Doug called Christian last night wondering if we wanted to get together for dinner tonight, which we figured sure, what the hey. Doug’s request was for Chinese because he wanted pork fried rice. In thinking about places to go, I read about a Szechuan place in Malden called FuLoon. It got a Best of Boston award from Boston Magazine in 2009 (i.e. last year). In the same way that I found out about Chau Chow City from Boston Magazine, so I have now learned of FuLoon! The menu sounded really interesting, and reading more reviews made it sound like something we all definitely wanted to try, so off to Malden we went in the midst of a horrible rainstorm. We were seated quickly and took off our stinky, wet overcoats. I’d made some notes beforehand of stuff that I wanted to try, specifically garlic chicken wings, JingDu pork pancake, and wok baked beef. I also wanted dumplings because hey, dumplings. Who doesn’t like dumplings? Christian got pepper steak, Doug got tea smoked duck and pork fried rice. The first thing to come out were the dumplings. They may have been Chinese Spaghetti Factory dumplings, they may not have been; I don’t care if they weren’t made fresh right there because they were very good, came with a nice dipping sauce. The next thing to come out was the chicken wings, and holy crap, let me tell you something, those garlic chicken wings were a very wise choice. An enormous platter of fried wings covered in fried minced garlic, sichuan peppercorns, black beans, and dried red peppers. It was suggested to us by the hostess that we put the garlic on our rice. Holy moly. I could eat that on anything. The pork pancake was wonderful and was more or less like the way I’d seen it described: a scallion pancake stuffed with pork dumpling filling. That was served with black vinegar, also fantastic. The wok baked beef was as good as claimed, but I really enjoyed the black pepper steak that Christian got, which was super-tender all nestled on a bed of sauteed onion, all covered in black pepper. I didn’t try the duck, so no comment; it came with four little steamed buns, and I ate one of the buns, which reminded me a little of a communion wafer. The pork fried rice was nice and light and contained no magenta pieces of pork, but instead tender little slivers of pork with egg, bean sprout, and onion. Iron Chef Chen Kenichi would be proud. It was all-around fantastic, and I look forward to going again and trying something else. I believe the hype!

Tonight was the fourth time we’ve given the Friendly Toast in Kendall a shot at our dining dollars. So far, it’s been pretty inconsistent. I maintain that the one in Portsmouth  was better in terms of food quality, service, and consistency; husband says it was just as inconsistent The mojito milkshake in Portsmouth is full of lime, vanilla, and fresh mint flavor (or it was); the one in Cambridge tastes more like mouthwash-mint and has not even a hint of lime. We got our almond joy pancakes in two shifts. They were good, but I’ve had them fluffier and cooked just right instead of just about the other side of overcooked. Homemade hash was very tasty, no complaints from me. I dunno. Maybe I’ve been putting an unreasonably high standard on it, but I am pretty sure that the Portsmouth location’s been better. After almost a year, I’d like to see them work out the dang kinks a bit better. Is it because this area lacks the gutterpunk work force that’s present in Portsmouth? I do not know. The only way I think this is going to be settled is to go up to Portsmouth. I’d like to see how they’ve redecorated the Portsmouth location. The first time I went there, it was a few years ago on a Sunday morning with my parents and I tell you, I felt more of a spiritual connection with that place than I ever felt in church. It was like a glorious palace of all that is good in the world in terms of decor, menu, atmosphere, even location.

So, The Phantom Gourmet is a local restaurant “review” show on one of the local regular-type-broadcast channels. It’s kind of horrible in that every episode seems to be about where you can go to get the giantest, most fried food in the greatest quantities for the lowest price and the lowest common denominator. To be fair, I’ve discovered some okay restaurants because of them, as they actually pay attention to the suburbs (including the less affluent ones, i.e. where I live) and because of them I know where to get pretty decent Chinese within minutes of home. They have also covered some places that I like a lot, so I can’t knock all of their choices. It would be real nice, though, if they could do a show on places to go eat that aren’t disgustingly excessive fall-of-civilization-type places to eat. Read the rest of this entry »