Tag Archives for Asian

That soup tasted funny

The one thing people need to know about me is, that from time to time I am surprisingly spontaneous. So the other day I was on a bus and was passing by this one restaurant called Thai Kitchen. No, this post is not about this restaurant. Hm, you see. Very spontaneous.

The taste of this soup was rather unexpected

The taste of this soup was rather unexpected

Anyhow. I jumped off the bus and walked back only to find out that the restaurant was closed due to vacation reasons. Damn. Now, I had to find another place to get my lunch. Luckily I was close to Naschmarkt around U4 Kettenbrückengasse. And yes, this is some sort of a China Town or better Asian Town. In this area of Vienna there are many rather authentic Asian restaurants, shops, haircutters etc. So I thought: no problem, I find something else. And so I walked towards Naschmarkt.

Eventually I ended up at Pho Saigon on Naschmarkt. Now this restaurant is connected to the restaurant called “Saigon” on Getreidemarkt und is more or less the mini version of that one. It also has a small Asian grocery store. During lunch time you get special meal offers and they are all Vietnamese food. Each lunch special consists of the daily soup, main course and dessert. In the beginning I was unsure what to take. I always think that Vietnamese dishes sound completely unspectacular. It is like “beef with basil and lemongrass”. Doesn’t sound fancy, or? But when you order it it is soo delicious! For me I chose the tofu with veggies. I had to take Vietnamese rolls in addition to the soup. I love Vietnamese rolls – no matter which one.

I love Vietnamese rolls - any whether they are cold or warm.

I love Vietnamese rolls. Any kind whether they are cold or warm – it doesn’t matter.

But first came the soup – the unexpected star of the whole meal. In the end I came to the conclusion that it was the Vietnamese variation of a sweet n’ sour soup. It had chunks of pineapples, it tasted chili spicy and sweet and unexpected. I have to admit I never tasted something like that before and I have tried a lot in my life. It had really nothing to do with anything I ever tried. It didn’t even come close. I have to say although I liked it I would not order a soup like that on purpose.

The Vietnamese rolls pretty much came with the main course. They were filled with seafood and covered in fried rice noodles. I always love the dip that comes with them. Fish sauce here we come. I really don’t mind that entree and main course sometimes come at the same time at Asian restaurants. I just eat cross-course.

The tofu with veggies was just as good as the other two courses.

The tofu with veggies was just as good as the other two courses.

And of course, I also enjoyed the main course. I think they put oyster sauce. It was really yummy. I really like that restaurant. Right at the spot where this restaurant is located you also have a number of other Asian restaurants. One is right on the opposite. It has Japanese, Chinese, Thai food. But don’t fall for that when you are at Naschmarkt. It is always much better not to choose the trans-Asian restaurants that offer all cuisines at once. They all have the same food and the taste is like an instant-food-jolly – all but not exciting.

Info: Phò Sài Gòn, Naschmarkt, Stand 191 – 194, phone: 01 585 02 24, internet: www.saigon.at, opening hours: Mo – Sa 11:00 a.m. – 11:00 p.m. in summer and winter 11:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m., they take credit cards, I am not sure about smoking but I guess it is non-smoking, you can reach the restaurant by getting off at U4 Kettenbrückengasse and walking towards the city centre on Naschmarkt, take the aisle of stands that is the furtherst left one and there the restaurant is on the right side.

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Green Cottage Part II: This time the Chinese one

Last week was the week when I spent my time outside Vienna at an Austrian lake called Traunsee. It was wonderful – believe me. But what was missing was the variety of different cuisines. Don’t get me wrong! I love Austrian food – its my home food in the end. But I do need other food too – especially Asian one. So today I had to get some Chinese food. And there is one restaurant close to Naschmarkt which serves really good Chinese food.

Green Cottage – great Chinese restaurant close to Naschmarkt

You can find it right close to the U4 stop Kettenbrückengasse. You just need to walk away from Naschmarkt along Kettenbrücckengasse and you find it on the right side. There is an outdoor area too and since it was a wonderful day I wanted to sit outside. There was nobody though and so I had to get the waiter who was inside the restaurant.

During the week they serve lunch specials consisting of one entree, which today was either daily soup or daily salad and one main course. You choose from 7 or 8 different main courses all at different prices. These lunch specials are somehow affordable. Other than the lunch specials I would say that the restaurant serves food slightly more expensive than in regular restaurants but it is wonderful food. And so you can find stir-fried duck with green thai asparagus or some other Chinese food which is out of the ordinary. In their menue they state that they get their veggies from Naschmarkt. I guess I have to believe them as I cannot prove it.

