“The King and Mee’s”

I must say I got distracted looking for the restaurant tonight.  It was tucked away right past BJ’s Warehouse (bonus Jew Appeal points!!).  I had to call my brother, Yong Joo (who better to ask for directions than the brother we affectionately call “The Wandering Joo”?), and he told me to look past BJ’s (it’s not easy sometimes, always having my Jew on sniffing out bargains!), and the entrance was to be found:

Fortune Wheel Seafood Restaurant

3601 Hempstead Tpke #28

Levittown, NY 11756

Trust me, it is easy to miss!  Look for the BJ’s, avoid all the pedestrians crossing the road to the parking lot, and find a parking spot as soon as you pass BJ’s.

You walk in and you feel you’ve entered a Chinese restaurant from the 1960’s (and I think some of the decorations, tables, etc., haven’t been updated since then (and neither has the bathroom!).  But we didn’t come for the decor, we came to be entertained.  With fine food.  We were entertained.  Mainly by our waiter, who, when asked his name, said it was “King”.  He truly was the Master of his Domain (and the restaurant).  We had asked for the Owner (who was sitting discreetly near the back) for her recommendations on what to eat.  But the King told us to “ignore her, I tell you what’s good and what’s not.  You’ll eat what I serve you”  (I might have misquoted him a wee bit, but not Mee, bit).

No spare ribs!  This was a problem.  THAT was the one staple that we’ve used to compare all restaurants against each other.  As the King said, this is a REAL Chinese restaurant.  No ribs for you!  Instead, we were served a duck dish (Ed. Note:  Mee Tsu Yan will be writing an extensive review on all the dishes that we were served this evening.  Look for it this coming weekend)… all minced up combined with something I don’t know, served on a lettuce leaf.  I was impressed.  It was very tasty and not greasy!

The restaurant is known for it’s Dim Sum.  So that’s what we had as our second appetizer.  Nine pieces.  Shrimp and pork.  It didn’t do anything for me.  I was expecting to be blown away with flavor and surprise.  I got neither.  I’ve had Dim Sum before, where the inside of the dumpling was a soup.  Kind of like freshen-up gum.  But this was better for your teeth and your belly.

Our last course before the entrées was soup.  Three servings of special wonton soup, and one for our non-red meat eating Mee, V. Stoogas.  The soup, in my humble opinion, was a “no”.  The wonton was acceptable, the “broth” unpalatable.  Reminded me of egg drop soup.  If that’s your thing, this is your soup.   Next time, no soup for this Mee.

Four entrees were served.  My favorite was the scallops with a very crispy green bean.  Excellent!  Two chopsticks up!

Other dishes were chicken (tasty), shrimp with fried noodles (the shrimp was fine; the noodles were a miss), and a roast pork dish (Mee Yan Tsu will detail the exact names, etc.).  The roast pork was my second favorite dish.

Then came sliced oranges (EXCELLENT and refreshing), and of course, the fortune cookies:

“Expect a change for the better in job or status in the future”

“Cut through organizational impediments and get some real work done” (umm, did my boss stick that one in there?)

“One of the first things you should look for in a problem is its positive side”

“Character is to man what carbon is to steel”  (That was my fortune.  The brothers had to explain it to me.  Clearly I should have paid more attention in Chemistry class!)

And now for our ratings:

(click ratings to enlarge)

Most humbly submitted for your consideration,

— Mee Magnum (“Chop!  Chop!”)