Mao Jia Fan Dian (Mao's Family Restaurant)

Dinner with the Chairman

Once again, coming to you live from the People's Republic! I had visited a Hunan style restaurant a while back which was decent, but it was a very casual neighborhood kind of place. I had a chance to step it up a bit with a visit to Mao's Family Restaurant, a chain of restaurants established in 1987 by a distant relative of the late Chairman. This place serves up a proud tradition of dishes representing fiery cuisine of Mao's Hunan provincial heritage. A new Moa Jia branch has just opened up right down the street from my hotel in Dongguan City, so I decided to bring some of my colleagues and check it out. Typically, my trips to southern China involve numerous Cantonese mega-meals, so I thought it would be nice to change things up.

The Chariman himself is waiting to greet you upon entering. You'd better like the food, though, or else!

Chrysanthemum Tea - The tea server jets his arm back and raises the teapot up next to his head, shooting a laser of boiling water right into your cup. Nice aim, buddy.

Ma La Xia - Spicy Numbing Shrimp - Although food here is primarily Hunan sytle, this dish throws a nod to neighboring Sichuan province. Shrimp are skewered, fried, and topped with garlic, dried chilis, and a generous helping of mouth numbing Sichuan peppercorns. This dish is always a winner for me, and it was great this time as well.

Snake - Well, this was a new one for me. When we were reading the menu, I thought it would be fun to order this. But when the dish was brought out, I was a little taken aback to see how, well, how snake-like it looked. But Rich!! (you're thinking) It is snake! I know. But, seriously, look at the picture. I had no idea the skin would be so vividly blue. And look at that piece right in the front. That's where the freaking head goes! I should point out that there was also a mountain of stir fried hot peppers and garlic.

Yup. That's me, eating snake. The taste was surprisingly mild and non-exotic, almost like fish - but with a lot of bones, which made it difficult to eat. Yeah, lots of bones. The peppers had a nice kick, too.

Eggplant and Four Season Beans - Fantastic flavor on this one. When I asked how it was seasoned, they told me that there wasn't any special seasoning, it was just normally seasoned. Whatever that means, it was great. I could have eaten this whole dish myself.

Hong Shao Rou - Red Cooked Pork Belly - We couldn't come here without ordering this, the Chairman's favorite dish. Five spice seasoned chunks of pork belly are stewed in soy sauce and spices, and were served over a bed of dried mushrooms and unidentifiable vegetables. The belly pieces were incredibly soft, with tender meat surrounded by soft, gelatinous fat (belly is, of course, what we use in the States to make bacon out of). The skin was left on, and had become soft and sticky. Of course, fat equals flavor, so this dish was obviously delicious. It was quite rich, though, as you might imagine.

Here is an inauspicious page of the menu, featuring, ahem, bull penis. Since I had already eaten one tubular meat product (snake), I decided to pass on this one. Okay... Maybe I would have passed anyways...

At the end of the meal, I was happy to have found a new place to put on my "regular spots to hit up when traveling to Dongguan City and staying at the Dong Cheng International Hotel" list (what - don't you have one of those too?). The food was good, and although moderately expensive by Chinese standards, it's still quite reasonably priced. One of my Chinese colleagues was unhappy with the portion size for the price, but the high quality and great taste was more than enough to balance that out for me. So if you're in Dongguan, go check it out for yourself. Just make sure to bone up on your Mandarin first.