Kansas City: Chinese

Pine and Bamboo Garden

Faced with a flurry of stimuli, the fam hit up Pine and Bamboo Garden a few weeks ago for dinner. It was snowing outside, so there was pretty much no one on the roads. KC’s a southern town that way.

A few days prior, I’d gotten an ALL CAPS PM from Geo: EMERGENCY ALERT! He had just visited his best-yet Chinese joint in KC. When the former Wuhan resident speaks on Chinese, you listen. This is my favorite kind of emergency. The downside was, his food critic friend was set to talk up the place on Walt Bodine’s show (like Milt Rosenberg?), and the KC Star food critic Lauren Chapin was set to review their dim sum the coming weekend.

As far as I can tell, there’s not much “Check, Please!” effect in KC. We had no wait for a table, and the oddly layed out, sprawling room, easily accommodated our family of four.

There is a menu of “Traditional Chinese Items” (or similar) following the regular menu and, on Geo’s advice, this is where we turned. Our order was modest.

We started with potstickers/dumplings, steamed first (I think) and pan-fried on one side. Our boys, who had previously fallen for Chinese soup dumplings at Chicago’s House of Fortune, had their love affair rekindled. The eldest exclaimed, “I like dumplings better than pizza!” That’s my boy. They were quite enjoyable.

For the rest of our meal, we ordered beef chow fun with black bean sauce, Chinese broccoli with garlic, and chicken with ginger. I must say, none of these did much for me.

Now—important qualification and admission—I’m something of a Chinese food philistine. Cantonese food has never been a real source of excitement for me. A dish here and there, sure. I love LTH’s crispy-skinned chicken, but not too much else. Outside Canton, I think Spring World (Szechuanese, Yunnanese) is absolutely terrific. I love good soup dumplings. But I don’t have a lot of standout Cantonese experiences to hang my hat on. (I’ve had a great meal or two at Sun Wah).

Back to Pine and Bamboo Garden. The beef chow fun was on the bland side, and I wish I’d read Hammond’s post on sucky Chinese beef a few days earlier.

The chicken had potential, for sure, and maybe was even quite good. I was hoping for something crispy-skinned a la LTH. Instead, it was very much in the gelatinous-texture school that I understand is very desirable for some, but for which I haven’t quite yet developed a taste.

The Chinese broccoli was a dish I was glad to have the option of ordering, but didn’t register much one way or the other.

The service was very friendly, though very slow. Probably took half hour to get our food. Our waitress was a little embarrassed by the kitchen’s speed, and explained it in by saying the traditional menu orders came slower. I don’t quite understand this, especially with the potstickers (were they different than regular menu potstickers?) but it was in this instance a relatively minor complaint.

I’ll go back, for sure, and when I was out of town recently, my wife took the boys to satisfy their dumpling fix. I’d love for a little guidance, though, on how to maximize this menu. (As an aside, Lauren Chapin reviewed the dim sum service, with which I also have pretty minimal experience, but may be worth a shot for anyone interested.)

Pine and Bamboo Garden
10915 W 63rd St
Shawnee, KS 66203-3513
(913) 268-9545

The rest of my family has been back to Pine and Bamboo Garden a number of times, but I somehow hadn't made it again until last night.

Perhaps it was lowered expectations, perhaps it was better ordering, perhaps it was the bourbon--in any case I really enjoyed.

A dry erase board in the entryway had something written in Chinese for $8.95. I asked the owner at the front desk what the special was...walnut chicken.

Is that what's written out on the board, I inquired skeptically.

Oh, that's just for Chinese.

Ah, ha! She explained it, upon further inquiry, as "snow pea leaf tips" or something. Pea shoots, I guess, though with all the stringy part removed. She told me later that there was considerable waste in the preparation because they removed all the stringy part, so I guess that makes sense. She said Chinese liked them but she wasn't sure about me. They were really wonderful, stir-fried with garlic, a bit nutty, not bitter, slight crunch in the remaining stem. I was grateful to be given the real deal, when we also ordered egg foo young and crab rangoon.

Steamed dumplings were delicious--the boys still love dumplings, which is nice.

Tried the Hong Kong Roast Duck, which was perfectly, duckily delightful.

The duck and the pea shoots were most of my meal. The younger boy really wanted the walnut chicken, which I enjoyed for a few bites as well. Egg drop soup, and especially hot and sour soup, were good too.

Oh, and the bourbon. I asked what kind they served. "Kentucky." Hey, what the heck. The first glass, big tumbler, came full of ice and half full of bourbon. It was a good size glass, okay pour, I thought. I took her up on a refill. I guess she warmed up to us a bit, because I got a brand new glass full of ice and bourbon. Bourbon and Chinese...hmmm, made me miss Chicago and LTHForum. But it won't be another year before I'm back at Pine and Bamboo Garden.

Aaron Deacon wrote:Tried the Hong Kong Roast Duck, which was perfectly, duckily delightful.

What, dare I ask, is "Hong Kong Roast Duck?" Is this restaurant Cantonese, culinarily?

ulterior epicure wrote:What, dare I ask, is "Hong Kong Roast Duck?" Is this restaurant Cantonese, culinarily?

You know, that's a good question. It looked pretty much like straight up roast duck, I had a half, hacked into pieces, crispy skin, served without sauce or accoutrement. I don't know what the "Hong Kong" indicates. They also had a Peking Duck on offer, so maybe this is a way of differentiating. It's different than the BBQ ducks that hang in the windows of places like Sun Wah. (I don't suppose there's any place like this in KC?)

Apparently, KC's first Szechuan restaurant has opened.