It is more of a fancy schmancy restaurant – they give you fresh cutlery for every course

Since they had these lunch specials today I decided to take one this time. I decided to take the salad as an entree – since I don’t particularly feel like soup for lunch in summer. And as the main course I chose the trout with veggies. The weekly menue also stated that there was a three-course business lunch but for 18 Euros that was much too expensive for me – plus it didn’t say what it contained and I didn’t want to ask. The waiter who took my order had to check whether they still had the trout but fortunately they did. I once experienced that they ran out of something even though it was on the menue. But that is ok as I think that this is a good sign that food is fresh here.

The entree was the Cottage salad

So, the first course was the Cottage salad and it said that there was some sort of dressing coming with the salad. It turned out that it was pretty sour dressing as they used lots of vinegar. But it was ok since they also had celery beets cut into the salad and I have to say without the sour dressing I would have not wanted to eat the celery as I don’t like celery.

The trout filet was definitely yummy!

The main course was the highlight of the meal though. The fish was wonderful although part of it caught quite some salt and made the veggies salty too. But other than that it was perfect. The veggies were really fresh and they chopped some zucchini and pak choi also so I had two of my favorite veggies there. That was really yummy. The fish was crispy. It was great!

The size of the meal was sufficient although I have never been stuffed when I came here for food. The time before I ordered the tofu and it was not enough food. So in any case I would suggest to also order a first course or a dessert. Then you are on the safe side. The fact that I have also seen Chinese eat here is also a sign for me that this is a great place. So if you are at Naschmarkt you might consider coming here instead of the other restaurants on Naschmarkt.

Info: Green Cottage (http://www.green-cottage.at), Kettenbrückengasse 3, 1040 Vienna; phone: +43/(0)1/5866581; fax: +43/(0)1/5866581; mail: info@green-cottage.at; opening hours: Mon – Sat 11:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m., Sun closed, all major credit cards

Sichuan: Yes, you have to walk inside on the zig-zag path

It is probably one of the most authentic Chinese restaurants in a district of Vienna where you might least expect it – the Sichuan Restaurant in the 22nd district far outside the city centre at the Alte Donau (Old Danube). Not only does it serve typical Chinese cuisine but in fact it serves one of the four most influential cuisines of China – the Szechuan cuisine.

At the Sichuan Restaurant you can enjoy your food at a wonderful terrace with a view

And because the restaurant mainly serves Szechuan cuisine the food does not lack chili and other exciting spices. So don’t expect something too mild here. But that is exactly when things start to get exciting, right. That is why I love coming here.

To reach this place you need to get off at U1 Alte Donau take the exit and walk towards the swimming baths and there on the left side you cannot miss it. It truly does look like a Chinese house somewhere far from Vienna. And yes, it does follow the tradition that you do not walk inside a house by walking zig-zag. Because it is the Chinese that believe that the evil spirits cannot walk zig-zag and so you need to build entrance areas accordingly.

As soon as you reach the entrance door you find out that this place is decorated with lots of awards and that the people that come here are very often employees of the United Nations which is just one subway stop away. And so you might sit among a chitchat of lots of different languages and people.

The special lunch meal offers you three courses. This times’ starter: spicy-sour noodle salad

As for the food the restaurant offers a special meal every day on work days for little bit over 9 Euros as well as the typical lunch meals except here you find food like kung pao chicken and mapo dofu instead of the regular crispy chicken something. The special lunch meal gives you entree, main course and dessert where you can leave out the dessert to pay less. This time I took this offer and started off with a spicy noodle salad followed by stir fried duck with veggies and rice.

The main course of the special lunch meal was stir fried duck with veggies and rice

The duck really tasted nice but was completely different from the typical crispy duck. But I really liked the taste – again not missing the chillies. At the end came the dessert. I thought this time I had to have one as they served baked ice cream. You probably all know that one: where they put alcohol on top of the dough and burn it. There there was no alcohol and no burning but some outer shell around the ice cream and something I liked a lot which was pretty much like a cake.

The dessert was especially yummy: baked ice cream

And so the dessert was the perfect conclusion of a perfect lunch. The sizes of the meals are not enormous instead the restaurant is very considerate when it comes to quality and when it comes to satisfying the wishes of the guests. Here it is normal that the waiter helps the customer choose the right dish and recommends him something. Just like in China where the customer tells the waiter what kind of food he wants to eat and the waiter tailors the meal selection to his wishes. I truly like this here.

