Sweet Station in Chinatown Mall

Hi,

Sunday I had an early morning run to the airport. I thought it would be an excellent opportunity to breakfast at Sweet Station.

I wasn't exactly sure where in Chinatown Mall Sweet Station was located. I was hoping there might have been cars parked in one lot or the other to help identify its location. At 7:45 am, I was the only car in either lot. I finally parked at the eastern section and walked around speculatively. I found Sweet Station close to Spring World.

There were workers inside, but the door was locked. The posted hours were 8 am until 2 am, though not 6 am as reported on their website. I wasn't in the mood to wait politely for 15 minutes until the posted opening. I knocked on the window until someone let me in. They agreed I could have a table now. I went back to the car to collect my Mother.

We sat at a booth with a television playing an American Idol style program in Chinese. It was just like eating at home with the television blaring at one end of the table. They brought us tall glasses of hot black tea and breakfast menus.



When we needed a spoon to stir our tea, the waiter opened a drawer on the table's edge. There were napkins, chop sticks, soup spoons, knives and forks at our fingertips.



Mom ordered initially two eggs scrambled with bacon, a bun and coffee.




I ordered pork and preserved egg congee, beef crepe and hot almond milk. My Mom thought my order sounded better than hers and switched to a copy of mine. I told the waiter to cancel her eggs, give her my order and I would get something else. After a few moments thought, I switched to beef brisket noodle soup and hot almond milk.

Both menu choices allowed us a complimentary egg tart. These were fresh from the oven with the egg still setting in the middle.



Mother's bowl of congee arrived first with minced bits of preserved egg and pork. After a few spoons of soup, Mom sought out some pepper. When I tasted it later, I found it needed some salt.



My brisket soup noodles arrived quickly after with lots of wonderfully tender tendon and star anise scented beef. There was an option for "beef varieties," which I estimated was organ meat. While curious, it was maybe a bit more than what I like to deal with first thing in the morning.



When Mom's beef crepes arrived, the waitress moved her soup aside and placed it front and center. This was a generous portion of mince beef in rice noodles than normally encountered for dim sum. A bonus was the addition of Chinese brocolli.



Each of our selections cost a lofty $4.25. Together with tip, we spent less than $12 for breakfast.

When we began the morning, my Mom was enthusiastic to go out for breakfast. She groaned when I told her breakfast would be Chinese. Fortunately the pleasant experience and good food changed her opinion.



Sweet Station
2101 S China Pl
Chicago
312-842-2228
http://www.mysweetstation.com/

Regards,

if you like Sweet Station, definitely try Chi Cafe at the other end. There is a long story with lots of drama and divorces and stuff worthy of a soap opera, but Chi Cafe is the earlier of the two and they have similar menus and pricing (except no free egg tart, I gotta go back to Sweet to get one of those). However, I find Chi Cafe to have better flavoring (I've never needed salt in any of my congees) and a better value (even moreso since Sweet Station opened since they are competing). I personally enjoy the Scallop and Fish Fillet Congee at Chi.

BUT my favorite is still HK Style Milk Tea (hot or cold) found at Hing Kee, also in Chinatown Square, but Sweet Station's Almond Milk is a close second for my favorite hot drink in CSquare.

Disclaimer: I've never eaten breakfast at Sweet Station, only at Chi Cafe. I have eaten late night at both locations though. I definitely need to try Sweet during breakfast.

Cathy2 wrote:Fortunately the pleasant experience and good food changed her opinion.

C2,

Looks an enjoyable breakfast, your mom is a real trooper.

Enjoy,
Gary

Chi Cafe also has the table drawers (we found them very clever as well).

I'm always curious about breakfast in other cultures, good to know this is such an accessible option. Nice work, C2!

Hi,

I will certainly give Chi Cafe a whirl sometime. They pretty much keep similar hours, though I was initially pretty excited by Sweet Station's 6 am opening. Unfortunately 6 am is an error confined to their website. I cannot get too fussy about the salt issue, because so many places undersalt now. Fortunately it is easily remedied with a few shakes.

