I finally tried this with my wife and some friends about a month or so ago. Here's are some comparisons between this and the original:

Chili-oil cabbage: This free starter that is omnipresent at the original was there at the uptown location. However, it was distinctly less spicy and more garlicky than any I've had in Chinatown. As such, I liked it less and my wife liked it more given how much we each care about heat and garlic.

Tony's Chicken: Strangely, this dish was the same as in Chinatown with one huge exception, there was black pepper all over it. Don't know what the deal is with that. Same peppers, same sweet-spicy sauce, but tons of black pepper. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't what I was expecting/hoping for.

Portions: My wife and I both felt that the dishes at the Uptown location were all larger in portion size to a small, but noticeable degree.

Overall, I was pretty happy with the meal. Not sure what was up with Tony's Chicken, might just have been a weird mistake on our dish or that night. Maybe others can confirm this when they visit?

itshissong wrote:Chili-oil cabbage: This free starter that is omnipresent at the original was there at the uptown location.

Were you there for dinner? We went to the Uptown location for lunch about a month ago and were not served the slaw, which we were always served at the Chinatown location.

itshissong wrote:Overall, I was pretty happy with the meal. Not sure what was up with Tony's Chicken, might just have been a weird mistake on our dish or that night. Maybe others can confirm this when they visit?

The main course we chose was the "chef's special dry chili chicken". I had asked the difference between that and the "Tony's dry-chili chicken", and was told that both are hot but the latter is also sweet. I'm not sure how true that is. In any case, we didn't notice any black pepper in the chicken dish we got, but the spiciness level was significantly hotter than when I've had the Tony's dish in Chinatown (the latter was already pretty darn hot, but this one was borderline inedible, even for this lover of hot-spicy foods). HTH

nsxtasy wrote:

itshissong wrote:Chili-oil cabbage: This free starter that is omnipresent at the original was there at the uptown location.

Were you there for dinner? We went to the Uptown location for lunch about a month ago and were not served the slaw, which we were always served at the Chinatown location.

itshissong wrote:Overall, I was pretty happy with the meal. Not sure what was up with Tony's Chicken, might just have been a weird mistake on our dish or that night. Maybe others can confirm this when they visit?

The main course we chose was the "chef's special dry chili chicken". I had asked the difference between that and the "Tony's dry-chili chicken", and was told that both are hot but the latter is also sweet. I'm not sure how true that is. In any case, we didn't notice any black pepper in the chicken dish we got, but the spiciness level was significantly hotter than when I've had the Tony's dish in Chinatown (the latter was already pretty darn hot, but this one was borderline inedible, even for this lover of hot-spicy foods). HTH

We did go for dinner so maybe that was why we got the cabbage and you didn't. Also, we had both dry chili chicken, which is my favorite as I love, love, love spicy food, and Tony's chicken. Both were spicy, but nothing out of the ordinary. I guess the Tony's chicken was slightly spicier than the version I'm used to at the Chinatown LSC, but it's tough to compare given all the black pepper that was on it.

A few things I've noticed:
- if you call for delivery, the minimum is $20. Unsure on fee.
- if you use grubhub, the minimum is $25, with a $4 fee.
- the lunch specials that they serve are indeed valid for delivery, even though they're on neither the printed menu, or the grubhub menu. You just need to call and ask. Almost makes me wish I worked with other people so that I could hit the minimum without blinking, instead of it becoming an expensive lunch.

Interesting: the delivery fee for the Chinatown location is $10 as opposed to the Uptown's $25. I'm slightly curious to spot-check the two menus & see if there are price differences. Mainly out of curiosity. It's not going to change my addiction.

An update on this. I just ordered from GrubHub and there was no minimum order with a $4 delivery fee. I am very happy about this. As a single person, I didn't want to have to order $25 of food for just myself.

dupreeblue wrote:Interesting: the delivery fee for the Chinatown location is $10 as opposed to the Uptown's $25.

It sounds like this statement is not true...

nsxtasy wrote:

dupreeblue wrote:Interesting: the delivery fee for the Chinatown location is $10 as opposed to the Uptown's $25.

It sounds like this statement is not true...

I think what this poster meant was the minimum order for delivery.

Some restaurants require customers to order a minimum amount of food in order to make a delivery. This minimum is different from a delivery charge. A delivery charge is a fee which a restaurant charges in addition to the food, tax and ti,p in order to cover costs associated with delivering the order to your home. Of course, the delivery might also be to your office or another place which you might be partaking in your meal.

Delivery fees also cover the cost of to-go containers which might be made of cardboard, Styrofoam or even aluminum foil.

In many cases these fees, which can range from free to several dollars, also cover the delivery persons pay. The person who drives your food to you might use this money for gas, auto insurance or even as part of their own take home pay.

What I meant when I said update is that there used to be a minimum order of $25 and now there isn't. They have changed it. The delivery fee of $4 has stayed the same.

Recently I took a small group of family members to the Uptown Lao Sze Chuan. This particular group is only really familiar with Americanized NYC style Chinese food. I could tell they found the menu a little intimidating, so I decided limit the number of "weird dishes" when ordering. That meant I ordered the lamb with cumin and mayonnaise shrimp, but I also ordered General Tso's Chicken, pork fried rice and crab rangoon.

