Last night we introduced friends to the joys of pork belly, Jade tofu, and a bevy of other things - and learned that Lao Hunan sports just two high chairs. Luckily one of the toddlers in attendance is in Advanced Sitting class at daycare (sadly, not mine).

Rene G wrote:
...

My first noodle dish at Lao Hunan turned out to be a real winner. Heng Shan Noodles (I don't recall the exact name) is sort of a Hunan version of niu rou mian. It comes to the table under a blanket of cilantro and peanuts . . .



...

This was excellent even in takeout, and at $6.95 - it was Heng Shan Style Preserved Rice Noodle on the Grubhub menu - a great value; thanks for the recommendation. The beef is very thinly sliced rather than long-braised in hunks and makes for a delicate, balanced presentation with the other garnishes.

Pork with preserved bean and jade tofu have been consistently beautiful in or out. I think they get even better with a day to meld in the fridge - order extra to go.

Twice-cooked sliced duck here is a genius item worthy of its own duck-crack moniker. As good as the crisp-fried duck shreds are, the bed of fresh and dried peppers, coarsely crushed spices and mixed onions is a worthy dish on its own and a different flavor toolbox from many of the other dishes.

One (footnote) surprise is that the orange beef tenderloin has been strikingly average on two visits, which puzzles me since Lao Sze Chuan, Lao Beijing, and now Lao You Ju have the same superb version with orange essence and peel and a sweet but non-oily sauce. LHN will not be my spot for this particular craving, but everything else on the menu has sung.

Santander wrote:
Pork with preserved bean and jade tofu have been consistently beautiful in or out. I think they get even better with a day to meld in the fridge - order extra to go.

So true for the jade tofu, and equally true for the stir fried lamb. Maybe there's another restaurant concept in here for Tony.

I was practically in tears last night when they told me they were out of Jde Tofu at 7:15 last night. I was introducing Lao Hunan to two newcomers and I had touted that dish so much. Oh well.

We opted for crispy eggplant, which was very tasty and beautifully fried with such a delicate crust. Quite pretty too:



Crispy Eggplant



We also had the Heng Shan Noodles referred to by Rene G. They didn't put it into individual dishes for us like they did for Rene G (I will say that it was a zoo there last night), but I tossed the dish anyway, revealing pickled green beans, cilantro, peanuts, noodles, some sliced beef, hot peppers and a sauce vaguely similar to the one in Jade Tofu, but packing less punch. It was very tasty, although the noodles themselves were not exciting and it was a little difficult to eat as slippery as it was. It was also quite picturesque:



Heng Shan Noodles




Another view of Heng Shan Noodles



We actually had to send back the Hunan Chiles in Black Bean Sauce. Never mind the ever decreasing black bean flavor I've noticed in repeated visits. The dish was so salty to the point of being inedible. All three of us took a couple of bites and could not tolerate more. They were very nice to remove this item from our table and the bill.


Hunan Chiles in Black Bean Sauce



After being stunned by the unavailability of Jade Tofu, one of my dining companions requested General Tso's Tofu. I was a little worried, but must say that the tofu was nicely prepared, the sauce not nearly as sweet as I might have expected, and the sour flavors nicely complemented any sweet (and some heat from hot peppers). Overall, surprisingly decent - better than any General Tso's dish I have had elsewhere.



General Tso's Tofu



Overall, a very good meal, the only exception the chiles. But I was happy to try two dishes I had not tried at Lao Hunan, and happy to welcome to new members to the Lao Hunan fan club.

I just returned to Lao Hunan for the first time since it opened, and found the food just as good as I remembered. We had the beef tendon, which is sliced thin and fried, and served in a cilantro-chili oil sauce, the Mao's pork belly, the stomach and the intestine, which reminded my girlfriend, who is from Taiwan, of food carts from her childhood.

I do have one question, however: we brought a couple of bottles of wine, which they wouldn't let us open, telling that they were no longer BYO. The explanation did not seem all that clear, and I have to say: diet Coke does not make a great pairing with terrific food like this. Does anyone have any idea what the deal is with this? I wouldn't have thought you needed any kind of license to do BYO; indeed, restaurants often go BYO because they can't or don't want to get a liquor license.

