Golden Chopsticks Chinese Restaurant
1430 Plaza Blvd
National City, Ca. 91950
We've been meaning to check out Little Dim Sum, in the same
shopping center in National City, but most of the reviews pointed us at Golden
Chopsticks, a couple of doors away.
This morning, the wife needed to refill her vitamin
prescription so we made a trip to the CVS right across the street and decided to
swing by and check it out for an early, leisurely, Sunday morning
lunch.
We ordered the Hot & Sour Soup for the wife, the Wor
Wonton Soup for me, Egg Rolls, Szechwan
Shrimp and Mongolian Beef with a cup of plain rice. I also ordered hot tea for the wife, iced tea for me.
The egg rolls were cool in the center (our only complaint),
both soups were terrific, the Szechuan Shrimp (their spelling) really wasn't
that spicy (what we do at home is definitely spicier and I think of their
version as more of an Orange Shrimp dish) and the Mongolian Beef is a tried and
tested recipe, like many others we've had over the years (BTW, how many ways are
there to spell Szechuan?).
I had to ask for chopsticks. I understand that I don't look
like I can use chopsticks or be trusted with anything sharp and I can see how
they would save a lot of money by not putting them out for everyone but that
also means someone should ask if you want them when they take your order. The
same with Chinese hot mustard, as well...
Service was attentive and almost immediate, the iced
tea refills were on top of it, we didn't have to ask for extra napkins and they
presented the check in a very timely manner (one of my pet peeves with a lot of
restaurants).The place was nice and clean,and we will be back.
Next time, we plan on tasting the Seaweed Soup, a Hot Pot or
Sizzling Platter, the Pork Fried Rice and possibly the Peking Duck. They also
have a Whole Steamed Fish and I know the wife will love
that...
Our bill was $35 and coin; make it $41 with tip If that's a bit steep, we have to say it was the best Chinese food we've
had since we moved here and they also have very reasonably priced lunch ($5.50
to $6.95) and family meal ($10.26 to $13.25) menus.
Unfortunately, they don't have a web site or even a
complete online menu.
UPDATE:
For our second visit, we split another cup of their excellent
Hot & Sour Soup and ordered the Pan Fried Dumplings, House Special
Combination Hot Pot, BBQ Pork Fried Rice, a pot of tea for the wife and an iced
tea for me.
The Hot Pot features shrimp, beef, chicken, pork,
calamari, tofu and a few veggies (carrots, mushrooms, etc). Unfortunately, the
beef, pork and mushrooms were rubbery and inedible (I discreetly spit them
out), the tofu had an unpleasant, spongy texture and the BBQ Pork Fried Rice was
nondescript (a great disappointment as I was really looking forward to
it).
The topper was our server, a middle aged guy with absolutely
no sense of humor and an exceedingly short attention span as he appeared to be
too busy to actually stand still long enough to hear our entire order
(appetizer, soup, 2 entrees and drinks, how hard is that?).
He would turn and start walking away halfway through our
order, causing himself to make several more trips than would have been necessary
as we already knew what we wanted when we walked into the place. Instead, we had
to ask him for a cup of soup, then chopsticks and hot mustard, then more
napkins, etc.
Because of this server's rudeness, the inedible Hot Pot and
mediocre fried rice, we are re-evaluating our review and will visit at least
once more (although it will be a while), just to be sure...
