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Jun 04

NRN Noodle (San Gabriel)

Food 01: San Gabriel

I haven't frequent the San Gabriel/Alhambra area much so I'm always in awed by all these new obscure exotic regional mainland Chinese specialty restaurants popping up here and there. We saw the sign of this newly open place and went in for a try. They specialized in ONE type of noodle called Luo Si Fen from Liu Zhou City of Guang Xi province.

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What is Luo Si Fen? According to the guide posted on their door, it's Snail Soup Noodle. I can't tell by the name alone (it seems to be a fancy name for Snail, maybe Escargot Soup Noodle sounds more appertizing? ^^;;). It also explained that no actual snail meat are served, they're only used to cook the broth. The ingredients in the bowl are Sour pickled bamboo, Jew's Ear Mushroom, Peanuts, Fried Tofu Skin, Golden Needle and beef, etc. The flavor is hard to grasp on: it's a complex but pleasant mixture of dense spicy + sour. The rice noodle are very smooth. Very good!

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Winter melon and Sour plum Juice. Snail Soup cooked Quail eggs.

The entire menu is based on that snail soup (variation of the noodles)...pretty risky (delicious but a bit too novelty/obscure to draw crowd perhaps?). Their other specialty is Duck feet.

NRN Noodle (same plaza as J & J Restaurant
301 W Valley Blvd. San Gabriel, CA 91778

Freda | June 4, 2007 07:12 PM


Comments:

To be honest when I eat it I didn't realize "Luo Si" means snail, I thought maybe it's sea snail (the 'insect' in the character tip me off ^^;;), but I expect it's something from the ocean. Now that I found out...I had a frozen moment but recover soon when I called it Escargot soup in my mind...^^;; Read too many Ito Junji...

Freda | June 6, 2007 09:38 AM

I have always thought Luo Si Fen was just a chinese name for fusilli. ^^;; Snail soup sounds gross but escargot soup sounds like a delicacy. Cow stomach=gross, tripe=delicacy. ^^;;

seat | June 5, 2007 07:56 PM