Shaanxi Garden

Shaanxi Garden Restaurant Review:

This Shaanxi-style Chinese restaurant is located in the back corner of San Gabriel’s Sunny Plaza. The space features white walls with framed posters from Shaanxi, gold and brown booths, and round tables with red plastic cloths and Lazy Susans. Menu categories include boiled dishes and Shaan’s barbecue. There’s even a dish called “plastic noodles,” but you’re probably better off with the handmade noodles. Shaan’s "special biang biang noodle" consists of thick noodles folded with a hearty mix of pork, sprouts and vegetables. Qishan’s handmade noodle with special gravy amounts to a tangy noodle soup. Stir-fried cumin-spiced lamb features shredded meat that’s powerfully pungent, in a good way. Crunchy, hollow-stemmed a choy is stir-fried with a prodigious amount of garlic. If you’re looking for a change of pace, braised small yellow croaker is a whole fish with tender flesh that pulls easily from the bone, served in a bowl with gravy and peanuts. Drinks are limited to sodas, Wanglaoji tea and plum juice. Dessert, if you can call it that, is a creamy Beijing yogurt.