And just to clarify: they didn't mean that they were now serving alcohol and therefore no long BYO. They meant that we couldn't drink the wine we'd brought and they didn't serve.

Curious. The situation, I mean, and also me.

I am very happy to report that my most recent meal was top notch. As good as I remember from my first visits. I was sure to chat with our server before ordering, and let them know I love the food authentic and spicy. Also, maybe this is new, or maybe i just didn't notice it before, but there are two chili with black bean dishes listed side by side on the menu now. One is listed with a little icon for 1 chili pepper of spice, and the other with 2, indicating very spicy. I don't remember this chili rating for the spice level on the menu.

Not only were the peppers a spicy as i remember, they also had that characteristic smokey flavor, a flavor that i only remember on my first visit, which was not present the past 2 times i ordered the dish. All of the other dishes were spot on, as I remember from the earlier days. Lots of variety in flavors, plenty of szechuan peppercorns... Heaping mounds of hunan food, no broccoli or candied cherries.

What would the typical wait for a table be for a party of 4 or 6 on a Friday night?

fropones wrote:What would the typical wait for a table be for a party of 4 or 6 on a Friday night?

you can make a reservation

Had a great dinner last night at Lao Hunan for the first time with a group of friends. Not a single miss among any of the dishes, in my opinion. Although we may have gone a little overboard with the ordering for 5 people, it was still about $25 pp.

felliot wrote:I do have one question, however: we brought a couple of bottles of wine, which they wouldn't let us open, telling that they were no longer BYO. The explanation did not seem all that clear, and I have to say: diet Coke does not make a great pairing with terrific food like this. Does anyone have any idea what the deal is with this? I wouldn't have thought you needed any kind of license to do BYO; indeed, restaurants often go BYO because they can't or don't want to get a liquor license.

Not sure what the problem was then, but we had no problem bringing a bunch of beer and some wine.



The view outside


Spicy Cabage

I didn't think there was anything real special about this but it wasn't bad.


201 - Hot and Sour Soup

A fine rendition.


109 - Jade Tofu

A very tasty dish and good start to the meal. I really enjoyed the texture of the tofu as well as all the accompaniments.


106 - Hunan Style Cucumber Salad

Unfortunately they were out of the Tai Gan so we opted for this instead. It was a very good cucumber salad with thick cuts of cucumber and tomato and some spice.


411 - Chairman Mao’s Favorite Pork Belly

The first of the main courses. This was a very good dish with excellent pork belly that wasn't real greasy.


605 - Famous Hunan Chili in Black Bean Sauce

It seemed like the server was almost trying to talk us out of this one saying it was really really spicy. It was spicy but it also had a lot of really good flavor to it. Maybe one of my favorite dishes of the night, although it's really hard to pin down.


408 - Ground Pork with Preserved Sour Bean

Another standout dish. Sort of thought of this as Chinese Italian Beef (pork). Really enjoyed the flavors of the "preserved sour bean".



716 - Heng Shan Style Preserved Rice Noodle

They split this at the table for us into smaller bowls. This was a good dish however I don't think it stood out nearly as much as the rest of the dishes.


302 - Home Fed Chicken Xiang Xi Style

This one was another dish that was good but didn't really stand out against the rest of the stellar dishes here. Unfortunately most the people I was with didn't realize that when they said the chicken had bones that it would be chopped up with chunks of bone here and there and didn't care for that.


309 - Twice Cooked Sliced Duck

"Crack Duck" indeed. This was extremely tasty pieces of fried duck. My only complaint was that it was a little overly salty. Otherwise it would have hands down been my favorite of the evening.


523 - Dry Chili Fish Fillet

I believe someone upthread put it correctly when they said "this is what tilapia dreams of becoming." An extremely moist, slightly spicy, not at all oily piece of fish. Absolutely amazing.

Just looking over these pictures this morning I absolutely cannot wait to return and continue exploring the menu. Although I still have a lot of other restaurants to explore in Chinatown, this one will stay towards the top of the list. I believe it is time to start digging into the leftovers.

