I may have written about this before- I can't remember- but this be one of my new favorite dishes from Mainland Chinese diner Thumbs Up on East Coast Road just downstairs.
If there are two things that at Thumbs Up I can (quietly) say gave us new impressions, the first one be Lao Gan Ma, and then there's this- Chicken in Salted Egg Sauce.
Okay, I don't know the actual name of this dish but it probably will have a more elegant name than this blatant, bland description.
Whatever it might be doesn't matter.
What's important is that the dish alone makes for one of my favorites when I am at this place, and when dining here- despite the portion being pretty large for even two people- I find myself wishing that the plate had more.
The unique part about this dish is its simplicity.
I'm not sure if the preparation is simple, but from the looks of it, it doesn't look too difficult, not when the plate is reminiscent of crowd favorite spicy mala La Zi Ji- only the children's version.
The one thing I like about this dish is how fun it is to eat.
You know how life is like.
A day ends, a week ends, and you're kinda pooped. A part of you wants to have something solid for the meal. A part of you also feels too tired to have one of those big solid meals. You want something fun, light, easy to eat. Same time too you want a meal that isn't fast food or instant noodles.
That's where this dish comes in.
If you're familiar with the mala version, well, the way you eat it is the same, piece by piece, picked up by the chopsticks.
The only difference is that you don't have to hunt about for the pieces as you would for the mala version because here there's no chopped dried chili. There's just chicken all perfectly cut and perfectly fried, with no pieces of chili that you gotta sieve through to get to your chicken.
Perhaps that be the very thing that make it fun.
No doubt there might be a bit of a mindless eating especially if it be after a long week, but that's not to say that it won't be enjoyable, especially since there is a good deal of taste.
They do theirs rounded, by the way.
At no time has it been that the chicken is salty on one side, tasteless on the other. At no time too has it been that some pieces have more seasoning than the others.
It's rounded, and equal, with the right taste and the right crisp, on all sides.
Got to say, that's something I absolutely appreciate (for $15) and love.