Szechuan Cuisine Restaurant has recently opened in Glendale Arizona. It’s not a fancy restaurant but they do offer wait service. They offer some American Chinese Favorites but they also offer Authentic Style Szechuan Cuisine.
Lots of interesting choices on the menu. It was hard to decide on what to try today.
We thought it was a good idea to start with what they call “Grandma Salad”
The salad is made of cabbage, roasted peanuts, garlic, onion and spicy fish sauce. The salad seems light, a little spicy but also is tasty.
We share the Casserole Style Chicken and the Chongqing Spicy Fish. Both are spicy.
Casserole Style Chicken
You have to see it this way too.
Casserole Style Chicken
The Casserole Style Chicken is NOT the American casserole that has cheese and a can of Campbell’s added to it this is completely something better and arrives in a metal bowl with a burning bottom that cooks the vegetables and makes a sauce. We were instructed to eat some of the meat first so the vegetables could cook. Some of the vegetables were lotus root, mushrooms, bean sprouts and celery. The chicken is extremely tender. It is spicy but not stingingly spicy.You can taste delicious flavors without the heat over powering the flavors. It’s very good.
Chongqing Spicy Fish
This Chongqing Spicy Fish is very mild delicate white fish (sole) that has been dusted in corn starch, cooked and picked up heat and flavor from the chili pods. It’s very delicate and just melts in the mouth. It’s salty but for some freakish reason that I don’t understand the salt taste good here…….It’s an interesting sensation.
WOW! My first visit was Worth a Fork!
Worth a Fork!
Our 2nd Visit was even better than the first visit. Had this incredible delicious complex and spicy dish called Spicy Chicken Noodle….It was Awesome. Had a super spicy Fish Hot Pot and Juicy Pork Dumplings…Soup filled where you suck the soup out and then eat….@nd visit was really great……
For our third Visit the owner wanted to pick food out for us so we let him since everything was so positive before.
We weren’t thrilled with what he picked for us…….
On the left is slightly dry duck and on the right is Americanized Jalapeño Chicken.
For our 4th visit we decided to just order off the white authentic Chinese Menu. We tried Sour Spicy Cabbage Salad and we ordered Authentic Kung Pao Chicken.
We both liked the Cabbage salad….but the Kung Pao Chicken wasn’t so spicy and was in a thick sweet sauce and wasn’t made with Szechwan Peppercorns. I was disappointed that they served me an Americanized Kung Pao when I ordered the Authentic Style….Nobody asked me how it was and the owner was absent or I would have told him…..
Seems like communication is a problem……
I haven’t found a website or Facebook page for Szechuan Cuisine. You are just going to have to visit them at 5158 W. Olive Ave. Glendale AZ. They are there 7 days a week lunch and dinner.
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may NOT differ.
Braised Beets with Pickled Golden Raisins, Spiced Walnuts and Mint
I’m always coming up with new ways to do beets. These Beets are really hard to photo for me but I tried my best. I sort of braised the beets in a sweet and sour solution with onion, garlic and cinnamon. The beets got flavorful but not too much so I used that flavorful liquid to brine the raisins. Then I made the spiced walnuts and an earthy vinaigrette. Added a little mint and where’re done. Please remember to save at least 1/3 cup of the beet braising liquid to pickle the raisins. They came out really great and taste better than the majority of beets I eat out. Don’t use yellow beets for this recipe. Yellow beets only come out nice on the stove top.
Ingredients for about 8 servings
2 lbs beets – (just the beet) (about 6 beets)
1 cup sugar
1 cup red wine vinegar
2 cups water
1 Tablespoon course sea salt
1 large sweet onion – cut in 8 slices
3 garlic cloves
1 cinnamon stick – break in three pieces
1/2 medium lemon – just the juice for vinaigrette
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil – for vinaigrette
1 teaspoon cumin – for vinaigrette
1 teaspoon paprika – for vinaigrette
1/2 teaspoon course sea salt – for vinaigrette
1/4 cup golden raisins
1/3 cup of hot beet braising liquid – (to pickle the raisins)
1 cup walnuts – (for spiced walnuts)
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil – (for spiced walnuts)
2 Tablespoons sugar – (for spiced walnuts)
1 teaspoon Aleppo pepper – (for spiced walnuts)
1/4 teaspoon cumin – (for spiced walnuts)
1/4 teaspoon course sea salt – (for spiced walnuts)
1/4 cup mint leave – loose – and lightly torn
Directions
Set oven to 350 degrees F.
In a large pan add the beets (well scrubbed and clean), a sliced onion infant of and behind each beet. Garlic and one third of cinnamon stick in three different parts of pan.
Add sugar, vinegar, water, 1 T sea salt.