Just to add another data point, a work lunch for 5 here last week was really delicious but almost completely devoid of heat. Most notably, ground pork & sour bean and famous Hunan chiles with black bean sauce were really mild compared to previous trips. I'm not sure if this represents inconsistency or a reluctance to cook really spicy food for folks who they fear might send it back. In any case, we pleaded with our server to make things spicy but for whatever reason, that just didn't happen. With the chiles, I'm guessing it was just luck of the draw because I'm not sure how one could make whole chiles in a preparation like this more mild than they naturally are. In any event, the food really was tasty across the board but quite different from my earliest trips.

=R=

Just wanted to mention to anybody who hasn't been to Lao Hunan in awhile that they have

1) got a brand new, colorful, fancy-schmanzy menu
2) the lunch specials are MIA

And don't think they just didn't put the lunch specials on the new fancy menu, but you can still order them. You CANNOT. They are gone. And it looks like a lot of the prices have gone up. Now it wouldn't be so bad if they would sell you 1/2 orders, but they won't.

I love Lao Hunan. I started going there for lunch with my one of my co-workers when we got sick and tired of the waits, slightly surly service and the rice upcharge at Lao Szechaun. I am now addicted to Lao Hunan's crispy eggplant (thanks LTF for turning me on to that) and we get an order to share every time we go. We used to also each get a lunch special. But those are gone. So what used to be about a $10-12 dollar a person lunch is now much closer to a $20 lunch ---since we still have to get the eggplant (now $10.50--wasn't it $9ish before??). And if we want that great Hot N Sour soup (which used to come with the lunch special) it's a couple dollars more each.

BOOOOO! Tony bring back the lunch specials!!! Raise the price a dollar if you want but bring them back!

Visited LH yesterday with a big group, so I was finally able to try the Bandit's Pork Liver (my husband is my usual companion, and he is horrified at the thought of a plate of liver). Very good - if you are a liver-loving freak, give it a try. This is another one of those dishes that's even better the next day.

We weren't given the shredded cabbage at the start of the meal. Had I remembered I would have asked after it. We were, however, given four lotus-root moon cakes gratis, which were delicious.

Suzy Creamcheese wrote:Visited LH yesterday with a big group, so I was finally able to try the Bandit's Pork Liver (my husband is my usual companion, and he is horrified at the thought of a plate of liver). Very good - if you are a liver-loving freak, give it a try. This is another one of those dishes that's even better the next day.

We weren't given the shredded cabbage at the start of the meal. Had I remembered I would have asked after it. We were, however, given four lotus-root moon cakes gratis, which were delicious.

No cabbage last night either. We were told it was too hot to properly ferment.

I missed it but #622 Hunan style eggplant is still a winner.

Heard the same about the cabbage on Friday. But the rest of the meal was terrific--was just what i needed to fight a nasty cold that followed me most of the weekend. Can't wait to return, especially since I didn't realize I'd forgotten to order the crispy eggplant until I was out on the sidewalk!!

I had a group meal last week. The ground pork with preserved sour bean, the appetizer trios, crispy eggplant, and dry chili fish filet were as good as ever. I had the peppers with black bean for the first time and it wasn't all that hot and wasn't all that special. Overall, I'd say most of the food was as good as last year, with some things a notch below. Still, a destination well worth visiting.

Also, they are absolutely still BYO. I called to confirm and we brought wine and beer and they offered an ice bucket, glasses, bottle opener, the works. I'm not sure what happened with felliot, but I wanted to set the record straight.

My wife had a conference at McCormick Place yesterday (Saturday) so picked her up, by 6:45pm we had found numerous open parking spaces in front of & across the street from Lao Hunan, and upon going into the restaurant found 4 open tables, I was shocked quite frankly at how easy it was for a Saturday night. So our meal started.....

Jade Tofu is a stellar dish, just a stunner. So you can imagine the excitement we had looking forward towards the other dishes.

