Golden City: A New Beginning Part 2

After a satisfying meal at the "new" Golden City(and quite a bit of leftovers as well), we decided that one good turn deserved another. This time we decided on 2 items that were "kept" from the old menu, and 1 new item that caught our fancy.

We started with an old favorite the Peking Duck, 2 courses, at eighteen bucks, pretty much a bargain. To our surprise, instead of  the slices of duck skin lying on shrimp chips, surrounded by "buns", Golden City now does their Peking Duck "cart style".

The Young Man wheeled our friend out on His own little cart and made short work of Him. After trimming off most of the skin, Mr Duck was taken to the back room and worked over.

Though I found the duck to be better flavored than the version from the Old Golden City, most of the rich subcutaneous fat had rendered off, and thereby losing some of the richness I enjoy. The Missus, not a fan of duck fat, thought these were very good. The duck was served with shredded Scallions and Hoisin Sauce. Only one small complaint; the scallions apparently had been lying around; they were tough, dry, and tasteless.

A steamer insert of buns was brought to the table, steaming hot. I thought these were much too thick and large for the petite slices of duck. Overall, not the highest quality duck, but a bargain at eighteen bucks. And let's not forget the chopped duck in lettuce cups, the second course.

I daresay the Missus enjoys this more than the duck skin. Duck is stir fried with Scallions and Jicama, creating a great contrast in textures. The taste is a rich sweetness, to go along with hints of 5 spice.

One of my favorite dishes is Kwai Fei Chicken, a cold chicken dish(half chicken $8.95):

This version was much different than what I'm used too; first off, instead of the usual pale white color, the skin of the chicken was a light brown. The chicken also had a very nice 5 spice, wine, and soy flavor. I really didn't need the minced ginger-scallion oil for flavoring at all. The chicken was cooked perfectly, no hint of blood dripping from the bones, and the meat was moist and tender.

The most satisfying dish of the evening was the Chaozhou Beef Stew ($12.95):

A Chiuchow version of the standard Beef Brisket with Turnip Hot Pot. The soup was brought to our table in a stainless steel hot pot, with flammable gel in the chamber below. Unfortunately, the Server forgot to light the gel, no big deal. The light broth was full of flavor, and much more complex than its color would indicate. The meat was a very flavorful brisket, the cut of meat also included the fat cap and the connective tissue, which could be somewhat off-putting to some, but not for us. Buried under then meat were matchstick sized slices of radish(daikon), along with preserved vegetable, which added to the flavor of the broth. All of this topped off with basil, cilantro, and scallions.

Man that was good!

It seems that the new version of Golden City serves up some pretty good food. I'm hoping that they can keep it up, and give us another option for Chinese Food in the Clairemont area.

Golden City Restaurant
5375 Kearny Villa Rd.
San Diego, CA 92123

Open Daily 11am - Midnight

We recently did a revisit post on 12/17/06, it can be found here.

Comments

[Ben]

Mmmmm ... that was nice. It must have been, what, 10 yrs since I tried Peking Duck. Time to go out and get some ...

[dietchilicheesefries]

i'm with da missus... just say no to duck fat... not a big fan of mongoose fat either..

[jeni]

Dang. Did that Peking Duck get a shot of botox? That skin looks hawt!

[mizducky]

Cool! Now that it sounds like they've finally gotten their act together, I'll make a point of dropping by the next time I'm up in that area.

[elmomonster]

Aww...but it looked so scrumptious. Too bad, if you had said it was a great duck, I would've made a special trip to SD for it.

[Captain Jack]

Man, I have to try NGC. What style of Chinese would you call it?

[Green Turtle]

How do you compare GC to China Max & Emerald for dinner? Are they all on par now?

[Trent]

Hello Everyone,
I'm interested in hearing opinions on who has the best Peking Duck in town: China Max, Jasmine, Emerald, Golden City, others?

[Candice]

I'm liking the new ownership as well. Thanks for the report! The hot pot looks great - I'll have to try it. I can recommend their lobster with spicy xo sauce too. Do their really do their chopped duck with jicama? I thought it was traditionally made with water chestnuts?

[Fred]

Those dishes do look good. I went there for lunch about 2 weeks ago and was somewhat underwhelmed by the menu, but it looks like I need to drop by for dinner one of these days.

