For Chinese food, why go anywhere else?

Steamed whole striped bass with ginger and scallion at Lotus Cafe.

 

Lotus Cafe -- a small, unassuming Chinese restaurant tucked away in a shopping center in Hackensack -- is approaching its 20th anniversary and still delivering simply prepared food that is both fresh and delicious.

A simple spinach and tofu soup with spicy chili oil.

On Saturday night, we ordered soup, seafood and vegetables from the a la carte menu, but we could have chosen the Dinner for Four from Lotus Cafe's Special Price-Fixed Dinner and Banquet Menu.

A six-course meal for four is $66, plus tip and tax. Other multi-course dinners are for six or eight people, and there are two 12-course banquets for 10 ($238 and $288, plus tip and tax).

Popular BYO

Lotus Cafe is a BYO, and the opening of a chain Chinese restaurant, P.F. Chang's, in the upscale Shops at Riverside a few hundred yards away, hasn't made any difference: 

You still have to reserve a table in the small, tastefully decorated dining room on weekends. With large plate-glass windows in the front, lighting is subdued.

We started with soup, and three of us shared simple spinach and tofu in a clear broth ($4.95). My son had wonton soup ($2.80).

Great seafood

Our entrees were Prawns with Mixed Vegetables (actually large shrimp) for $15.95, and Steamed Wild Bass with Ginger and Scallion for $28.95.

Lotus Cafe serves a 2-pound fish for the price of what some North Jersey restaurants charge for a smaller whole fish or fillets. 

These large, great-tasting shrimp came with mixed vegetables.

The presentation of the steamed wild bass made the fish appear to be swimming in the sauce (top photo). It tasted as good as it looked, and the light soy-based sauce was wonderful over rice.

Our vegetables were fresh spinach ($8.95) and leafy Chinese broccoli ($9.95), both sauteed with fresh garlic. 

Water spinach with garlic.

We asked for the Chinese broccoli well-done to soften the stalks.

Shrimp and vegetables in a bowl of brown rice.

Leaving the teapot cover open signals you want a refill.

We received a complimentary warm rice pudding for dessert.

One of the messages in the chocolate-flavored fortune cookies.

Don't expect a typical Chinese menu or one that is all Szechaun or Cantonese and so forth.

The owner, Philip Su, is from Taiwan, and the menu draws inspiration from that island, as well as Hong Kong and mainland Chinese provinces.

The restaurant offers more complex dishes, such as a beef casserole with an X.O. sauce of shrimp roe, dried shrimp and herbs.

We've tried some of the great noodle soups, including Seafood Soup Noodles, which is filled with fresh, tender shrimp, scallop, squid and other items.

And you won't be able to top Zar Jiang Mien -- thick noodles topped with "Zanadu meat sauce -- Marco Polo's favorite."

Our waiter has been working at Lotus Cafe for many years, and he treated us like family, even asking whether we wanted to take home a little leftover brown rice.

We did, and I had it this morning with a gooey cheese omelet.

We also took home half the fish and most of our rice-pudding dessert. 

Lotus Cafe, 450 Hackensack Ave. (in the Home Depot Shopping Center), Hackensack; 201-488-7070.

BYO is open 7 days. Lunch specials from $6.95 to $8.95 with rice and soup. All dishes are prepared with 100% vegetable oil and without MSG.

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Weekend at the sea

Image by WildVanilla (Rob) via Flickr
The lighthouse at Barnegat Light.

Our weekend at the sea was also a seafood weekend.


We drove down to Barnegat Light, a New Jersey fishing port at the northern end of Long Beach Island, and stayed at a B&B called Minerva's By The Sea. At the end of the street was Kubel's, which opened in 1927, and we had dinner there Friday and lunch Saturday. Unfortunately, Off the Hook, a takeout place for great prepared seafood, and many other places we have enjoyed in years past, had not opened for the season.


But fresh fish and shellfish is one of the reasons we return to the Jersey Shore year after year, and we weren't disappointed. Friday night, we had a great piece of halibut with small shrimp in a light tomato sauce, served on a bed of sauteed spinach; steamed clams and Alaskan king crab legs. We had flounder and crab cake sandwiches for lunch the next day, along with steamed clams and clams on the half shell.


In search of lobster Saturday night, we had dinner at the Engleside Inn in Beach Haven, one of the most popular towns on Long Beach Island. But the restaurant had no whole lobsters, only South African lobster tails. We ordered those, panko-covered scallops from Barnegat Light and a yellowtail tuna sushi roll. Only the too-thick lobster bisque was disappointing.


Our best seafood meal awaited us on the road back to North Jersey. A small building with some peeling paint on the exterior and the word "Fishery" on Route 35 in Sayreville (732-721-9100) had closed in the year or so since we had been there and had been reopened by a man from Greece about a month ago. He kept the menu, prices and recipes, adding distinctly Greek touches.


We started with small bowls of a light lobster bisque that tasted of sherry and Maine lobster, clam and corn chowder. Great. The steamed clams were outstanding, surpassing the ones we had at the shore. They came with a small cup of butter plus another cup with clam broth, garlic, herbs and white wine. Wow!


We also ordered the grilled whole bronzini from Greece on the specials list ($21.95). The fish, which we had seen nestled in ice in The Fishery's seafood display, came topped with a white wine sauce that contained whole garlic cloves, and was accompanied with rice and sauteed fresh spinach. It looked to be about 14 inches long. My son took the tail portion, my wife took the head and all of us shared the delicious white flesh in the middle. We only had room for a little of our second entree, perfectly fried whiting, which we took home.


There had been signs of an auspicious weekend. At the Whole Foods Market opening Thursday (see earlier post), I saw a whole monkfish with a sign that it had come from Barnegat Light, where Scandinavian fishermen settled in the 1920s. Then we learned that Minerva's, the B&B where we stayed, is in a building that once housed a fish wholesaler. The top-floor kitchen, where we had breakfast Saturday and Sunday, was where the wholesaler prepared fish for customers from Europe, Japan, China and elsewhere, said our host, Emma.