I was the only one eating them. I had five out of eight pieces, to be specific.

I finished up with a glass of che 3 mau, a concoction of beans and jellies in coconut milk. It’s really more of a dessert than a drink, but every place always serves this as a drink. After finishing my bowl of noodles, egg rolls, and che 3 mau, I felt a sudden urge to urinate (I did drink a lot of fluid, after all). It was when I finally stood up after eating that I realized just how much I ate: my abdomen began to contract, trying hard to contain all that I ate to prevent my stomach from bursting out a la Aliens.

It was painful.

I never thought I would throw up from eating so much. And I wasn’t going to anytime soon. I suggested to Donna that we kick it and meander around Chinatown.

Chinatown is one of the most underrated hangouts in Los Angeles. Sure, it’s a huge tourist spot during the day, but it doesn’t compare to New York’s Chinatown; you won’t find counterfeits here. During my years tutoring at Castelar Elementary School, it was only during my last year at USC that I discovered the art galleries and hipster shops in between antique shops. There’s also a pretty chill nightlife. And the architecture is pretty awesome. It’s like walking around an brightly colored Asian themepark.

I came back with baked goods–egg tarts–despite my stomach ache. And I ate them. They were creamy, flaky and delightful.

That night, I went to Yai in Thai Town, another hidden gem/hole in the wall I only discovered during my senior year at USC. The food is cheap, plentiful, and made with some soul. Each dish tasted like someone’s mom or dad made it, albeit without as much love, because I don’t really know who made it, so there’s not much love there. But it’s still good!

Pad thai was at a happy medium in between neon orange and poo brown. It’s also tastier when it’s not either of those colors, too.

The panang here was leaps and bounds superior to the one I had on Friday, and any I’ve had in Nashville. The sauce was creamy and thick, much like a stew. I ordered this mild, but I probably should’ve asked for something spicier. Thai food just isn’t the same when I’m not reaching for a Thai tea to extinguish a fire in my mouth.

The beef salad I ordered did start a small fire, though. This was one of the more authentic dishes on the menu, with beef and red onions tossed in vinegar, chilis and rice powder. Usually beef salads tend to be overwhelmingly sour or spicy, but this was balanced, possibly from the rice powder? I’ve never had rice powder so I can’t say for sure.

It’s been a week since I almost ate myself into painful stomach ache oblivion, and I think I’m still suffering the consequences of eating that much. I don’t regret it, though. Somehow, eating until the verge of throwing up made me feel alive. So how do I feel about it now? I say, “Screw Ben Franklin and his quotes–I live to eat!“

A Week of Noodles

It’s not really a whole week of noodles. I didn’t even have all these dishes this week. But I needed an excuse to put up excessive pictures of food porn. As an added benefit to you, the reader, I’ll add in a quip for each dish, no extra charge!

My mom and I were home one night, and my told me to take my mom out for dinner so she wouldn’t have to go through the hassle of cooking just for two. As usual, we spent a long time debating where to go because there are very few places, as you may have noticed from reading this blog, that the family of fatties will go willingly. And so, after debating the choices, we decided to just stay home and make something simple. I found some packages of ramen and thought we could make some noodles really quickly and add some choice toppings. Unfortunately, it wasn’t ramen, but flat rice noodles, or he-fen. It didn’t really matter to me–after topping it with an egg, some green matter, seaweed, and some bbq pork, it was almost like ramen, except not as declious. But as a lesson to ya’ll, as long as you at least have eggs, seaweed (nori), and maybe green onions, you can make any instant ramen (note: when I say instant ramen, I mean high quality ramen that costs more than 10 cents a bag) into a hearty bowl of noodles.

On another night, she brought home a new noodle dish from our restaurant (China Bistro) for me to try. I think the literal translation is “bird’s nest noodles,” or something to that effect. They take some thin egg noodles and fry them into the shape of a ball/nest, and you’re supposed to dump a bunch of sauce and noodle accessories (i.e. meat and vegetables) to soften up the noodles. If you wait a minute, the noodles will have wilted a bit and safe for consumption. Though if you are more of a daredevil, you can choose to just eat crunchy noodles plus sauce right after combining them for more of a textural delight–crunchy and soft–if you’re willing to risk exposing the roof of your mouth to hundreds of sharp noodle-ends. I am one to do that.

