ARDENT GOURMET: Stunning Szechuan Garden in Hillsboro

By David & Susan Greenberg

The first two times we visited Szechuan Garden they were closed even though their website said they were open. Most would be dissuaded from visiting a third time but we, undauntable foodies, were not. We lived in Hong Kong for five years pursuing toothsome quarry and we knew that this was just a feint to throw us off scent. Perseverance is all.

Like fishermen casting chum, Szechuan Garden casts photos of its food on its front windows to attract ravenous fish such as we. Within we discovered that, better yet, the dog-eared menus also had photos of their food. The interior had the charm of a DMV waiting room. We looked at each other – this was great. For an axiom of Chinese restaurants is the spiffier (and more expensive) they are, like P.F. Chang’s, the greater the likelihood of unexceptional food. Scruff shows that a restaurant has its priorities straight. For it indicates they’re not throwing their finite resources into fancy plumage.

We started with Szechuan Wontons with Chili Oil. The wrappers were pliable yet firm to the bite. The interiors weren’t minced scraps of whatever but minced pork and probably cabbage, delicious in-and-of itself. It was strewn with bits of scallion and some green, maybe pea shoots. Many Szechuan restaurants serve food to make your fillings melt, overpowering all nuance. Szechuan Garden’s default heat, exemplified by their chili oil sauce, was assertive but not aversive. It had a lyrical sub-note of sweetness.

Their Sliced Beef Tendon with Chili & Peppercorn was the best rendition we’ve ever had. Braised beef shank, deboned, chilled, sliced thin was tossed in a unique spicy sauce with a judicious touch of Szechuan peppercorn, a good deal of crunchy raw onion, roasted peanuts, celery, cilantro. Szechuan peppercorn is a hallmark of Szechuan cuisine: hot, piney, zingy. The beef was intensely flavorful and somehow crisp but also chewy. The dish was not only a flavor-fest but a texture-fest. Truly addictive, we highly recommend it.

Hot and Spicy Hand Shaven Noodle was alpha. Hand shaven noodles, shaved with a kind of trowel or knife-cut from a large chunk of dough, are the soccer hooligans of noodledom, strapping bruisers. It was tossed with cabbage and slivers of carrot. A rough and tumble version of chow mein; we loved it.

Dried Cooked String Bean is a well-known dish but not easy to pull off. It requires a stove that generates Vesuvian heat to instantly condense, crinkle, and sear the beans without rendering them limp. Slightly salty, it had a subtle glaze, dried chili nubs, and possibly-perhaps-maybe fermented black bean. It was paradigmatic.

We’ve seen eaters in China ingest a large portion of bony fish, bones included, work their mouths in a rotatory fashion, and then expel the bones from their mouths like owl pellets, a sight to make your eyes boing in and out cartoon style. Bones, even intricate skeletons, don’t seem to deter eaters there. Chong Qing Hot Chicken (in China often made bones-in, but here in the US boneless) is popcorn chicken strapped to a SpaceX Raptor engine. Its specific impulse is fiercer (and more delicious) than any other such concoctions we know including Korean or Japanese fried chicken or even KFC which makes fine bird. Probably coated in a mixture of rice flour and wheat flour, chicken chunks are deep-fried into juicy crunch-bombs. They’re then tossed with lots of roughly chopped dried chilies, garlic, powdered Szechuan peppercorn, and accented by fried string beans (stroke of genius). This is the best version of this dish we’ve ever had, including those in Hong Kong.

While not eschewing oil, none of the food was oily, the bane of too many Chinese restaurants. Service was cordial, warm, gracious. Portions were extremely large. Prices were extremely fair. There were numerous other interesting dishes to try. They even put intestines and kidney on the menu, not that they interest us or most folks. That took guts.

This is not a self-impressed restaurant. Our waiter (who once resided in Tillamook, which he remembered fondly, where he took courses at the community college to improve his English) seemed to have no idea how exceptional his restaurant’s food was because apparently he couldn’t imagine anything less. Outstanding food, for him, was normative. The idea of pandering to American tastes (as does ‘Pander’ Express, for instance) never crossed his mind. We gather their chef is from Szechuan Province. Clearly he cooks as though he’s still in China, land of incomparably delicious food, where everyone down to tykes and tots is a serious gourmet.

What is the meaning of life? Love. We love Szechuan Garden in Hillsboro. Therefore, Szechuan Garden is the meaning of life. A pilgrimage is mandatory.