Noodles at Kam Hong Garden (MPK)
Thursday, May 1, 2008 19:43To passerbyers, Kam Hong Garden isn’t much to look at. It’s in its own little corner of a little strip mall and upon entering it, I thought that it looked a little too clean and sterile to be a delicious noodle-house in the SGV. Luckily, I was proven wrong.
The waiters at Kam Hong were pleasant and accommodating to the vegan in our group, which is always a plus. Most of the noodle dishes on the menu gives you the option of ordering hand-shaved (dao xiao), hand-pulled (shou la), and sometimes even rice ovals (nien gao). I prefer hand-pulled noodles in fried dishes and hand-shaved noodles in soup dishes.
We ordered a couple of appetizers first. The green onion pancake (vegan) was alright when it first came out of the kitchen, but soon lost its crispness. It didn’t have as much green onion as I usually like, so I would probably skip ordering this next time.
The beef wraps however, were a lot better compared to the green onion pancakes. The paste inside was the right amount of savory and sweetness and the slices of beef were tender. I’m not a big fan of cilantro, but I didn’t mind it being in this dish. The cucumbers made the wraps even more refreshing.
Maybe it was a mistake to order xiao long bao here, but they were a bit disappointing. The wrapper was nice and chewy, but the meat filling and soup inside was too salty and lacked the savory taste that restaurants known for their xlb’s had.
After the appetizers, it was time for the stars of the restaurant to shine. The BF ordered the stir fried hand-shaved noodles (vegan). The dish had a great wok chi taste and the noodles were satisfying and chewy.
We also ordered jia-jian mien (vegan) which is cold noodles with black-bean sauce. The toppings vary, but this place put in julienned vegetables. I don’t think the regular version is vegan, but you can ask them to do it vegan and they’ll probably leave out the hard-boiled egg. I didn’t actually try this dish, but everyone else at the table seemed to like it.
I saved writing about the best dish for last. The shanxi noodle soup (the first thing item under the noodle soup section on the menu) was so good, I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of it. The first time I had it, I ordered it with hand-pulled noodles and it tasted good. The second time I ordered it with hand-shaved noodles and it was delicious. I still can’t stop thinking about the noodles’ chewy texture and the soup’s beefy broth. The dish also has slices of beef and kombu in it, but the noodles and broth are the stars. A splash of black vinegar into the soup perfected it.
While it’s no Heavy Noodling (RIP), Kam Hong Garden does a good enough job with its handmade noodles to satisfy my craving.
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Kam Hong Garden
848 E Garvey Ave
Monterey Park, CA 91755
Louise absolutely LOVES filthy, cheap places! (See more of her posts). You can also find more of Louise's writing at her own website NakedSushi.
MaxMillion says:
May 2nd, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Very nice review.
What’s the difference between hand-shaved (dao xiao) and hand-pulled (shou la) noodles?
Will says:
May 3rd, 2008 at 9:03 am
Dao xiao (knife cut) are shaved off a ball of dough with a knife. They’re wide, thick, and chewy.
Shou la (hand pulled) are longer and thinner (but still chewy); the process for making them involves taking a single piece of dough, stretching it out, and doubling it over on itself; over time, it turns into increasingly thinner noodles. This is easier to understand if you watch someone doing it, either in person or on a video.
Someone on Chowhound said that the hand kneaded, machine cut noodles (not sure if these are shou gan mian or something else) at Kam Hong are really good too, and sometimes chewier than the dao xiao. I haven’t tried them yet.
(search youtube if you want to see a video of either method).
TonyC says:
October 29th, 2008 at 9:06 pm
someone above was me. lolz.
Hand-pulled noodles tend to be thinner, very stringy. It’s hard to cook them al dente. The hand knead / machine cut have the shape of wide noodles, but are thicker. If Kam Hong still has ‘em, they’re the ones to get. They’re even better prepped than knife cut because the knife cut noodles might end up being overdone as the cook wants to make sure they’re not too chewy.
Either way, Kam Hong just didn’t have the soup base down the times I’ve visited…