Mee Yong Joo Talks About the Mee’s

The Mee Boys Just Want to Have Fun

Once a month, and sometimes more often, I look forward to meeting my brothers for a Chinese Food experience. When we have the date penciled in, no matter where we end up going, we know that it will be a fun evening. You see, The Chinese Quest is more than a gastronomic experience. It is a bonding, laughing, telling jokes, picking on each other and just having fun. Good food always boosts the overall experience, but we just want to have some good fun.

What started as a quest to find the best Chinese restaurant in Long Island has turned into some great friendships and mutual admiration’s. I look forward to see Mee Magnum’s expression when he takes the first sip of his favorite drink, Mai Tai. If he likes it, you can be sure that he will go for a second glass. As our scribe, this whole Quest has grown to what it is because of his perseverance. This proud papa of Mini Mee, at times will bring his son to our Quest so we can have another unbiased professional point of view.

I totally enjoy Mee Tsu Yan’s sense of humor and his jokes. From the time he placed a leaf of iceberg lettuce on his head, I knew we would get along just fine. I laugh so hard at his jokes that it practically hurts my gut (and at times whet’s my appetite). He is also a fine gentleman who can be funny and silly one moment, and very professional and serious the next. His graphic design creation is our calling card, as well as his gifts from his travels are an integral part of our Quest.

Mee V Stoogas does not like to eat red meat. He is OK with chicken and pork, but no beef for him. We always take that into consideration and make sure he is well taken care of otherwise. We enjoy seeing his granddaughter’s pictures on his iPhone and admire him for the proud grandpa that he is. I also have something else in common with him; we both like vegetables very much and always make sure we have at least one vegetable dish ordered. His office has been our go to place for our board meetings and a location where we get our inspiration as we plan the future endeavors of the Quest.

Mee Gonzi Bao is another story. He is always looking for gas money to drive to the restaurants. The ultimate businessman, he never misses a chance to ask anyone he meets, who takes care of their payroll? He also undertakes a mini quest with his family to Chinese restaurants. By the way, he is also very generous in his scoring. He was the first and only person to give multiple 5s on a single restaurant. He will never hear the end of it from the other Mees. You never know when he is kidding and serious, but nevertheless we all pretend to like his jokes.

Our latest addition, Mee Har Vee is our resident wine “meeven”. He really understands and enjoys wine. I am convinced drinking “good” wine every day makes you look younger and healthier. Will drinking it all at once speed up the process doc? His passion when talking about wine is equal to his passion of enjoying a good spare rib together with his attempt at convincing the waiters and waitresses of his fluency in the Chinese language.

And mee? They call me the wandering Joo. I have been known to have gotten lost getting to restaurants even with the use of my GPS. It seems all these ‘ancient’ Chinese restaurants do not show up correctly on Google maps. They are off by at least one to two miles and when I ask around, no one knows what the heck I am talking about. It must be my Chinese accent.

You see, the Quest is more than just food; it is enjoying the company of good friends and having fun while applying our time tested ancient methods of tasting and reviewing the food we eat. At the end of the day, our Quest will take us to many places, some great and some not so great, some fun and some awful places. But no matter where we go, we have a great time and plenty of fun, which adds to the whole experience factor of the Quest.

Respectfully submitted by

Mee Yong Joo