Twice cooked duck, was ok, I'm thinking lamb or other stronger flavored meat would work better, duck flavor got lost and it could have been chicken for all we knew.

Chairman Mao's pork belly, we enjoyed this dish but I don't think I'll order it again.

Then the famous Hunan chili w/black bean. NO HEAT, WTF????? I was not happy after reading the dreamy quotes about the heat of this dish and especially after being warned by the waiter that this was going to very spicy. Dish was about as much heat as some green bell peppers sauteed w/a couple of small slices of jalapeno. I really think Lao Hunan may be dumbing down this dish despite our telling the server we like it spicy.

On a side note, a family across the way from us ordered an upright fried fish w/sauce on it. When they were leaving I asked him how they liked the fish, he complained about the number of bones and that one gets a lot less fish then one thinks with this dish, but they did enjoy. What was ironic, was that he mentioned he had just recently been in the region of China where Hunan cuisine is served and so I asked how does Lao Hunan compare to what he had in China. He stated that Lao Hunan cooks with much more heat than what he had over in China. Sadly I didn't experience what he was served at Lao Hunan.

Despite all the above we will go back as that Jade Tofu was fantastic and I'd like to try some of the other menu.

gastro gnome wrote:Also, they are absolutely still BYO.

Still BYO.

Sweet Willie wrote:Twice cooked duck, was ok, I'm thinking lamb or other stronger flavored meat would work better, duck flavor got lost and it could have been chicken for all we knew.

Sweet Willie wrote:Then the famous Hunan chili w/black bean. NO HEAT, WTF????? I was not happy after reading the dreamy quotes about the heat of this dish and especially after being warned by the waiter that this was going to very spicy. Dish was about as much heat as some green bell peppers sauteed w/a couple of small slices of jalapeno. I really think Lao Hunan may be dumbing down this dish despite our telling the server we like it spicy.

Sorry to hear you had a disappointing trip. I was an early skeptic, but I have to say Lao Hunan has won me over and my past couple trips there have been quite consistent. I do emphasize that I want the food to be spicy and they have been delivering the goods, so maybe they need a little coaxing.

I recently had a dish similar to the twice-cooked duck that used dried shredded beef at Homestyle Taste in Bridgeport. Maybe that's worth checking out, the dish is pretty intense.

Personally, I've never been as enamored with the twice cooked duck as others. I just find that the breading is a bit thick and the duck gets just a little bit lost. Don't get me wrong - I like it . . . the duck underneath is always moist and the breading always crisp and not oily. But I understand the lack of love.

The heat in the chilis/black bean dish has been an issue for some time.

In my opinion, the Jade Tofu is a real gem on the menu. But there are other dishes I quite like. For instance, the ground pork with sour beans, the Hunan Famous Prawns in Hot Wok and the dry chili fish, just to name a few. My only other major complaint about Lao Hunan is that I frequently find at least one dish served each visit (and often more) to be overly salty.

Don't miss the crispy eggplant next time--and I highly recommend getting the LH version of the appetizer platter--a combo of the jade tofu, taigan and beef maw--it's a fantastic cold dish combo!!

boudreaulicious wrote:Don't miss the crispy eggplant next time--and I highly recommend getting the LH version of the appetizer platter--a combo of the jade tofu, taigan and beef maw--it's a fantastic cold dish combo!!

Love that eggplant. The chef's special chicken in a wok and the lamb with cumin powder, ordered spicy, are rolling in Szechuan peppercorns in addition to chilis and deliver strong flavors. I'm still happy with Lao Hunan. Lao Ma La also turns things up when requested, and the small portions and pricepoints make for good sampling. Double Li (when Ben is there, last visited in January) still sets the bar for me for sheer heat and numbness without masking flavors, since that's what many seem to be seeking, but I use Lao Hunan mostly for cooling, sour, and fried (particularly eggplant, fish, duck) flavors, so the downtick in the peppers doesn't disappoint.

