By Assunta Ng
The Seattle Chinese community is not famous for its Chinese restaurants. I hate to admit it, but our neighbor to the north, British Columbia’s Chinese cuisine well surpasses ours.
When I host out-of-town Chinese guests from Asia, it makes me nervous. Should I take them to a Chinese or non-Chinese restaurant? If I take them to eat Chinese food around the area, they might be critical of our local Chinese eateries.
On June 2, I took a group of Chinese classmates from the University of Washington who returned to Seattle after some time away. One came from Hong Kong and hasn’t visited Seattle for 40 years. He loves to eat. Another just returned from Shanghai and had tried, I’m sure, many delicious Chinese meals.
I chose to take them to Jade Garden Restaurant in Chinatown for a dim sum lunch. I didn’t dare to ask for their feedback, but they were forthcoming with their views.
“The food here is not bad, they are similar to our [Chinese] food,” said my friend from San Francisco, Calif. I was elated when I heard that. What a compliment! Chinese food from the Golden State has frequently received high marks.
My Hong Kong schoolmate said, “The eggplant was really delicious, you should try it.”
I didn’t expect my friends to say much about our dim sum. But it looks as though, this time, Seattle’s Chinese food won my friends over. (end)