| rev:text
| - Funny how things change.
Once upon a time, a review of Ho Jan would likely have started by mentioning their location smack dab between Maple Leaf Gardens and the Eatons department store at College Park.
Now Maple leaf Gardens is a Loblaws and Ryerson's gym, and Eatons has been replaced by Winners and a slew of government offices.
I don't think that Ho Jan was around back when. I don't fully understand how they're around right now, unless they do bang-up takeout business. The place is always mostly empty, which is a good thing if you're in the mood for a sit-down meal over a tight lunch hour. Also good since it's just far enough off the beaten path that I'm unlikely to run into my co-workers. I like them, but the 8 hours we spend together is enough for me, most days.
I often complain how difficult it has become to find decent, old school, local Chinese restaurants. Ho Jan fills that void. Lunch specials recently shot up from $9 to $10, but it's still a fair deal for a small bowl of soup and an entrée.
Soup choices are limited to corn or veggie hot and sour. I usually opt for the latter; it's deeply flavoured, with a smattering of veg and just enough heat and acid to keep you interested. it's also not cloyingly sweet. Corn soup is fine, but one-note in the way that all lunch special corn soup is...the bigger issue with both bowls is the likelihood that you will encounter an insufficiently-dissolved glob of corn starch, which during cold season may make you wonder whether someone sneezed in the pot.
Menu items vary from OK to pretty good. Portions are huge, and invariably involve a decent amount of protein, thick sauce, and a bed of medium-hot rice. I've had the General Tso and Chilli chicken, and don't think I could distinguish between them; both battered hunks of meat, a surfeit of hot-raw onion, and a sauce that owes more to sugar than to spice. Still, on a cold day with a growling stomach it's just what the doctor ordered.
Beef in black bean sauce is surprisingly good. Tender beef, rich brown sauce strewn with fermented beans; more onions and a green pepper or too. Mapo Tofu and a spicy eggplant dish are even better; warming and porky; a freer hand with the chillies makes them worth coming back to.
If you're really hungry, order a plate of noodles-easily more than enough for one. Singapore noodles include actual slivers of bbq pork and full shrimp cooked just to popping.
Ho Jan offers a daily Dim Sum special, too-a bowl of soup and an assortment of dumplings, plus sticky rice. If you're a Dim Sum addict and can't make your way over to Spadina and back to the office in time, go ahead-otherwise give it a pass; it's nothing special.
Service warms up with repeat visits. Tea is offered and refilled promptly.
Ho Jan may not be the fanciest, most authentic or even 'best' Chinese food in the city, but I appreciate it. Other attractions nearby have faded, but what's left is the kind of Chinese restaurant I hope always has a place downtown.
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