[RONW]

I'll ship over some Ala Wai duck for you as soon as they're ready (from the Ala Wai canal in Waikiki).

http://ronwaikiki.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/717_c.jpg

[Jim]

"Mr Duck was taken to the back room and worked over."

Darn Kirk, from the looks of it, I would say the duck had been through enough already! And then worked over again? Does not pay to be a duck these days!

[Rachel]

Wow that chiu chow beef stew looks delicious! although my mum is chiu chow, I have neer seen that dish. It does look more interesting than the usual beef stew. (Although I do love the taste of the cantonese version too!)

Great value for the duck! Youd be hard pressed to buy a duck for that price in Australia, let alone one that was done two ways for you. Its usually handed over in a plastic take away container!

[nhbilly]

Nice pictures, roasted peking duck is my all time favorite. Back in the day it used to be wrapped in an asian flour tortila now its this bloated steam bun that hides the ducks' fatty flavor.YUM

[Kirk]

Hi Ben - 10 years! I don't think I can go 10 months without it......

Hi DCCF - I think I know the punchline...pork fat rules.....

Hi Jeni - LOL! Didn'y you know that Botox for Poultry is the latest thing??? ;o)

Hi Mizducky - Stay away from the lunch menu, and splurge. Maybe Howie and I will tag along to help...hehehe

Hi Elmo - This ain't no Lu Din Gee....

Hi Capt Jack - It's GuangDong/Cantonese/HK - style.

Hi GT - Not on par with any of the "big 3", but a notch below, in terms of price and quality. But still pretty good grindz.

Hi Trent - My that's loaded question, because everyone has their favorite. We like China Max the best. Many people I know like Jasmine. Funny, many of the people I know who like Jasmine, don't like Emerald, and visa versa.....call it Peking Duck polarization!

Hi Candice - We think it's Jicama, because the flavor was much sweeter than water chestnut, and the texture a bit different as well.(It's also much cheaper....)

Hi Fred - Golden City kept the previous Ownership's lunch menu, that is meant to feed the office crowd. You can ask for the Dinner menu at lunch as well - even if you just want to check it out.

Hi RONW - Thanks for the offer - so long you have the first bite!

Hi Jim - Call it Torquemada duck ("Let's face it - you can't Torquemada anything!").

Hi Rachel - I think it's just some HK-Chefs rendition of what he thinks ChiuChow Beef Stew should be - it was quite good. $18, for Peking Duck 2 ways is pretty cheap.

Hi nhbilly - Actually that's the way the Missus prefers them as well - having eaten them in Beijing.

[Chubbypanda]

Kirk,

Those two dishes are my two favorite poultry dishes in Chinese cuisine. It looks like the restaurant does a fairly good job with them. I'm with your wife on preferring duck skin without the fat. A well-roasted Peking duck should have little fat left in the skin, and the skin itself should be crispy and practically melt away in you mouth as you eat it. Roast duck is a different story, and should definitely have fat on the skin. Love that duck fat.

- Chubbypanda

[Kirk]

Hi Cp - I guess what I'm trying to say without some fat(I know most of it has rendered off) and a bit of moistness, you'll have a brittle skin cracker, and good flavor but dry and listless without any richness what so ever...not good eats. At least to me. Try Lu Din Gee if you haven't yet, and you'll see what I mean.

[Andy 食神]

Ok Kirk, from the first Golden City post, I thought this place might be offshoot of 避風塘 (P:bi feng tang) in MP, RH, and Arcadia.

Now seeing the Gwai Fei Gai 貴妃雞 (P:gui fei ji) and the Chaozhu beef stew, those are exact items they have in the Monterey Park store (on Garvey and Chandler) served in the exact heated chafing dishes, I am 100% certain this is the same owner/offshoot.

Do they serve a garlic deep fried crab that is covered in mounds and mounds of fried minced garlic? That is the signature dish at the LA stores.

[Kirk]

Wow Andy - That's some detective work! I think we gotta find that crab dish, that sounds great....Now if I can only find some good Dao Ko Chicken in San Diego!

[BAK]

Found your site when looking for local Chinese food recommendations.

We just went to Golden City & loved it. We also got the Peking Duck and found it really freaking good.

Thanks!