Thursday, December 13, 2007

LITTLE SHANGHAI**

Lunch at Little Shanghai in San Mateo. An extensive menu of Shanghainese dishes and small plates. After surveying the tables around me, I decided to give the Xiao Long Bao and Water Boiled Beef a try. I added an order of Green Onion Pancake, just as a good point of comparison to other places. The Green Onion Pancake came first and was ordinary, the onion flavor was there, but it was not crispy on the outside and a bit oilier than I like. Next came the XLB which were a decent effort. Much more soup inside the dumplings than at other places in the City, but the skin was on the thick side and the pork filling was plain. The best of the three dishes was the Water Boiled Beef which I ordered extra spicy. It had a nice deep red pepper flavor and was full of beef sliced thick enough to stand up to the spicy sauce, but thin enough so that it was easy to bite through -- an almost silky texture. The pickled vegetables were a good texture contrast, but were somewhat overwhelmed by the strong red pepper flavor, still other flavor elements like garlic came through. I would order this again or try some of the other offerings on the menu.




E 25th Ave San Mateo

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