Shiang Garden, translated into Fresh Garden, was the restaurant that my father owned, and where my story begins.
It all started back in the sixth grade, my brother and I would visit my grandfather and grandmother almost every Sunday. For lunch we would go to my father's restaurant, Shiang Garden. The restaurant was located on the corner of W. Garvey Avenue and N.Atlantic Boulevard on the top floor of a business plaza that was literally red all around (red is a lucky color in the Chinese culture). Since I haven't been there for years, the only thing that it looked like a decently clean establishment. Tables were covered with bleached white linen that you would find in any other restaurant. Lacquered black oak chairs with red cushioning, that would creak a little whenever you tried to move, were at every table in sets of four. As you walked in, there were about four "private" rooms WITH A DOOR(!) along the right side, with another banquet room in the back of the restaurant. They were used for bigger parties or the occasional "business" meeting. Along the left side of the restaurant were the big glass panels for windows with Venetian blinds.
Whenever I went in with my family, we would always have a reserved table right in front of the cashier's booth. That was our special seat, nobody else was allowed there except us, man, I felt like a king. Unlike most of the other places, we never served dim sum, we left that to NBC, Ocean Star, or Din Tai Fung... which were all down the street. I guess you could say that we were considered "fine dining" compared to all those other places. Don't get me started about Ocean Star, I had a terrible experience there once, otherwise the food is really good.
So one day we were having lunch and I ran out of Sprite, so I got up and went into the kitchen. It was a really busy that day, so I just said, "Eh, why not? I'll just go get it myself." Best and most terrible experience of my life, folks! The soda machine was right next to the door of the kitchen so it was pretty easy access. As I walked down the hall, the bus boys and waiters were walking in and out of the kitchen with steaming hot plates of food like clockwork. Trying to get in through that doorway at the time was like dodging traffic, if you were off one split-second, BAM! You were on the floor.
After much thumb-twiddling, I managed to squeeze my way in, and believe me, at that time, I was a damn chubby little kid. Upon entering the kitchen, it was like sensory overload wonderland! Sounds of meat and vegetables sizzling the fan buzzing over head, pot lids shaking, banging and clattering of pots, pans, and plates. Not only the sound of our cooks busting dishes, but also the language; Spanish, English, Mandarin, Spanglish, Engdarin, Cantonese, you name it, it was being used.
At the time, I thought to myself, "Wow, this F**king epic! I wanna do this kinda stuff." I left the kitchen, and went up to my father and asked him to let me watch the guys cook. He told me, "Then go wash dishes or something." And that's exactly what I did, and spent 2 summers doing it too. Some stuff happened on the management side, not sure what, but we had to sell off the restaurant, and that's when everything went downhill... for the restaurant anyways. We also had side ventures, but they failed as well.
The thing about Shiang Garden that still strikes me are the recipes. Chinese food, it's all the same right? Not really, it all depends on the way its cooked and by whom. There was one dish that always made my mouth water, and it was the beef and bell peppers. It was cubes of beef tenderloin with some bell peppers sauteed and mixed together with the Feng family Black Pepper sauce. Well yeah, beef and green peppers, you can get that anywhere, but it was just the way it was cooked. It was put together so perfectly, every bite was like a feeling of beefy ecstacy.
And here I am in culinary school. You could almost say that me being here is like getting ready to infiltrate Shiang Garden and take back what is rightfully mine. I just want to get all those recipes back because I have yet to eat anywhere else that has had the quality food that Shiang Garden used to have... Well that, and my brother told me that Thomas Keller really liked the Shiang Garden, who knows.