Cover pan very well and leave in the oven till beets are fork tender. Around two hours. (during this time you should be preparing the walnuts…or if not you need to turn the oven back on for when you do the walnuts.
Let the beets cool on the counter but remove about a third of a cup of the hot beet liquid to pickle the raisins.
In a small bowl whip up the vinaigrette by adding lemon juice, cumin, salt, paprika and oil together and set to the side.
Now make the Spiced Walnuts.
In a small bowl add the walnuts and to that add 2 T olive oil, sugar, Aleppo pepper, 1/4 teaspoon cumin and 1/4 teaspoon sea salt. Spread them out evenly on a baking sheet. They only need ten minutes in a 350 degree F oven. Remove after ten minutes and set to the side.
Now you have to put it all together.
By now the beets are cool enough to handle. you either peel the skin off or use a vegetable peeler. Cut them up in whatever shape you like.
Pour the vinaigrette, drained raisins, and mint leaves over the beets. Carefully stir. WAIT to add nuts to serve so they don’t get soggy. It’s not a lot of vinaigrette for all these beets but it’s enough to be flavorful.
It looks like this
Braised Beets with Pickled Golden Raisins. Mint and Spiced Walnuts
Braised Beets, Pickled Golden Raisins, Spiced Walnuts and Mint
These beets are interesting, flavorful and do differ from others I’ve tried….
Nashville Hot Chicken is only authentic in and is a specialty of Nashville Tennessee. Here in Phoenix you can find Nashville Style Chicken….and other Hot Chicken…….we should just call it Hot Chicken. The Chicken should be marinated, floured and fried. It needs to be sauced either before or after flouring (or breading) with what they call a dry sauce or paste. If a wet sauce is applied then IT IS NOT NASHVILLE STYLE CHICKEN according to the Nashville Hot Chicken Coalition. Nashville Hot Chicken IS HOT because the paste is suppose to be 1/3 fat (often lard) OR it can be OIL and 2/3rds cayenne pepper that gets cooked and reduced till thick. A few other seasonings are sometimes added. Nashville Hot Chicken is not just about heat as it’s is also suppose to be about flavor. Authentic places serve the chicken with dill pickles over the chicken and one-two slices of white bread under the chicken to soak up juices and flavors.
Here’s the Hot Chicken Sandwich from 6 Degrees Urban Kitchen in Scottsdale.
This sandwich was stuffed with a plump juicy marinated notable crispy chicken breast that was topped with honey hot sauce. House made pickles were tucked inside and the sandwich was served on a grilled eggy bun. (*****UPDATE***Sadly 6 Degrees Urban Kitchen has CLOSED for business since)
The Hot Chicken Slider from PNPK in North Scottsdale.
This Hot Chicken Slider is seasoned fried chicken, topped with dill pickles, slaw and spicy aioli sauce. It’s tasty….not scorching hot but hot that might be mellowed by the slaw.
Hot Chicken from Starlite BBQ in Scottsdale.
Here was a plump juicy breast and leg quarter. Both were SCRUMPTIOUS flavored chicken in a crisp HOT but delicious crust. It was just delightful with house made pickles and this really tasty whole grain mustard.
From Famous 48 in Old Town Scottsdale.
By far the most stingingly HOT! I almost couldn’t eat this one. This one had some sort of Mayonnaise applied to the chicken. This one was topped with an insanely HOT but delicious Buffalo kind of sauce with a good TANG. It topped the crunchy chicken and they gave me extra hot sauce on the side. You had to open your mouth a mile deep to eat this one as the eggy bun was extra thick and was difficult to eat… (I do note that Famous 48 was recently opened when I tried them and it’s possible this sandwich has been toned down or tweaked since to please the masses…….Another note is that Famous 48 has closed for the summer 2018. (*****UPDATE****Famous 48 closed and happened to re-open in a different location in Scottsdale) I recently tried the Famous 48 Nashville Style Chicken at a festival and it’s a completely different sandwich. It will be pictured at the bottom after the fork.
I also tried the Hot Chicken Sandwich at Mingo’s Louisiana Kitchen in Phoenix. It’s a LOUISIANA Style Hot Chicken Sandwich and Not a Nashville Style…..But it’s Hot Chicken so this sandwich is included here.
Mingo’s Chicken is flavorful and very moist. The chicken coated in a seasoned Corn meal and has a much better texture than than other corm meal coated foods I’ve tried. I know it’s the best cornmeal coating I’ve ever tried. The sandwich has a generous application of Tangy Hot Sauce with a great bite. There is some shredded lettuce, tomato, pickle chips and a slathering of remoulade that is a French style of Tarter Sauce that is more detailed and complex than any I remember trying before. Old Bay dusted Fries came with the sandwich as a side.
