February 19, 2014 Lunch – Budai Chinese Restaurant

February 19, 2014 Lunch – Budai Chinese Restaurant

I went to Kaspia’s new office at 10:30 to work on several of their projects.  Shortly after 11:30 we finished one and Aaron and I left for lunch and our 1:00 meeting on another matter.

He said he did not know what or where he wanted to eat and that I could choose.  I said that I had not tried Budai, which was on our route to the meeting.  Aaron, said, “I think it is the best Chinese and my kids love it.”  I said, “I have never been there and would love to try it.” So it was decided and Aaron drove us to Budai.  The restaurant was half full when we arrived a little before noon.  We took a booth by the window behind the checkout stand with a view of the entire restaurant from my side and out the window from Aaron’s side.  

 After being seated we were handed a luncheon menu.  Here is Budai’s luncheon menu:

 Lunch Specials

All Entrees come with a Veg. Egg Roll, Egg Drop Soup and Steamed Rice (Hot and Sour Soup and Fried Rice are available on request)

* Jalapeno Chicken * Kung Pao Chicken Mushroom Chicken Sweet and Sour Chicken * Twice Cooked Pork Sweet and Sour Pork * General Tao Tofu Tofu and Vegetables * Curry Tofu Mixed Vegetables

Pepper Steak Beef with Broccoli * Mongolian Beef * General Tao Chicken Sesame Chicken Chicken Lo Mein Sweet and Sour Shrimp Shrimp in Lobster Sauce * Shrimp in Garlic Sauce * Crispy Flounder in Black Vinegar

After looking at the choices, I decided to try the Crispy Flounder in Black Vinegar, because I have never had that dish before.  When the waitress/owner came to take our order she asked, “Do you like it spicy?” and I said, “No”.  She said, “It is not too spicy.”  I asked if any black pepper is used to flavor the dish and she said, ”No, only white pepper.”  So I decided to try the dish.  Aaron chose the same dish.

Then there was even a longer discussion about the choice between hot and sour soup, which is spicy, and egg drop soup.  After Aaron said he thought Budai’s hot and sour soup was the best he had ever tasted, I decided to order the hot and sour soup.

Soon a server brought two small bowls of hot and sour soup with another small bowl filled with fried wonton strips.  It has been so long since I ordered hot and sour soup and I had forgotten that fried wonton strips are often served with it.  The soup was thick with lots of egg threads and strips of tofu.  It was spicy but the chili spice was balanced with the Chinese vinegar flavor.  Luckily, I did not taste any black pepper, so I guess white pepper was used instead.  The main flavor was of vinegar, which is okay, even if not perfectly balanced from my taste profile perspective.  I will need to try it again before making up my mind about it.  The one interesting flavor observation I can make is that the hot and sour soup had a pleasant complexity of ingredients but there seemed to have a blandness of flavor, save the vinegar, which gave it a blandness to my taste.

 

After a few more minutes the server returned with two platters filled with our flounder lunches. Each plate held about a 4 ounce piece of fish battered and fried, which I was not expecting, covered with that dark brown Szechuan sauce made with chili, garlic, and other small chunks of vegetables and spices.  I could not tell if Budai buys the sauce in bulk as some other restaurants do or makes it themselves.  The fish still had its skin on and the crispy skin coated with the sauce was delicious, sort of like tender fried chicken skin.  I mixed some of the mound of rice with the sauce and fish and enjoyed the dish.  Each plate also contained three small flowerets of steamed broccoli, a small vegetarian egg roll and a small steel ramekin filled with a vegetable pickle that was too vinegary/spicy for me.  But I enjoyed the fish a lot and even ate Aaron’s uneaten broccoli and sauce and last bit of fish with the rest of my rice.  

I loved lunch at Budai and will go back to try it again.  I noticed that it has my favorite dish, "Shrimp with lobster sauce" on its lunch menu.

I also notice on  Budai's website http://www.budaigourmet.com/ that it was selected as the best Chinese restaurant by the Albuquerque, the Magazine, readers in 2013.  So, Budai merits further consideration and lots more tasting.

I was going to meditate tonight, so when Suzette arrived home and she told me that she had eaten a late lunch and was not hungry, I fetched my PPI Vietnamese noodles and ate them.  They were, surprisingly, still soft and tender, not soggy from being over cooked or over sauced.

When I returned from meditation a little after 8:00 p.m., I ate three chocolate truffles with a bit of cognac flavored with Suzette’s juniper berry liquor as we watched Colbert Report.

Bon Appétit