Sesame hen is an icon of Chinese language American delicacies.
The generic identify and mundane strip mall location within the far northern area of Broadview really feel notably acceptable for Asian Kitchen, a restaurant that excels on the much-maligned area of interest delicacies of American Chinese language meals: egg foo younger, neon orange duck sauce, and plates of shiny, sticky sesame hen.
A sparse assortment of indoor vegetation do their greatest to enliven the large brown cubicles and yellow partitions, which in any other case match the accusations lobbied at American Chinese language meals as a style: missing in aptitude and nuance. However that is the sort of place that lets the meals do the speaking—and it has an excellent story to inform.
The proprietor spent 10 years working at Seattle areas of Din Tai Fung, together with serving to open the primary native department in Bellevue. (Sure, the xiao lengthy bao listed here are good, too, although they convey them in from an outdoor vendor). Asian Kitchen retains the polish and excessive requirements of its proprietor’s former employer, making use of them to Americanized classics you’d by no means discover on the Taiwanese chain.
All too usually, sesame hen is made with frozen pre-breaded hen sauced in cloying syrup and looking out as if it claimed to know a sesame seed, however she lives in Canada. Right here, it’s produced from scratch, in-house, and fried to order, coming to the desk crisp and complicated, showered within the namesake ingredient. It’s Panda Specific meals, with Din Tai Fung high quality.