Fortunately the Lao Sze Chuan specialty dishes were generally well received, but that's not why I'm making this post. I'm making this post to say Lao Sze Chuan does a lovely job with the classic dishes. In fact, I think the General Tso's Chicken was my favorite dish of the night. It might not be the most interesting dish in the world, but man it hit the spot. Perfectly cooked with a nice amount of heat. Yum.

So yeah, if you're ever craving NYC style Chinese food don't leave Lao Sze Chuan off your list. I know I won't.

Six of us were there on xmas eve, to relieve the 10-person limit that leek had when trying to make reservations in Chinatown.

I'm not a big fan of LSC's hot and sour -- it's vegetarian, and is just missing the depth of pork broth, but the "special" version with sesame and chile oils is a nice upgrade (and a bigger bowl).

We had one Kosher-keeper, one vegetarian, so we ordered several meatless dishes: ma po tofu, dry fried chile beancurd, and garlic string beans. They were probably better than the meat dishes, especially the deep-flavored ma po, and the dry chile -- we ordered a second dish of the latter. On the carnivore side we had pork with dried tofu and chive (the only thing we ordered that we hadn't eaten before), Tony's 3 Chile Chicken (yes, it could use more heat, but I like the sweet aspect versus the dry-fry chile), and of course the mayo shrimp (which they've renamed to Crispy Shrimp in Lemon Sauce for the may-squeamish). The mayo shrimp is particularly good with some of the chile oil from the dry-fry.

At 6PM when we got there, there were a couple tables open... by close to 8 when we left, the line was nearly out the door. Definitely a good stop on xmas eve.

I'll be going tonight with my sister. What are the must haves? Since there are only 2 of us, and we're going to the theatre after, we don't want to eat ourselves into a food coma, though some leftovers would be nice.

knitgirl wrote:What are the must haves?

For me:

1) shrimp with lemon sauce (formerly shrimp with mayo sauce)
2) three chili chicken
3) wontons, szechaun style
4) cumin lamb

Thank you! I haven't been to any of the Lao Sze Chuans, so I definitely need help coming up with a balanced menu. The 1st 3 sound great, I'm not a big fan of lamb, any veggie recommendations?

knitgirl wrote:Thank you! I haven't been to any of the Lao Sze Chuans, so I definitely need help coming up with a balanced menu. The 1st 3 sound great, I'm not a big fan of lamb, any veggie recommendations?

For veggies, I like the String Beans in Spicy Black Bean Sauce, which is not very spicy and also a misnomer because there really isn't any sauce. It's basically chopped up string beans, small cubes of fried tofu and fermented black beans. I think there are also a few chilis in there but not too many. I really love this dish. If you're eating in, House Special Hot & Spicy Hot Pot with Mixed Vegetables is a great dish but definitely more of a main than a side. Pot Herb (with or without pork) is also worth ordering.

For non-veg, in addition to what's been suggested above, I think the Boiled Beef in Spicy Szechuan Sauce, Ma Po Tofu (can be ordered with or without meat) and the House Special Dry Chili Prawns with Shell On (can be ordered with shell off, too) are all great. If you like belly, the Twice Cooked Pork Szechuan Style is a great dish. Double Fried Sliced Pork with Cilantro (dry) is also a tasty dish.

=R=

as far as the dry chili preps, I think the tofu is the best

AlekH wrote:as far as the dry chili preps, I think the tofu is the best

I do love that one but those prawns are fantastic.

=R=

Thanks so much, I'm sure we'll have a great dinner!

Some of the presumably non-szechuan things can be quite good too. Tea smoked duck and pork belly with sweet pickle (like the Taiwanese dish served with bao) are great. No bao for the latter, but you can improvise with steamed buns from the snack that comes with condensed milk. Jiao ma chicken, a cold appetizer of steamed chicken in scallion and szechuan pepper sauce is a menu sleeper that is similar to Hainanese chicken and its Viet and Thai spins. Some dishes that are presumptively great Northern or Szechuan stalwarts, especially LSC's take on dan dam mein, suck ridiculously (doubly odd when other places in the Hu empire such as Lao Beijing have nice versions).

We ended up with the 3 chili chicken, shrimp in lemon sauce, some sort of green bean and the cheng du dumplings. Everything was good, but not mind blowing. I don't know if it was because we got there quite early for dinner, if it was an off day, or if I just don't appreciate more authentic Chinese food. I thought the filling was really skimpy in the dumplings, but we loved the sauce with it. Tony's 3 chili chicken was good, but there were a ridiculous number of dried chilis which we had to pick through in order to get to the chicken. Surprisingly, with all those chilis, I found it fairly bland. Somewhat sweet, somewhat spicy, but no strong flavors. I would have liked some garlic or ginger or more spice. I would have liked a little bit of sauce to soak into the rice, as it was, all 3 main dishes lacked that. The shrimp were plump and had a good texture, again, I thought the sauce was lacking in much flavor. Mayo predominated with just a slight citrus taste. I forgot which green beans were recommended. The ones we got were fairly plain, just a small dice of golden onion or shallot and a very occasional bit of ginger. I had 2 cocktails which I enjoyed, basically a spinoff of a Moscow Mule with lime juice. Even that was somewhat muted. I'll probably go again, maybe try the dry chili chicken and the ma po tofu.

knitgirl wrote: there were a ridiculous number of dried chilies which we had to pick through in order to get to the chicken.

