Recently Mike and I had lunch at a Taiwanese restaurant in San Gabriel called Liang’s Kitchen (or “Liang Mama Jia” in Chinese).  How Taiwanese is it?  See those planes in the photos?  Those are part of the very thorough homage Liang Mama pays to the military folks (read: kuomintang) who came from China to Taiwan back in the 1940’s.  The restaurant website even suggests that their dishes are meant to celebrate the beloved home-styled cooking of that “unique culture.”

While I am not well-versed enough to describe how it’s any different from regular Taiwanese fare, I can attest to this: Liang Mama is thus far one of the only places I’ve been to besides Old Country Cafe that serves a xiang chang fan I really liked.  Theirs is a “ma la” xiang chang fan, so those who don’t enjoy that I-can’t-feel-my-tongue sensation may wish to try one of their popular noodle soups instead.  But for those who are down, the dish comes with a generous helping of xiang chang (Taiwanese sausage), rice, ground beef, doufu gan (dry tofu), suan cai (pickled vegetables), squash, a whole lu dan (braised egg), some steamed broccoli and cabbage and, last but not least, a little dollop tucked away on the far side of the dish of what tasted like chili seeds and minced garlic.  Think of that as “turbo boost” for your ma la xiang chang fan.

Afterwards, we wandered over to Tea Station for dessert/drinks.  If you’ve been here, you know the menu is epic and can even be intimidating if you don’t have a “go-to” drink.  Mike’s is the boba green milk tea.  I ordered a hot taro ball dessert thing that was delicious, but was basically a little pot of purple sugar.  I think its glycemic index must’ve been off the charts.  Sadly I did not get a photo of it.

This strip of San Gabriel has so much good Chinese food crammed into it that I don’t know if we could ever blog about it all.  But stay tuned for more in the future.