Spiced Up Evening - 峨嵋山庄-Emei Restaurant

November 24, 2011

峨嵋山庄 - Emei Restaurant, Philadelphia PA

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担担面

干煸四季豆

水煮鱼

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So when it comes to Chinese restaurants, there tends to be many many dishes on the table, all meant for sharing. Thus, it leaves me too many photos and too many posts if I am writing about individual dishes. Therefore, I shall resort to reviewing everything in one post - if I can fit it in!

峨嵋山庄 started out 小菜（花生米&泡菜） with for everyone. Kind of cute, if you ask me. It was the most formal Szechuan restaurant we could find in Chinatown and the few reviews it had were quite positive.

Their 担担面 was, according to Dad, quite authentic - as authentic as you can get with Philadelphia anyways. The spice and numbness of the sauce was great, and the skinny noodles slippery and tender. I would have preferred more vegetables, though. And more of the meat and sauce. This is usually the case with noodles in a restaurant.

Their 干煸四季豆 was not authentic, partially because it is not really a Szechuan dish. Nonetheless, they fried the beans and it was not spicy which pleased Dad.

Finally, their 水煮鱼 was not authentic either.

It had bok choy and celery on the bottom, instead of the usual yellow bean sprouts.

The soup is supposed to be watery with spicy chili oil but this was more spicy sauce and corn starch. The fish was fried too, instead of boiled. Regardless of authenticity, however, the fish was tender and the flavor was good. Who really cares whether it is authentic, as long as it tastes good right?

I have to say, reading reviews online helped so much in picking restaurants for the day. After three months of non-real food, this day was a huge improvement. Very spicy and satisfying.