I think it’s being sold as a limited-time special, so get it soon before we stop selling it. However, I think if there’s enough good response, we may make it a permanent menu item (that’s what my dad tells me).

This past week was my last week at work, and I will miss most aspect of it (not the part where I sit down for hours at a time reading about broken necks). But one of the perks I will miss most is the location to such great eats, like May’s Cafe and other keepin-it-real taco shacks. Without work, I wouldn’t really have a good reason to drive 10 miles across town to eat a 6 dollar bowl of noodles.

I’ve been getting bun a lot during the summer, and this time I switched up the toppings (exciting!) from shrimp and pork to egg rolls (super fried-tastic!). I didn’t expect the mountain of egg rolls, but I like cha gao, so I didn’t have problems with the mountain or fried-ness.

And thus ends the week of noodles. It was a good week.

Addresses!

May’s Cafe

2327 N Fresno St # 102

Fresno, CA

(559) 225-7990‎

China Bistro

2021 W Bullard Ave

Fresno, CA

(559) 447-8399‎

Kim’s Seafood

Kim’s has a pretty long history in Fresno. When I say long history, though, I’m talking in relation to the past few decades, starting from right before Fresno experienced its boom in growth around the mid 1990s. Kim’s didn’t use to be about Seafood. It used to be known as Kim’s Vietnamese before, and it also used to be located at Shaw and Maroa. That all changed when a huge fire charred its innards and the restaurant had to be rebuilt from the inside out. Back then, Kim’s Vietnamese had a pretty good crowd every time I visited. Even with the fire, and with the time it took to be rebuilt, there were always people eating at Kim’s. That was back when I’d like to think my prepubescent mind was slightly capable of pondering the future of Vietnamese food, and possibly ethnic food in general, in North Fresno. Those were the days. Anything could happen! But then Kim’s moved to its current location across from the mall, just a few miles down the road. It was still the same food, just in a bigger and fancier location. Yet the crowds dwindled. Then they changed their name and changed their menu (not a good sign). When I ate there recently, it was empty–we even had to try for a few minutes to find somebody in the restaurant just to seat us. Just what happened?

Maybe I was right. Fresno has become more and more bland in their choices of cuisines. Vietnamese is being phased out of peoples’ palates.

Fortunately, the slowing business at Kim’s has affected their food…too much. For a really quick lunch, we ordered dishes that we have come to known and love.

We started out with an order of shrimp and pork rolls. Four giant rolls of rice noodles, bean sprouts, shrimp, barbecue pork, and lettuce and wrapped inside rice paper and cut in half. It’s served with a side of peanut sauce, which is basically liquid peanut butter with some spices and topped with carrots and crushed peanuts. I’ve been eating these ever since I’ve been eating Vietnamese food. They’re always good, have a light taste with some meatiness and some crunch. It’s a light appetizer, unless of course, you’re like me and eat 5 pieces before the main course.

The hot beef salad is basically an average salad with run of the mill pieces of veggies, topped with sauteed beef. The beef is a little chewy, and is slightly spicy and citrus-y. I don’t like the scant ratio of beef to salad, but then again, if there were more beef, it wouldn’t really be a salad, would it?

To finish lunch, we ordered Thai style pan fried noodles, or what used to be known as pan fried rice noodles. Why call it Thai style? Is it because everyone and their mom in north Fresno loves Thai food now (a couple years ago, no one knew about Thai food, and now there’s a place on every other block), or because it really is a different dish? It tastes the same as the ones I’ve had in years past. And it’s definitely not pad thai. Maybe it is because everyone is familiar with Thai food now. Anyway, it’s usually a good dish, but this time the noodles were a couple minutes short of al dente. These were like half raw noodles, and I felt like they were going to expand in my stomach after soaking up gastric juices and cooking more. The noodles could’ve used a couple more minutes in the pot before being mixed with the other contents.

It’s sad to see restaurants become shells of what they used to be. Who know? I may be wrong about Kim’s; they could be doing extremely well and we could’ve just gone at an off time, but judging by the loss of staff and the condition of the restaurant, I can’t help but wonder. I really like the place, and hope it doesn’t go the way of culinary diversity in Fresno.

