juan0505

http:// http://www.tootoo.com/w-Furniture_Furnishings/buy- Bar_Furniture /src_product/ Like so many small mom-and-pop places,Po’s Dumpling Bar got its start around a kitchentable. For years friends and family raved aboutHuei Ying Ow’s cooking and encouraged her to open a placeof her own. Truth be told, she was a lousy cook when they married30 years ago, says her husband, Po Kang Hwang. But his father tookOw under his tutelage and successfully taught her to cook familydishes. After the kids were grown and gone and,according to Hwang, the couple “had nothing else todo,” they opened their own restaurant in the former Circespace on 39th Street. The space still looks like Circe —press-tinned ceilings, modern furniture and retro Americansoundtrack — but the food is clearlyAsian. The menu is an ambitious mix of standardChinese dishes familiar to Americans — think cashewchicken and sweet and sour chicken — and more authenticdishes from their native Taiwan. And while Ow runs the kitchen,Hwang, a gentle-faced man with a perpetual smile, works the diningroom and teaches diners about the authenticity of hiswife’s dishes and ingredients. Whatsets Po’s apart from many other run-of-the-mill Chineserestaurants is the variety of the sauces; instead of aone-sauce-fits-all mentality, each dish had its own distinctflavors. Many sauces, like the plum sauce served on the lettucewraps and kung pao chicken, were made from scratch. Seasonings andsauces were light but potent: lots of scallions, ginger and garlic,for example Instead of the typical moon-shapeddumplings, the Emperor dumpling appetizer was cigar-shaped,pan-fried wonton wrappers stuffed with a delicate pork and scallionfilling. For the lettuce wraps, Ow spooned finely chopped chickenand crunchy vegetables into three iceberg lettuce cups, served witha thick, smoky-sweet plum sauce. Both appetizers were subtler, morerefined tasting than many other dumplings and wraps I’vehad. Po’s also serves several kinds ofdim sum, small servings of fried or steamed dumplings and bunstraditionally served only on weekends in many Chinese restaurants.The cha su buns were pillowy, steamed dough balls filled with bitesof pork sauced in a Chinese-style barbecue sauce. The shu-mai porkdumplings — crinkled, one-bite, minced pork fillednuggets — were steamed in a bamboo steamer on cabbageleaves. Like the other appetizers, they were tender and exotictasting. During two dinners, my party of fourmostly ordered authentic entrees. The sesame sauce noodles werelong, thick, knobby wheat noodles dressed with a soy-based dressingand served with a small cup of crumbled pork and sesame paste sauceto pour on top the noodles. Hwang explained later that Ow makes herown eggless, wheat flour noodles almost daily with an Italian pastamachine. The kung pao chicken was just the sortof offering that showed off the kitchen’s ability tocraft a well-seasoned, flavorful dish without overloading it withgeneric, commercial sauces. A heap of vegetables, cubes of chickenand whole red chili peppers mingled in a woodsy, housemade plumsauce. Hwang’s eyes lit up when Iordered the mao po tofu, cubes of cushiony tofu in a fiery saucedotted with chili pepper flakes. But the prettiest and tastiestdish was the sautéed shrimp with soybean peas.Custard-tender, flamingo pink shrimp was coated in a white sauce ofwhite pepper, garlic, ginger and cooking wine and dotted withspring-green edamame. Although the restaurant hasa full bar, I wanted to try some of Po’s loose leaf teasand bubble teas instead. The Taiwanese and Chinese tea leaves,including a fragrant Jasmine Dragon Pearl and the King 103 teaenhanced with ginseng, are served in three-part teacups. The tea isspooned into an infuser; the lid of the cup serves as a cozy forthe infuser. The potent leaves can be brewed up to three times,simply by adding more hot water to the cup.
2008-06-20 16:29:03