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| - Review by SnackHappy on Chowhound:
Fantastic Big Flat Lamb Noodle Soup in Verdun
""I didn't even know what it was before I tasted it, but I knew there and then that I'd been missing it all my life. I'm talking about Henan Hui Mian: braised broad noodles with lamb from Henan province in China. NYC chowhounds know it as "Fantastic Big Flat Lamb Noodle Soup" and fantastic is a pretty good descriptor for the one I had as well. The first bite I took of this famous Chinese snack had me floating off my chair. I was elated and it just got better as I inevitably made my way to the bottom of the bowl. This savoury lamb broth with its fresh hand-pulled broad noodles and its perfectly seasoned pieces of lamb meat packs a muttony punch. The soup also contains bean thread noodle, daylily, long thin slivers of seaweed, cilantro, a few leaves of bok choy and the occasional wolfberry. You can add to it some Changkiang vinegar and a condiment made up of dried chilli flakes in oil with sesame seeds, something I highly recommend. This is one serious life-affirming bowl of soup.
Where can one find this bowl of lamby goodness? At Lotus Bleu Restaurant in Verdun. It's a hole-in-the-wall, mom and pop kind of place with very sparse décor and harsh neon lighting. It's anything but upscale and that's just fine with me. What really counts is that he food is yummy and the people there are incredibly friendly and helpful.
And if all the place served were just the Life-Affirming Lamb Noodle Soup, that would be great in itself. But wait, there's more! Daoko chicken is also a famous Henan dish. The preparation involves basting the chicken with a honey-water solution, deep-frying it and then braising it with a bunch of aromatic spices. The result is a fragrant and tasty bird with soft yielding meat and delicious almost completely de-fatted skin. The chicken is sold by weight as is the stewed beef which is sliced thin and served with a dressing of herbs and crushed red pepper.
You thought that's all there was to this place? Think again! They make dumplings. Damn fine dumplings. The lamb and Chinese cabbage ones are crazy good. There's also a hot pork and rice noodle soup that, while it doesn't hold a candle to the Life-Affirming Lamb Noodle Soup, is still pretty darn good, too. My sister couldn't stop eating the Chinese cabbage with hot and sour sauce we had ordered one evening even if she was already full, and I really can't blame her.
The menu also features some Sichuan favourites like "Boiled sliced fish in the Szechuan special spicy sauce" and "Home-style double sautéed pork slice" (twice-cooked pork) as well as a bunch of other seemingly out-of-place items such as Thai-style stir-fried noodles or rice.
On top of that the food is dirt cheap. You can walk out of there full to the gills for about $10 per person.
I've been three times at different hours and the place is never full. The patrons are almost all Chinese and almost all there for the lamb soup and the chicken. There are also a lot of people getting take-away chicken. Don't miss this place. It's a keeper.""
OK, my turn.
I have been at this restaurant 3 times now and agree with absolutely everything that SnackHappy says, especially about that Lamb Noodle Soup. I'm almost looking forward to winter just so I can go and slurp up that soupy goodness on those cold, abominable days we have in January and February!
Another dish worthy of mention is the Home-style double sautéed pork slice" (twice-cooked pork). Imagine super-thick cut pieces of bacon, spiced up and sizzled up with spices and cooked with delectable pieces of stir-fried sauted onions, and green and red peppers. (drool...)
Yes, this place is a dive, a real hole-in-the-wall, no table service, you have to get up and pick up your own bowls and utensils. No drinks, except for the water cooler and syrofoam cups, so go next door to the depanneur and pick up your drinks beforehand.
Dirt cheap, huge portions, fantastic dishes, and the family that run the place are very, very nice and friendly folks.
Hurray for Verdun for scoring another foodie hit!
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