Why have we eaten at this Chinese restaurant six times within a year? Is it the quality? Yes, but relative quality not absolute quality.
Let’s take a ride on this rickshaw!
Hot and Sour Soup. Prepared by an accomplished Chinese chef this dish is an easy-to-understand example of the balance in Chinese cuisine. Think yin vs. yang. P. F. Chang’s’ version does not attain balance. They take out the Hot and they take out the Sour and we are left to savor “their version” of hot and sour soup. It is not bad soup but it is not what we expect in an authentic Chinese version. Mine arrived lukewarm in temperature…just hot enough to discourage my returning it. But it was bland. I tried to give it some “Hot” via the chili oil on the table. I kept adding oil and tasting and by the time the waitress had returned my soup was three-quarters gone. She suggested the chili sauce, also on the table. It did work. A spoonful into my quarter cup of soup drove the soup right through hot to HOT, completely over shadowing the Sour. So I just gave up and left the balance in the cup…finally some balance. The waitress returned; removed the unfinished cup and said nary a word about it.
The wait was a little long for the entrees and when we were feeling the necessity to mention it…they came—together and hot.
Salt and Pepper Prawns. To a Florida boy these are shrimp, size approx 21-25…not prawns. But the dish is very well done and attractively presented with ornamental bright-red bird’s-eye chilies. This dish alone is worth a visit. The shrimp were fresh and not overcooked, a well-executed entrée.
The other entrée was Coconut Curry Vegetables. The combinations of vegetables and the degree of cooking was encouraging. Portion size was generous… Great to look at… but the flavor. This restaurant should either leave curry to the Thais, Indians and Indonesians or just steal their recipes. This dish could have been great but the sauce was too flat and unidimensional. It was very disappointing. The high quality vegetables were cooked just right but the sauce was a failure. A whole mushroom in the mix was obviously a dried shitake that had not been given time to hydrate and was inedible. They did remove the stem. Fresh shitake would have been the way to go.
On previous occasions we have had:
Almond and Cashew Chicken. Boring.
Chicken w/Black Bean Sauce. Expectations ran high. One of my favorite cook-at-home dishes is a Chinese black bean sauce shrimp dish: Unfortunately this dish fails. Dull and flavorless. Just don’t order it.
Mu Shu Pork. This dish is classic and prepared without error. Safe to order. But when served the waitress asked “Do you wish me to assembly the pancakes?” The tone said, “You don’t want me to assemble the pancakes do you, I really have more important things to do? Of course, sensing the tone, I accepted her assembling the dish. This is the same waitress that later tried to combine two different dishes into a single take home container—one on top of the other. You know the little paper cartons with the wire handles.
Orange Peel Chicken. This dish sounds so good. P. F. Chang’s must be proud of it. They have variations in Beef and Shrimp. It was a disappointment. Not bad… just not what it could be.
Sichuan Style Asparagus. A winner. Perfection. I was so impressed with this dish I tried to make it at home. I got close but theirs is definitely better.
The duck we had before now appears gone from the menu. It was good
Generally the quality of the ingredients and the cooking is very good. The failure is trying to please the mass market and resorting to a dummying down of flavors. Taking too much of the edge off. I don’t expect to find chicken feet on the menu but they could do so much better. Committees don’t belong in the kitchen.
The wine list deserves mention. In pairing wine to Chinese food some sommeliers would recommend… beer.
The wine list, rather embarrassingly, separates white wines into categories of Fruity, Floral, Tangy, and Creamy and reds into categories of Lush, Soft & Tangy, Rich & Spicy, and Powerful. I find this overly simplified, arbitrary, useless and misleading.
There is only one Gewurztraminer: Covey Run a very inexpensive wine from Columbia Valley in Washington State. There were only three Sauvignon Blanc’s —all California. None from New Zealand, South Africa, Chile or France. They have seven Chardonnays on the menu…
Why? I believe they picked the wines without consideration of the food menu. Most likely from the distributor that showed them the most popular wines sold in restaurants. I bet they buy all wines from one distributor to get a lower price. What other explanation? Anyway, I passed on the wine.
It could have been different. After we had ordered our entrees a talented waitress could have said. “We have an excellent blank that will pair beautifully with the blank in the blank. It will balance the spiciness of the blank and I think you will enjoy it and we have it by the glass…SOLD!
On pricing. The food prices at P. F. Chang’s appear on the high side of fair. The place is well appointed and comfortable. Someone has to pay for that. But the wine and especially the bar prices reflect an obscene markup. Beringer’s white zinfandel (why they have this on the menu says a lot about P. F. Chang’s) for $6.00 a glass. You can buy this “wine” for $4.00 or so a bottle. It appears the mark up on wine by the glass is 5 times and by the bottle it is 2.5 to 3 times. They have an exotic sounding concoction of cocktails priced up to $8.50.
On Service. Really no better than a barbecue joint. Little evidence of training. Plates were served and removed from random sides showing no knowledge of convention. We noticed a fellow come in with a child. The mother was not there. A staff member brought a bolster seat, handed it to him and walked away. He stood there with the chair pushed in, child in one arm and the bolster in the other. He fumbled with the task at hand and in time another waitress approached and helped him. Bad show!
Will we return? Yes, but we will order very carefully and stay away from the Cantonese inspired dishes and more to the Sichuan. Maybe we just order the Salt and Pepper Shrimp and Sichuan Asparagus with white rice and a bottle of beer.
P. F. CHANG’S CHINA BISTRO
˜