The bill comes in style at the Sichuan Restaurant

Still, it is not a cheap restaurant but it is also a restaurant where you can meet with a group of people and ask for a separate room – very convenient. But the best thing about the restaurant remains the building and the wonderful terrace with the view at the little pond.

Info: China Restaurant Sichuan (http://www.sichuan.at), Arbeiterstrandbadstrasse 122, 1220  Vienna; Tel: +43/(0)1/263 37 13; Fax: +43/(0)1/263 37 14; email: info@sichuan.at; opening hours: daily 11:30 a.m. – 2:30 p.m. & 5:30 p.m. – 11:00 p.m.; credit cards accepted (AmEX, Diners, Eurocard, Mastercard, Visa, JCB, Maesto)

Sushi or Pizza?

Lets go for both! No, that was not my first thought when I went for Mochi. The reason was that it opened only a few months ago and I took a look at their menue on the internet and I had no clue what to expect. Well, yes. I had one that there were so many food items on the menue that I hardly knew of that I just had to try it. On their website it says that they fuse traditional Japanese food culture with all kinds of cuisines. Got it!

Mochi: one of these new culinary addresses where you can find amazingly innovative cuisine

No, in fact I didn’t. So that was the reason why it took me approximately two hundred years to choose my food. So in order to not disappoint the waitress for not choosing anything after staring at the menue for twenty minutes I decided for a starter. I chose two single sushis. Well, they provide you with the fish and you choose whether you like to have it as sushi or sashimi. And since I never had it before and never seen it on a sushi menue before either I chose one scallop sushi and for the other octopus because I hardly get that anywhere in Vienna and was happy to find it here.

Scallop Sushi (right) – I have never had that before

And the sushi was fantastic! Motivated by this success of having chosen just the right starter I thought to myself: “Well, now I chose whatever surprise I can get”. That is why I changed my mind and didn’t take the chicken but the skewer with shiitake mushrooms together with the beef one as my second course. And let me tell you: the shiitake one was one of the highlights!

The shiitake skewer in front was definitely a highlight

And now: the pizza and sushi part! Because now comes the crispy sushi pizza. Pizza because of the shape, sushi because they put raw salmon on top and then they do not bake regular dough but rice. Then you also get cucumbers and a chili mayonnaise on top. And it tasted yammy. First I was trying to eat it with chopsticks but that was not effective so I just ate it with my fingers.

crispy sushi pizza with raw salmon, cucumbers and a chili mayonnaise on top

In the end I paid 22 Euros for everything including beverages which is not quite cheap – on the contrary. This is a restaurant where I would not go every day or go to when I am starving. They serve lunch specials during the week which you can get at reasonable prices.

It is an experience though which you should not miss as the food they serve is really nice and of high quality. And so I would say judging from the quality of the food the prices are reasonable but not low. It is also a nice restaurant when you want to meet with friends and have a snack with your cocktail. But be aware that the restaurant is quite busy and reserving a table is only possible for the evening during week days and for both lunch and dinner on Saturday.

You can find the restaurant by getting off at U1 Nestroyplatz and walking towards the city centre at the right side of Praterstrasse and when the street makes a turn to the left towards the bridge you ignore that and keep walking on the right side towards Schwedenplatz passed the Nestroy statue and few meters further is the restaurant.

Info: Restaurant Mochi (http://www.mochi.at), Praterstrasse 15, A-1020 Vienna; phone: +43/1/925 13 80; mail: info@mochi.at; opening hours: Mon – Sat 11:30 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. (sundays closed)

Tofu & Chili

Guess what? Yes, the restaurant Tofu & Chili is called Tofu & Chili because they put tofu and chili in their food.

It was already late in the afternoon when I was there the last time. The music was a Chinese cleaning lady constantly shouting something in Chinese to the waitress who didn’t seem to listen but was busy with reading the paper. When I entered this small, very small, restaurant which is more like a diner, there was only one other customer left. So plenty of space for me to choose from which is completely unusual because this place is very popular among students from the Technical University which is close by and other young people. It is located on Naschmarkt on the left side of the street when you are walking towards the centre of Vienna. And normally it is packed with people and it does not matter if you sit with a complete stranger at the table. You sit down wherever you find space.

Tofu & Chili: A small Asian diner on Naschmarkt

As soon as you sit down the waitress brings a bowl of miso soup with tofu and some veggies inside. In the end, you get a soup to every dish on the menue. There are a some categories on the menue from which you can choose from: one for Thai style food, another one for more Chinese style food. In the past they were more strict: they only served tofu with chili and e.g. chicken or seafood. Today you also get red curries or you could even get crispy duck.