Tried the Hot Chicken Sandwich from The Larder + The Delta in Phoenix. This was one of the milder of the Hot Chickens but WOWEEE this chicken was just DIVINE….This was the BEST of the boneless chickens in flavor, texture and juiciness. It’s tough to say but this chicken really was among the best…It had a quality about it unlike the all the others…..It was a very large amazing thigh. The coating was different. It was thin but sort of shattering crisp and caramelized. I could taste cayenne, onion and other flavors in or on the coating. The chicken was topped with an apple slaw and B&B pickles that were thick and delicious and hot sauce aioli ……This one here was off the charts!
Maybe you are curious about GENUINE Nashville Hot Chicken.
There are only SIX Restaurants that are Certified in the Nashville Hot Chicken Coalition.
They are Prince’s Hot Chicken Shack, Bolton’s Spicy Chicken and Fish, Pepper Fire Hot Chicken, Hattie B’s Hot Chicken, 400 Degrees, and Deezie’s in Murfreesboro.
Here it is! Hattie B’s Famous Hot Chicken from Nashville Tennessee.
Somebody brought me back a piece of Hattie’s Hot Chicken to try. Here it is………..
I put in the oven for 15 minutes at 350 to heat up.
This one has a strong cayenne aroma. (the most aroma of all the hot chickens I tried)
I pick it up and it’s a bit greasy. It’s not crisp but I was told even fresh made it’s not particularly crisp but better than what I had.
I tried the one that sold as hot. First bite seems very HOT (stingingly)…..I taste mostly cayenne…..followed by onion. The Chicken is very moist and flavorful…..for some odd reason it doesn’t seem that HOT to me as the first bite did. It’s just flavorful moist chicken.
These were a few of the places for Hot Chicken in Metro Phoenix pre Mrs. Chicken (soon to come…Phoenix’s first Nashville Style Hot Chicken Restaurant) (****UPDATE***Mrs Chicken did indeed open since I wrote this)
******Slight update…since I wrote this back August 2018 Monroe’s Hot Chicken has opened in February 2019 in downtown Phoenix and became the First Hot Chicken Restaurant in Phoenix. I did happened to try a few items and wrote about them but I was there opening week and read somewhere that recipes were tweaked since so I can’t describe what you might taste there today. This week (last week of April Mrs Chicken did open. I expect to try it out sometime but didn’t yet)
EVERYTHING IS SUBJECT to change and your experience may or may not differ.
Some more updates are below the FORK.
The Forking Truth
www.Hot-Chicken.com
www.Wikipedia.com
Monroe’s Hot Chicken Sandwich
Another notable Hot Chicken Sandwich I tried since was the Carolina Style Hot Chicken Sandwiches from The Root and Soul in Phoenix.
The Root and Soul
I remember that this one was among the better Hot Sandwiches of what I tried. It was a mighty tasty delicious sandwich with very juicy flavorful chicken.
A new chicken restaurant opened up in Scottsdale called The Hot Chick. I enjoyed the HOT Chick sandwich very Forking Much!
This one had tons of spice flavor, a little sweet, very scrumptious and super crunchy and juicy. This new one is close to the best! I also liked that they offer Hot Chicken on the Bone….
Famous 48 Nashville Style Chicken that I tasted this time was plump, juicy and developed with flavors. It wasn’t as spicy as last time and was a different exterior texture.
I was paging threw a Food Magazine and saw this recipe for Cucumber Cabbage Slaw. I thought this recipe was made for me because I happened to have a few cucumbers and cabbage lying around that I had to use. I did the recipe as written…Wow it sucked…..It came out tasting worst than I imagined. I don’t think too many people would eat this salad…..It is so boring one note and bland. This salad is pretty much tasteless. So I had to fix up my bowl of Cucumber Cabbage Slaw. I added SEVEN ingredients and changed the proportions of the seasonings.
Ingredients for about 8 servings
1/2 head of cabbage – shredded thin
2 cucumbers – peeled – seeds scraped out and sliced up
2 carrots – grated
1/4 cup scallions – sliced thin
1 cup small sweet tomatoes – either half or quarter depending on size
1 red bell pepper – chopped
1/4 cup fresh cilantro – chopped
1/4 cup fresh mint leaves – chopped
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup yogurt (or sour cream)
2 Tablespoons dijon mustard
3 Tablespoons white wine vinegar
1 Tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon hot sauce
1 lime (just the fresh squeezed juice)
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon course sea salt
1/2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
Directions
In a large bowl add the cabbage, cucumbers, carrots, scallions, tomatoes, bell pepper, cilantro and mint. Set the bowl to the side while you make the dressing.
In a small bowl combine remaining ingredients. Pour dressing over the slaw and mix well.