Chi Cafe
2160 South Archer Avenue
Chicago, IL 60616-1514
(312) 842-9993
chicafeonline.com
Open Hours
Sunday to Thursday 8am - 2am
Friday & Saturday 8am - 5am

If we could not have gotten in to Sweet Station, Mom and I would have gone to a bakery. I like invading the almost all boys club for some dim sum occasionally. If my Mother gave me one more cross eyed look, who knows we might have ended up at Patty's with Gary and Ellen.

Regards,

Sweet Station is a fun place with a huge menu and reasonable prices, kind of a culinary amusement park, with the role of carnies portrayed by hip, black-clad Asian youth.

I was highly amused by the hyper-now stylin’ of the interior, which Nagrant analyzed with equally amusing insight.



My first thought was that, from a design standpoint, the place was kind of a Chi Café redux, but walking by Chi Café afterwards, this old place suddenly looked so…2008. There is so much about the look of Sweet Station that grabs the eye …and on the topic of eye-grabbing flash-bulb magnet design *, my youngest friend and namesake, Tavi Gevinson , is in Paris this week for the Couture show (whatever that is – it’s cool, that’s all I know):



The above is a pic of Tavi posing in front of her garage down the street from me; she’s gone from eccentric 13 year-old-kid to fashion sensation (noted in last week’s New Yorker article about the Rodarte sisters; she’s now under contract with Target); another one of us who discovered that the instant publication opportunities of the internet was a way of airing quirky thoughts and gaining some kind of audience.

Anyway, about the food: The Wife and I must have liked the squid balls based because they disappeared within minutes of hitting the table.



The squid balls are a type of seafood sausage, fried and served with a forgettable sweet-sour type of sauce which I decided to forego in favor of the hot-sauce. Nice stuff, and would be a good drinking food if you could drink at Sweet Station.

The pig tongue with arbus herb was full of meaty chunks, and surprisingly subtle.



Now, here’s a slight caveat about places that machine-out hundreds of dishes. Note the crusty ring around the edge of the soup bowl: a sign of microwaving…but no big deal. As you might expect, a place that is trading so heavily on up-to-the-minute (I think) Pan-Asian design elements is going to be serving food very fast (there’s less than a 10 minute lag between ordering and serving), and with a menu like this, I’m guessing a lot of stuff is made weeks in advance, flash-frozen, then zapped before serving.

There’s a lot of fun stuff at Sweet Station that I’ve yet to try: come for the pig tongue; return for the loofa.

*This is likely the first and last link I will ever post to Teen Vogue.

Hi,

Were those green apples real? I had meant to give them a look.

Interesting track your neighbor has taken. My next door neighbor played Danial Boone after school every day. He would switch from jeans to an all leather outfit. He'd track and trap animals. Guess what he does now? He is a licensed guide in Alaska for hunting and fishing trips. The bear that threatened his family was shot, butchered and eaten thoughout one winter. You never know where your youthful fancies will take you.

I did read through the full menu while I was there, because none was available to select during the breakfast hour. Your experience suggests I need to get there during prime time very soon.

Thanks!

Regards,

Cathy2 wrote:Were those green apples real?

Nope. Like the super-shiny dinner platters you see in the display windows of other places along Chinatown Mall, these apples were fabricated facsimiles.

David Hammond wrote:*This is likely the first and last link I will ever post to Teen Vogue.

That is likely the first and last time I will ever read Teen Vogue. It was an amazing & depressing article though.

Amazing because this kid spun her writing ability & motivation into a cherry gig; depressing because I'm sitting in a cubicle while this 13-year-old is living the dream

Khaopaat wrote:

David Hammond wrote:*This is likely the first and last link I will ever post to Teen Vogue.

That is likely the first and last time I will ever read Teen Vogue. It was an amazing & depressing article though.

Amazing because this kid spun her writing ability & motivation into a cherry gig; depressing because I'm sitting in a cubicle while this 13-year-old is living the dream

When my daughter Lydia saw this video byTavi...

http://www.thefrisky.com/post/246-check ... get-video/

...she said she "barfed up a combo platter of pride and envy."

Jeez, now I'm linking to The Frisky. Where will it end? Is Tiger Beat still in business?

