After our stay in Buellton and having lunch at Bell's, we decided to stay the night in our old 'hood of Rowland Heights. We'd do some shopping, do takeout from Mountain House, and then have dinner in the area. One of the places I'd read about over the last couple of years was Happy Duck House, which had opened on Gale just west of Fullerton Road back in around 2015. After all our previous meals on this trip, the Missus would be wanting some Asian cuisine, so we thought this would do.
We had early reservations and the place was pretty mellow when we arrived.
After perusing the menu, we went with the Peking Duck three ways ($89), Duck Wings ($6.95), and some stir fried Ong Choi ($16.95). Yes, this wasn't going to be a cheap dinner.
Soon enough the accoutrements arrived and all looked well.
Then the Duck Feet, which were supposed to be seasoned with five spice.
I say supposed, because this was very lightly seasoned. When highly flavored it's fun gnawing on "ducky" goodness, but this was strangely bland.
The duck skin arrived soon after.
The dan bing, the pancakes to wrap the duck in was really good, great texture, nice and warm.
The duck skin however was not. The skin was on the rubbery side, the subcutaneous fat had not been rendered, and it lacked flavor, as did the duck meat which was also dry. This was strangely one of the blandest versions of Bei Jing Kao Ya we've ever had!
We each made one "wrap" and just quit.
We ended up taking the meat and the "skin" home, where I went and made fried rice with the meat, adding in a bit of the skin which I crisped up. As for the rest of the skin, I went ahead and brushed the skin with a combination of melted duck fat and five spice and did the air fryer thing, which helped a bit.
We loved the texture of the Bean Sprouts with Duck Meat.
The texture of the Bean Sprouts were excellent, they obviously know how to stir fry. However, there just wasn't enough duck meat to make a difference in flavor. The meat was tough and bland and they should have just used most of what was provided for the wrap to bump up the flavor here.
The one item that we really enjoyed was the Ong Choi which was stir fried to perfection.
This was the one dish that was seasoned well, enough salt and white pepper to enhance the slightly sweet-bitter vegetal flavor of the water spinach. The texture was just perfect, crisp, yet tender.
The last dish out was the Duck Bone Soup, which, like the preceding duck dishes was severely under seasoned and watery.
This was quite thin and in need of more flavor.
Overall, the service was quite good, but while the Ong Choi was excellent, the name of the place is Happy Duck House, not Happy Ong Choi House. And the duck dishes were all disappointing.
Well, at least we tried the place out. You can't win 'em all......
Happy Duck House
18210 East Gale Ave.
Rowland Heights, CA 91748
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