Kim’s Seafood

4965 N Fresno St

Fresno, CA

(559) 225-0406‎

May’s Cafe

I’ve been told that I’m quite harsh on the Fresno dining scene, if it even is a scene. And I admit that I can be snobby at times, but maybe that’s because unlike many people I’ve talked to, I don’t consider Cheesecake Factory to have good food. Hell, I don’t even like the way they make their cheesecakes, and that’s supposed to be their specialty. There are, in fact, very few places in Fresno that I would willingly frequent on a regular basis, and May’s Cafe is one of them. It’s just a shame that May’s is so far from Northeast Fresno. You see, May’s serves primarily Vietnamese food, a cuisine that has been slowly disappearing from North Fresno over the years, but there were very few in this part of town to begin with. As a kid, I remember always going to Saigon Palace on Palm and Herndon to eat their pho, starting each meal with a shrimp and pork roll and capping it off with flan for dessert. They closed quite a while ago. Kim’s is still on Shaw, although it’s moved from Shaw and Maroa to Shaw and Fresno. But’s it’s still quite a drive. Regardless, the point is that for some reason, Vietnamese cuisine has disappeared from this part of the city, and has been replaced by restaurants like Claim Jumper, CPK, Cheesecake Factory, and Logan’s Roadhouse, to name a few. So while it’s not difficult for me to get an expensive burger or overpriced pasta dish, I would rather drive 10 miles, even in light of high gas prices, for May’s.

What makes it so special? Let’s start with the pho, a noodle soup dish that uses primarily beef stock and beef products. The soup base has a surprising amount of depth of flavor composed of beef, spices, and most importantly, MSG. It’s not as bad as they say it is; it’s just a salt, like sea salt, but infinitely tastier. It’s what gives the soup it’s extra umph. Add in rice noodles, select cuts of beef, and maybe some beef balls (meatballs essentially), along with bean sprouts, some onions, a squeeze of lime juice, and maybe some sriracha sauce, and you have a dish that can be eaten on a cold winter’s night or a hot summer’s day. It’s refreshing, it’s addictive, and it’s because the soup is just able to mesh everything together so well when you stick a spoonful of everything in your mouth at once. Now, I once had a batch of pho where the soup wasn’t as tasty, but it’s highly unlikely that it is. And if such a thing happens, there are other dishes that even my family didn’t know about until I introduced them.

Another dish that they do quite well, and one that I haven’t seen done in Fresno, is bun (pronounced “bwun”), a dish more suited to summer, comprised of rice noodles, bean sprouts, shredded lettuce, your choice of pork, shrimp, or egg rolls, all topped with a fish sauce (it sounds gross, but tastes heavenly). Once my family tasted this, they’ve been ordering it everytime they visit. It’s like a mix between salad and noodles, almost like a cold version of chow mein, but entirely unique. And the fish sauce–yes, I believe it’s made from parts of fish no one wants to hear about, but there’s not fishy taste at all, it’s more vinegary than anything, so imagine a slightly sweet vinegrette–also adds an addictive quality to the dish as well.

The last thing that we ordered this time we were there was a Chinese dish, combination chow fun, broad and flat rice noodles stir fried with everything that you can imagine in a combination Chinese dish. It’s probably one of the best chow funs I’ve ever had in my life, and that’s comparing it to dishes I’ve had in Norcal, Socal, and Asia. One of the main criteria for excellent chow fun is that each noodle has to be coated lightly in sauce, and not stuck to each other in stacks in the dish. The chow fun isn’t perfect, but it comes close. The sauce coats most of the noodles, which are mostly separated, and the dish isn’t too saucy or too salty like other versions I’ve had.

There are many other Vietnamese dishes that they serve here that I haven’t seen served at other Vietnamese restaurants in Fresno, and in my honest opinion, we’re quite lucky to have May’s Cafe in Fresno because it’s probably the next best thing to driving to Los Angeles Chinatown or Westminster for Vietnamese, and I’d gladly choose driving 10 miles over 230 miles any day.

May Cafe To Go

2327 N Fresno St # 102

Fresno, CA

(559) 225-7990