Learning that LTHForum superstar David Hammond is bros with Tavi Gevinson is prob the greatest gift this board has given me since I found out they'll still let you hold a bank account and a job if you publicly admit to liking chicken rings

Had a somewhat odd meal at Sweet Station a few weeks ago. At nearly midnight on a Tuesday the place was really hoppin'. Stepping into the restaurant I suddenly felt very old and very Caucasian. We settled into our booth to catch a bit of the Olympics and look through the book-length menu, interesting reading indeed.



Healthy Fish Soup with Taro and Mixed Mushrooms




A nice soup with a hearty fish broth, rice noodles, taro root, plus enoki and button mushrooms. I especially enjoyed the crunchy texture of the noodle bundles.

Pan-Fried Turnip Patties with XO Sauce


We tried to order this "spicy" but it came "not spicy." This dish would have been improved greatly by a little more XO or some other seasoning.

Portuguese Pork Chop Sandwich


I still don't understand this whole "Portuguese" thing. What makes this sandwich Portuguese (or even Asian) is a mystery to me. This fried pork chop on a bun with lettuce, tomato and mayo wouldn't be out of place at Burger King. Even the batter-coated fries served with ketchup would fit in. No need to order this again.

Definitely an interesting place.

Sweet Station
2102 S China Pl
Chicago
312-842-2228

I still don't understand this whole "Portuguese" thing. What makes this sandwich Portuguese (or even Asian) is a mystery to me.

Some connection to Macao, perhaps, the one Portuguese colony in the area?

The dish to try here, at least for me is the Honjg Kong style chow mein. It's a really simple dish of pan fried egg noodles with ground pork, slightly spicy, a little oily and just crispy enough. It's addictively good and one of my absolute favorite Chinatown dishes at the moment.

Rene G wrote:Stepping into the restaurant I suddenly felt very old and very Caucasian.

Sweet Station wasn't particularly busy Tuesday 10pm, but I relate, and you are much hipper than me.

Second stop Sweet Station seemed shockingly bright and modern even in comparison to Tau Ra Jun. Settling into the circular 'Chairman Mao' banquette we perused the enormous menu. I (mostly) deferred to Kevin Pang, who I had the pleasure of dining with along with the ever interesting Steve Dolinsky, as he was most familiar with menu and style.

Hand-Shredded Chicken, moist salt baked chicken served with, at Kevin's request, salt baked sauce as opposed to the more typical ginger/scallion puree. Salt baked sauce, which I understand to be Hakka style, is a prepackaged mix of salt, MSG and five spice powder that has boiling hot oil added just before service. Intense bright flavor bounce, subtle as orange knickers at a pajama party, moderation mandatory. "Westerners can ask for it as "Yeem Guk Gay Jup" which translates to "Salt Baked Chicken Sauce".

Hand-Shredded Chicken



Stir fried beef and Canadian King Mushroom was recommended by Sweet Stations owner, an amped up stir fry with intense mushroom flavor. A damn good dish, though given the array of exotics available it will be a while before it hits my rotation again.

Stir fried beef and Canadian King Mushroom



Sweet Stations Crispy Pork Intestine hit me right where I live, crispy, fatty, salty, porky, drizzle of house chili oil I was already figuring how to muscle Pang and Dolinsky out of the last crunchy fatty scraps.

Crispy Pork Intestine



Hong Kong Baked sliced beef tongue with Portuguese Sauce the only miss of the meal. Enjoyed the Portuguese curry sauce, which Pang called "remedial curry" but the tongue was chewy tough and flavorless. Pork chop with Portuguese curry recommended for next visit.

Hong Kong Baked sliced beef tongue on rice with Portuguese Sauce



Finished with a surprisingly light slice of cake and cold sugar cane drink, a refreshing finish.

Back soon for crispy pork intestine and to explore Sweet Stations enormous menu.

Enjoy,
Gary

This place has awesome "pineapple" buns, coconut buns, raisin twists, egg tarts, etc. I head straight to the back of the restaurant, eyes on the little bakery counter. They don't have a large variety as other bakeries in Chinatown, but what they do make, they make very well. I went around 1pm today, and the buns were SO fresh and soft! Glorious glorious sweet buns. After 5pm, all the breads are 1/2 off. Might not be as fresh later in the day, but 10 seconds in the microwave could fix that lol