China Garden's Happy Family

After a Democratic primary like vote of hundreds of thousands (ok so only 18) “Happy Family”, in a stunning upset, narrowly beat out the early heavy favorite Kung Po Chicken and the John Edwards like Moo-Goo Gai Pan.

After seeing the will of the people, I moved forward with the next, and most difficult, stage in the Chinese dish review process, placing the order.

I sat at my desk armed with only my office phone and a standard tri-fold cream colored China Garden take out menu, which informed me that “We Open 6 day”, luckily the menu informed me that “Sunday close” and today was not the “7 day”. With that cleared up I turned my headset volume up to near max (I don’t know why I did this, maybe I thought I could understand them better?), prepared for anything, and made the call.

One ring later a man picked up the phone and just said “China” in a questioning tone. I was caught off guard by the response; I wasn’t sure if he was expecting a call from someone in China, former women’s pro wrestler Chyna, or if he was waiting for me to answer a question about China. After a few seconds of indecision on how to answer him, I said the only two words that I knew he would understand, “Take Out”. I couldn’t understand what he said next but not wanting to stray off my plan of attack I just said “Happy Family” after a short pause he replied with “ok 10 minute” then he hung up. No total, no asking for a name, nothing.

With the hardest part behind me, I relaxed and thought of random things I could do to keep me occupied for the next 10min. after about 5min of blind staring at my planner I realized that the China Garden only takes straight cash homie, upon inspection of my wallet I only had nine dollars. Despite not being told the total during the phone order phase I still knew that, according to the menu, the dish was $9.75 plus tax. More than 5 min from the nearest ATM I became that guy and counted out two dollars in dimes and nickels from my desk.

Finally it was time to go get my food, not wanting to be that guy who shows up and pays with change I looked around (called his extension) for my office assistant, and like most assistants he was no where to be found when you really need him most. With no other option, me and my handful of change walked the ten feet next door to pick up my “Happy Family”. After getting the awkward “why are you paying in nickels and dimes” look, I then made another “that guy” move, I took a penny from the take-a-penny/give-a-penny to make it so I paid in exact change.

Now I am someone that really likes Chinese food and I at least have an idea what is in most of the dishes, but with “Happy Family” I didn’t know what to expect. You know that mysterious seven layer salad that your strange aunt always brings to thanksgiving that you just have to try otherwise she’ll nag you all afternoon? It’s like that only instead of it being a salad, it’s Chinese and instead of your aunt making it some guy name Pang made it and he wont try to hug you after you try it.

The reason for the comparison is that as I ate it out of the classy white take-out boxes, each bite I took revealed different foods that were not at the previous layer. It’s like finding a treasure chest full of American money and directly underneath that treasure chest is another treasure chest but this time it is full of Euros, ya one is worth more that the other but they are both money, just like this dish.

It started out with beef, chicken and some veggies on the top, no complaints there, then after a few bites I discovered the mushrooms. Mushrooms are like the coleslaw at Applebee’s, ya it comes with everything but id rather have more fries. Now I am not a big mushrooms guy and I can handle them, but this layer I was at had way too many mushrooms. There was some positive though, this bite also revealed the pork and broccoli that was hiding. After a few more bites I discovered the most ridiculous Chinese food ever, the baby corn. Just look at it and try to tell me that it’s not ridiculous. Just when I thought I was getting too full to finish I got to the shrimp, and that’s when my second wind kicked in. It was like the last 20min of every Rocky movie (except the original, Rocky gets his ass kicked), with Chicken, Beef, Pork and Shrimp being my Apollo Creed, Clubber Lang, Ivan Draggo, Tommy Gunn and Mason Dixon.

I did manage to finish it all; it was very filling and fairly good. The sauce was a mix of soy sauce and sesame oil a little bland but not too bad. All the veggies (Carrots, broccoli, water chestnuts, baby corn, sugar snap peas, and bamboo shoots) were really crisp and tasty. The shrimp went great with the sauce, the chicken and beef had a little kick to it but not much (They still tasted excellent), the pork was a little tough but I didn’t sweat that one too much.

So to sum it all up what have I learned today, besides how to say computer in Chinese (Thanks worthless information on my fortune cookie!). I learned that my six lucky numbers (at first I wondered why six but then it dawned on me “hmm six numbers in the Powerball, six lucky numbers coincidence? I think not!”) were not lucky, not even one of them matched any of the numbers in the Powerball drawing. I learned that grammar is not important to any Chinese restaurant flyer designer. And finally, I learned that the Happy Family dish is like Capitan Planet, when the forces of Chicken, Beef, Pork and Shrimp combine, Pang the China Garden chief flies in out of nowhere and says “By YOUR powers combined, I am Happy Family!"

Pros: “Happy Family” tasted great, it combined all of Ted Nugent’s food groups (Chicken, Beef, Shrimp and Pork), the veggies mixed well with the sauce, and it will fill you up.

Cons: There were too many mushrooms for my liking, and the sauce needed a little kick, it was a little too bland.

Overall I give it four flying monkeys out of five.