Everybody gets a soup as soon as they sit down and before you order

But I always stick to the tradition and always get the same thing. As a matter of fact I always go there when I feel like eating the one thing and that is the Tofu with Seafood Thai style. Of course, you can always get it hotter but for me the amount of chili they put inside is just right. I love the sauce that comes with it. There is mostly squids and on top one nice big shrimp. In the end, I love seafood so I take it whenever I get the chance.

I always eat the Tofu with Seafood Thai style

The sizes of the meals are sufficient. Everything comes with lots of veggies so you don’t feel too stuffed. Another advantage here is that they don’t use MSG and that is what I like.Pretty much every item on the menue is a meal with soup and some fruits as dessert and there is also some cabbage salad on the side. The prizes are really cheap and I can certainly recommend this place when you spend your day shopping at the Naschmarkt. I paid for that meal 6 Euros which I think is not expensive.

Info: Tofu & Chilli, Linke Wienzeile 18, A-1060 Vienna; Phone +43/1/585 69 70; Opening Hours Mon. to Sat. 11:30 a.m. – 10:00 p.m.; no credit cards; non-smoking restaurant; everything for take-away also; you can reach the place by either taking the U-Bahn to Karlsplatz and taking the exit “Secession” and then walking on the right side of the street from the centre or you take the U4 to Kettenbrückengasse and walk towards the centre on the left side.

Noodle Box Deluxe

First there was the sausage. No, wrong beginning. Now it is the noodle. Asian noodles have become popular in Vienna. There is a stand that sells Asian Fast Food Noodles almost everywhere. Still, these noodles are pretty much junk food nothing more. They don’t reserve the right of being of high quality food-wise. But there is an alternative: XO Noodles.

XO Noodles is located at the shopping mall Ringstrassen Galerien

It first opened on Hoher Markt but had to close down since the building it was at became a construction site. So now they moved to the Ringstrassen Galerien on Karlsplatz – Oper and re-opened a few weeks ago. And since I first tried these noodles when they closed I had to try them again now they re-opened. Now the Ringstrassen Galerien are a Shopping Mall Deluxe so the atmosphere is different than in a regular restaurant. The new XO Noodles are in the atrium part of the mall so people can look down on the place from above. It is not like a regular Asian Noodle fast food place. You just don’t go there order your fried noodles with crispy duck and leave. It is a bit more complex than that. They use a module system.

They use a module system where you can choose the ingredients of your dish according to your preferences

First you choose what you want to eat: either their wok or their noodle soup. Then you decide with what you like to have it, e.g. veggies, tofu, beef or seafood. Then you choose what kind of noodles and what kind of sauce. From the beginning I knew I’d like to have the wok with udon noodles, as they are my favorite noodles (supposedly the noodles are homemade and fresh every day). With the sauce I was kind of undecided. I didn’t feel like spicy but then there is only sweet-sour and peanut-lime creamy sauce left. Well, I decided for the peanut one cause I don’t like sweet n’ sour. Somehow it is unfortunate because I had hoped for more options from the non-spicy side but then there are only five sauces to choose from anyway.

The counter where you order your food first can be recognized by the menu on the screens above.

Still ordering is not that easy. Because I was heading straight towards the counter which is most prominent and that was were you got your food from. So I was send from there to the correct one. For newcomers it might be challenge. So I explain. First, you need to go to the booth were you order the food and there you also get your drinks, then you get a coupon, you sit down and wait until you see the number on the coupon on the screen above the counter where you get the food from. Simple, no? Yes, in the end it is not that complicated. Maybe they expect lots of people and have the fear of traffic jams if they use just one counter. So decided to introduce this system of having two counters.

I ordered the wok with tofu, udon noodles and peanut-lime sauce

Anyhow. I ordered my food at the correct counter and I sat down. And: I didn’t have to wait for too long. Niiice! But ok, there were only a few people. It was five in the late afternoon. So I guess I should not expect to wait for too long. The size of the meal is decent, the prices are: well, it is not an Asian fast food place somewhere at a U-Bahn station so it is more expensive. The taste is great! Yes, the ingredients are of higher quality than at the fast food places. But it is more like a snack than a full meal.

Info: XO Noodles at Ringstrassen Galerien; Kärntner Ring 11 – 13, A-1010 Vienna; internet http://www.xo-noodles.com; mail restaurant@xo-noodles.com; phone +43 1 533 83 90; fax +43 1 533 83 90 – 16; opening hours Mon to Sat 11:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.; you can pre-order your noodles on their website to eat it there or pick them up for take-away