Sunday, January 18, 2009

Sungari Pearl - Portland, OR

We had a hankering for fancy Chinese food while in Portland, so we headed to a magazine-recommended restaurant called the Sungari Pearl. It ended up being quite good for all of us.

They had a decent list of girly drinks, so I ended up with the Red Lotus - pomegranate juice and some alcohol that I can't remember right now. Gerd got a Malbec, since she's been hooked for months on this red wine. We also started with an order of fresh spring rolls - these filled with peking duck - called peking duck salad rolls. They were pretty good, although they seemed to have more cabbage inside than anything. That being said, we still devoured them.

Gerd got the Yin Yang Shrimp which was spicy shrimp and wine/garlic sauteed shrimp separated by a spinach leaf wall. Gerd's was really good. I got a couple bites and really liked it. The theme for the weekend seemed to be "Chao is a perv," so I channeled my inner perv to order the Chicken with Young Ginger. I should not let my inner perv order food for me. It was decent, but there was enough ginger in the dish that it tasted about two molecules away from cleaning solution. It was edible, but really not all that flavorful, since it didn't have any other vegetables except onions (which I don't eat).

There was a little kid water boy who kept our glasses super filled with water. After he would fill out glasses, he would slam the glass down directly in front of you, as if you were to drink it immediately. He would pop out of nowhere and grab your glass then slam it back down. Hilarious. The place notes in the review that it has metal chopsticks (written like this \m/ ). Not sure why this is a competitive advantage for the place, but they brag abut it.

Also I had several Hoisin issues. I kept spilling it everywhere. All over the table, all over other people's food, and all over my napkin in great globules. Not sure what my issue was.

Top 5 things about Sungari Pearl
1. Yin Yang Shrimp
2. Tang Tang noodles that Slutnik and Chicken Little ordered
3. Champagne punch that Slutnik ordered
4. Red Lotus
5. Peking duck Salad Rolls

Bottom 5 things
1. Militant water-filler
2. Chop sticks seemed pretty cheap-quality metal
3. Should have gone with a more mature ginger
4. My chicken came with no vegetables
5. Defective Hoisin sauce - oh wait, that might have been me...

www.sungaripearl.com

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