Sweet Willie wrote:Then the famous Hunan chili w/black bean. NO HEAT, WTF????? I was not happy after reading the dreamy quotes about the heat of this dish and especially after being warned by the waiter that this was going to very spicy. Dish was about as much heat as some green bell peppers sauteed w/a couple of small slices of jalapeno. I really think Lao Hunan may be dumbing down this dish despite our telling the server we like it spicy.

Had some nice dim sum at Cai this morning and then since I was in the area I figured I'd pick up some Lao Hunan for dinner. Happy to report that Famous Hunan Chili with Black Bean Sauce is as spicy as ever (my head is aflame and my sinuses fully drained). My qualm is they seemed to have raised the prices (although I didn't pay too much attention before, so I may be mistaken). The chillies were $10.50 and for that and the Jade Chicken it was $18.20 with tax. Does anyone remember if this is how much it normally costs or if this is an increase?

When I was ordering takeout from Lao Hunan last Sat I saw a Chinese language menu stuck on the counter under a plastic sheet. I tried asking if these were special dishes or a Chinese translation of the dishes already on the menu. (Although I would not know why you would have a chinese menu of a menu that is already in Chinese). I could not get a straight answer. Are there any Chinese mavens on the forum to check to see if there is a 'secret' Hunanese menu at Lao Hunan? All I heard in reply when I asked was "Chinese Menu."

Had a craving for Chinese last night so we ended up at Lao Hunan. I recalled hearing about: jade tofu, crispy eggplant, ground pork and sour bean, and of course the green chilis in black bean sauce, so we ordered these. We weren't too impressed with the pork dish - thought it was a bit bland (really only tasted the sour beans), and thought the tofu dish was decent, but not much to rave about - granted, neither of us are huge fans of tofu. Otherwise, we thought everything was very good, especially the eggplant. Loved the heat of the chilis too.

Overall, we really liked this place, and it was a great value. Only complaints would be that it was a bit salty and oily.

Since I don't live in Chicago and am always here for work, it's hard for me to hit up your local Chinese Restaurant. Nothing is more depressing than looking at a vast and delicious menu and knowing you can't even scratch the surface.

Tonight being my birthday, i was able to wrangle one person to go out with me. Still not enough to do serious damage but, more than if it were just me. Not to mention, the portions at Lao Hunan are on the large side.

I have traveled extensively through China. i spent a month to 1.5 months a year traveling there for work. By now, my customers know that next to doing business, eating is my top priority. Chinese food happens to be my favorite cuisine and Hunan and Sichuan and Yangzhou Cuisine are my favorites.

We started 3 choices from their cold dish menu. We chose pig ears, cucumbers and tripe.



Out of the 3 dishes, i enjoyed the tripe the most. The tripe had a lot more depth of flavor. The cilantro and sesame seeds added to the dishes complexity. Spice level was fairly nice. The cucumber had a lot less ginger than what i am sue to, there was plenty of garlic. A very nice start. (certainly wish i had read up on the place and discovered it is byob)

After pretty much decimating the cold dishes, i could have called that dinner.. But, i am happy i didn't.

We ordered the sour beans with ground pork.. in addition to beans, there was also sour greens. The pork i found to be slightly over cooked and dry but, the sour vegetables were really lovely. My favorite part were the greens added to the beans.



Cumin Lamb:

Stir fried lamb with hot dried peppers, fresh bell peppers and cilantro. Lamb was tender and delicious. A nice version. A lot lighter on the cumin than previous versions i have experienced.



Last dish was a huge metal pot of sliced fish in a Sichuan Broth. The menu seems to be a hybrid of Sichuan and Hunan Dishes.. I question it's authenticity. There were a lot of basic Hunan Dishes that I see on every Hunan Menu missing and a lot more Sichuan Dishes than one would see at a Hunan place.. Sure there is some overlapping but, green peppercorns and green hot peppers were missing. Various bread and bun dishes were not there, corn dishes and pork dishes were missing.Again it was all good none the less.

Sliced fish in Spicy Sichuan sauce though missing lots of sichuan peppercorns, clear noodles, cilantro and dried chile peppers. A very nice bowl of food.


To summarize, while I was not crazy about this restaurant, i am looking forward to trying this chef's take on a real Sichuan Restaurant.