While I think it is a waste of chilies and provides a lot less heat punch than the visual would expect, that is a traditional way of making it in China. I remember being served a chili chicken dish in Shenzhen that had a ratio of around 10-15 dried chilies to 1 small piece of chicken. It was like a Chinese version of bobbing for apples with chopsticks.

And if I recall correctly, the dry chili chicken at LSC has an even greater ratio than the three chili chicken.

The chilies are usually there for aroma if served dry -- a quick blast in a hot wok makes them fragrant. It's a big part of Sichuanese cooking.

jobst wrote:The chilies are usually there for aroma if served dry -- a quick blast in a hot wok makes them fragrant. It's a big part of Sichuanese cooking.

They also flavor the oil with which the dish is cooked.

=R=

The 3 chili chix has gotten much milder over the yrs. Sweet in fact and not my thing anymore. Used to pack a nice balance of sweet heat.

I thought it was just me. The 3 chilli chicken I had LSC Skokie a couple weeks ago was crunchy vs. crispy and predominantly sweet.

Octarine wrote:I thought it was just me. The 3 chilli chicken I had LSC Skokie a couple weeks ago was crunchy vs. crispy and predominantly sweet.

No, it's not just you. Dry Chili Chicken is the superior dish.

=R=

We've given up on this place. We've been ordering since they first opened, and been eating at the chinatown location for years but lately it has been pretty bad. I ordered last week what I thought would be a safe bet (Mapo tofu) and it was terrible. I was expecting tons of sze chuan peppercorn but got none of that. What I got was a strangely sweet, gross mess that looked or tasted nothing like it usually does. The lamb with cumin and dry chili prawns have been hit or miss. There are weeks we order and they're firing on all cylinders then other times where it literally looks like the worst kind of americanese you can image. Even the times where I just wanted americanese and thought maybe these guys would knock that out of the park were pretty bad.

I don't know what's going on in their kitchen but we're giving up.

Went here over the weekend and ordered the cumin lamb for the first time in a while. My recollections were than this dish was one of the more fiery ones on the menu. Although the appearance resembled earlier experiences with this dish, the heat level and flavor of this incarnation was more suited to Panda Express; not so much bad as bland. As the shrimp with mayo sauce (I still go by the old name) was always mild to begin with, I guess I'll stay with this dish for any future visits, and save the cumin lamb for the next Chinatown visit.

Chicago Hokie wrote:Went here over the weekend and ordered the cumin lamb for the first time in a while. My recollections were than this dish was one of the more fiery ones on the menu. Although the appearance resembled earlier experiences with this dish, the heat level and flavor of this incarnation was more suited to Panda Express; not so much bad as bland. As the shrimp with mayo sauce (I still go by the old name) was always mild to begin with, I guess I'll stay with this dish for any future visits, and save the cumin lamb for the next Chinatown visit.

The dish is not typically (spicy) hot but very seasoned and definitely not bland. It's right far more often than not (on a par with Chinatown) at the Skokie location.

=R=

My favorite cumin lamb by far is @ Homestyle Taste. Unctuous lamb on the bone w/the best balance of cumin I've had.

ronnie_suburban wrote:The dish is not typically (spicy) hot but very seasoned and definitely not bland.
=R=

I've had it at least twice at both Chinatown and early Uptown where it was as hot if not hotter than the Ma Po Tofu, and included the strong cumin flavor: a good combo in my book. Perhaps I got hotter-than-normal versions those days. I was going to make a reference to both Dry Chili Chicken and Tony's Three Chili Chicken, but those seem to be on the low end of the hotness scale, even though the amount of chilis in the them looks scary.

Either way, bland was the first word that popped to mind last weekend. The Szechaun wontons were still excellent though.

Had what I can only describe as a poor meal here this weekend. For an appetizer we tried the steamed bread, and what they served was rock hard. To their credit, they replaced it with a properly prepared version. I'll give them a pass on this.

We ordered fairly generically: eggplant with ground pork and whole fish with black bean sauce. Both dishes were completely bland. I'm not talking heat level (one was marked as hot on the menu), but just no flavor in the sauces.

I saw several large Asian groups and they seemed to be sticking with the Szechuan dishes like chili chicken and Ma Pa Tofu. Perhaps they've dumbed down a lot of menu and only kept some authentic? So maybe you have to know what dishes to order to get a good meal? Perhaps we got the B team on the day after Christmas?

I don't know what the cause was, but I won't be back. Our meal was no better than a neighborhood Ameri-Chinese meal. Since I'm not a huge fan of Silver Seafood either, the pickings near the Green Mill are thin ever since Vermillion (which I really liked) closed up shop.