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Panda country clairemont menu3/28/2024 ![]() ![]() The sauce used for these dishes also is spicier and more sharply defined, and it works especially well with the shrimp, which are thoroughly delicious. The menu offers shrimp, beef and chicken in similar presentations, with the exception that none is stuffed. This is a very successful way to serve duck, not only for the pleasant flavors but also because it is essentially greaseless, a rare comment about this bird. The dish that seems most specifically Panda Country’s own (memory does not recall its presence elsewhere) is the “house special duck.” This relatively elaborate presentation requires that a duck be roasted, then boned and cut in squares these pieces in turn are stuffed with ground shrimp, then crisped in deep fat and coated with a savory and somewhat pungent sauce. Choosing among them can in some ways resemble roulette, although the servers often prove reliable guides through the maze. Most of the dishes that qualify the restaurant for this high status appear on the specialties page, which also lists some quite inferior offerings. It probably ranks among the top three Chinese houses in the city. The Golden Triangle location is also a definite upgrade on this mini-chain’s other locations and seems Panda Country’s shot at the gold. The name change evidently has resolved a certain friction between these competitors. ![]() The restaurant is the offspring of the Panda Inns of Santee and Clairemont, which recently were renamed Panda Country, and is not related to the Panda Inn at Horton Plaza. Servers are polished, polite, informed and somewhat formal, and the airy decor has more in common with big-city chic than with ethnic identification. The place certainly is a far cry from the neighborhood cafes that, just a decade ago, dished up most of the Chinese food served in San Diego. ![]() Panda Country offers several innovations on its menu and, perhaps more importantly, has chosen to present this menu in an atmosphere of some style and elegance. ![]() The less obvious side of this little refinement, since ordinary shrimp toasts, like most foods, do not come equipped with handles, is that it is a refinement. Their practical effect is to serve as handles to lift the savory, sesame-and-shrimp-paste-coated toasts, detouring, perhaps, for a quick dunk in mustard or plum sauce. Since these properly are called Phoenix shrimp toasts (in reference to the mythical bird, not the city), it may be supposed that the shrimp tails represent cascading tail feathers, or something of that sort. There’s something rather engaging about the shrimp tails that stick up from the corners of the shrimp toasts at the new Panda Country in the Golden Triangle. ![]()
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