Monday was National Hot & Spicy Food Day, so a group of us headed to Lao Hunan to celebrate with some "greatest hits" from the menu. I'm not sure if it was because of the "holiday", but Lao Hunan was really on this day.

Amuse of Sugared Peanuts


This dish was brought out by the chef who greeted our table on this occasion.

Appetizer Platter - Jade Tofu, Crispy Beef, Tai Gan


Beef & Maw


Famous Hunan Chili in Black Bean Sauce


Ground Pork with Preserved Sour Beans


Twice Cooked Sliced Duck


Dry Chili Fish Filet


Crispy Fried Eggplant

Went after the movies last Saturday. I had the crispy eggplant and the jade tofu. They continue to be outstanding. That said I miss the cabbage.

Anyone have thoughts on re-creating this at home?

Thanks in advance.

It was a long time coming, but I finally made it to Lao Hunan. Took two friends who are not quite as Chinese-forward when it comes to ordering, but they let me take the reins for the most part and they were very pleased.

We had Jade Tofu, potstickers, ground pork with eggplant casserole, smoked wild duck meat, and dry chili fish filet. Wow everything was great. They both really liked the Jade Tofu (and I always get some weird enjoyment when people enjoy their first example of a cold Chinese appetizer). Potstickers were good if not anything special.

I thought the Smoked Duck was really great. I loved the flavor, the fattiness, and the chewiness. Turns out they were a bit too smoky for my friends which reflects some of the opinions on this board, but I enjoyed it. Eggplant casserole had that rich oily gooey goodness that the best eggplant dishes always have. And you guys weren't lying about the dry chili fish filet. Wow. By far our favorite thing at the table. I'm a big homer for Asian Bistro, and I think I prefer their spicing a smidge on their twice cooked fish filet, but this preparation was much superior. The crunchiness didn't come at the cost of juiciness. Not dry at all. Really really great. Could not stop eating even though I was extremely full.

Very glad I finally made it. Can't believe it took me so long.

Things were pretty off with a delivery last night. I know there are some consistency issues reported upthread, but in the dozen or so experiences I've had with Lao Hunan despite the capsicum intensity of the Famous Chiles, everything has been pretty even across the board, even with delivery.

The chiles were the only thing in complete working order, a fine batch and definitely fiery, but oddly one of the more mild dishes of the four we ordered. The Ground Pork and Preserved Bean was way off, very light on the pickled beans, the few present were cut shorter than usual and lifelessly bland in flavor, color, and texture. In its place were very hot strips of jalapeño, too many in fact. I can usually go all the way up the heat spectrum, but I was pushing aside every other piece of pepper. I don't even recall this dish having fresh chiles in the past. Twice cooked duck was hotted up higher than usual as well. We should have know better than order a fried dish for delivery, but this one was pretty lame too. Worst of all was the Jade Tofu, barely chile oil-lubed at all and devoid of any green shrubbery. One dimensional and weak.

Anyone else strike out here recently?

Jefe wrote:Anyone else strike out here recently?

The last two times we've been there (both in the last 3 months) we've had similar experiences. The green chilis have been off in both spice level and how much they were cooked. And the diced chicken hunan style, which is one of our favorites, has been saucy where it used to be a dry preparation. Other things we've ordered haven't had their usual pop. I assumed there was some turnover in cooks the first time, but things didn't improve between our two visits. I hope they get things together as this is one of our go to restaurants.

I ordered two large dinners for delivery in late December/early January, and found things to be generally pretty good--jade tofu was still a hit both times, as were the green chiles. Twice-cooked duck was pretty hot and quite salty on one of the meals. Sichuan green beans were excellent both times. I will say things suffered a bit in delivery (fried things, naturally--particularly that solid eggplant dish), but not enough to outweigh the convenience. Given the size and tastes of the parties, I ordered a few more American dishes, and even those were pretty good. In general, I think it's better to dine in most everywhere in Chinatown, and I don't think Lao Hunan is at the top of its game, but it's still a crowd pleaser, at least for the large-ish parties I was entertaining.