So about about a month ago on the weekend of Chinese New Year (yo fellow rats, this is our year!) Shef and I went for dim sum with Bret and Katie. We decided to go to a well known place in NYC Chinatown called Jing Fong which has a rep for being really big and bustling. The food was pretty good. It wasn’t stupendous but it did satisfy the yen (get it? that’s kind of like Chinese for “craving”) for things like shrimp dumplings (ha gow), pork dumplings (siew mai) and other stand-byes of dim sum at least for me. Alas I haven’t found a place as good as some of the places back in the Bay Area (Tong Kiang -still being one of my favorites) but I’m sure they exist. But back to Jing Fong. What I did enjoy was the atmosphere. It was big, crowded and people were all business, both the eaters and the servers. And if you don’t mind sharing your table with strangers than you won’t mind Jing Fong. I love that sort of energy. Plus I still like the dim sum places that have enough space for carts to roll by. Granted, at Jing Fong, you kind of have to be on the look out for stuff because sometimes the carts won’t make it to you. In other words you have to multi task and enjoy eating while thinking about what else you want to eat. I call it my zen state. In summary, go for the atmosphere and eat until your bursting because it’s pretty cheap considering. We each spent about 15 bucks including tip. But don’t expect the most amazing food. It was good and got the job done but it didn’t knock my socks off.

Alright, so check out this brief video or our Jing Fong experience that Bret made with his awesome, expensive fancy pants phone that actually takes pretty good video.

Ok, so if you’re now intrigued by the Shady Maple reference (and the reference to scrapple), I had the opportunity – no, privilege to go to Shady Maples with Bret and Katie a few years ago one Thanksgiving weekend. And what can I say? It was a buffet. A very special buffet or rather smorgasbord in Pennsylvania Dutch country run by Mennonites (I think) and catoring to gluttonites of all shades, shapes and sizes (mostly big) who often take big ol’ tour buses lest they fall into a food coma and can’t drive themselves away or are unable to fit in the front seat of their car. I ate until I felt sick and then I ate some more. How can you do anything less at an all you can eat smorgasborg?