Sheng Wang is the first handpulled noodle place that ever crossed my radar. Somehow, though, it’s taken me this long to finally get there… I headed over with Gmak after work on a cold, blustery day. Perfect for noodles in soup!
Gmak ordered the knife-cut noodles with beef.
I didn’t try any, but I know he was extremely happy with his dish, especially the beef, being of the aromatic kind. Win!
I decided to be adventurous, so to speak, and order the duck noodles. They were $5.50 and I figured big, meaty, fat slices of duck (like from the many Chinese butchery windows around Chinatown) over noodles couldn’t be a bad thing, right?
The noodles were excellent – proper thickness, a very nice chew to them, and really quite delicious. I was really happy with my bowl of noodles, except…
Don’t get duck. You see how the first photo of my bowl of noodles shows no fat slices of duck up top? It’s because they hid all the duck pieces under the noodles; why did they do this? Because it was all chopped up duck and, um, a duck foot. The duck pieces were even poorly butchered such that there were bone splinters in most pieces, which made eating my noodles a bit… interesting. There was very little actual duck meat, which made me think the duck noodles weren’t quite worth it.
However… look! another stuffed fishball! I think I am in love with these o_O… these were no exception, delicious!!! Juicy, flavorful pork wrapped in fishball… mmm *drool
And of course, if you’ve been reading along on my journey of handpulled noodles, you already know that I’ve ordered dumplings at every single place I’ve been. I always aim for fried, but most places so far (with the exception of my first, Lan Zhou) do not have fried dumplings on the menu. And so far, no place would make them for me unless they were ordered in Mandarin. ARGH. My Mandarin is not strong enough to ask politely “Yo bee-yotch, can you fry these sh*ts hard for me?” (props to those who get the reference, haha) so I have FAILed at getting fried ones without Spicy Ninja, grrr, and this place was no exception. No fried dumplings!
However, these were still really good, very juicy and bursting with flavor. The one bad thing? They cooled off very quickly (the restaurant wasn’t super warm to begin with, and when the door opened, the room would fill with cold air), and once cool, they were eons not-as-good. Doh.
Yvo says: I think the bill came out to $7 or 8 a person including a good tip. This is not expensive dining. Both the noodles and dumplings are really quite good. I continue to dislike the location of many of the handpulled noodle joints (there are at least three in the general same area, a 1.5 block radius), but this one was pretty darn good. Is it my favorite? No. But we’ll get to the breakdown of which I like best and why…
recommended
Nicholas says
Hrm… you tip at restaurants like these?
Aimee S. says
Hey Nick! You should tip pretty much anywhere you go that isn’t fast food. I don’t care if it’s take out. Tip.
Hungry says
I think Danny of Food in Mouth told me that they sell bags of frozen stuffed fishballs here. Did you see any on display for sale?
monstermooch says
when do i get my lesson on hand pulled noodles? i’m dying here.. 🙂
Stephanie Clark says
I was just researching from my trip to New York (I’m from Australia) and my friend and I loved this place so much we ate the hand peel noodles with vegies and dumplings for 3 nights in a row…so addictive and cheap $7…you just can’t get that much food, that cheap in Aus!