Day Trips
Everything in Houston's Chinatown is centered around food
By Gerald E. McLeod, Fri., June 3, 2011
Houston's Chinatown is huge. Like everything else in Harris County, it is spread out. The epicenter of this vibrant community is concentrated around Bellaire Boulevard and Gessner Road.
Nearly every block for a long stretch of Bellaire is filled with shopping malls with names like Don Juan Mall and Sterling Plaza anchored by warehouse-sized Asian supermarkets. Missing is the architectural history that makes an ethnic neighborhood visually appealing. That doesn't make it any less authentic.
Everything in the area seems to be centered around food. In one strip of a dozen shops, there were seven restaurants. "You could spend a lifetime trying and never sample all [of the restaurants in the area]," says Houston chef Chris Shepherd. Shepherd and chef Randy Evans lead the Houston Culinary Tours' Taste of Asia tour. It was a five-hour baptism into the sweet and sour sauce of Houston's Chinatown.
Really, the area should be called Asia Town because of the wide diversity of the ethnic groups represented. Space City has the third largest Vietnamese population in the U.S. Somewhere in the maze of malls on Houston's west side, there must be every kind of Asian cuisine being authentically prepared.
Sitting at a stoplight on Bellaire Boulevard, Shepherd pointed out Fu Fu Cafe, Sinh Sinh, and HK Dim Sum as being really good restaurants, all within a block of one another. And every newcomer should try Lee's Sandwiches once, he said.
We stopped at Banana Leaf (9889 Bellaire Blvd.), a small, family-owned Malaysian restaurant with only about 20 tables. Evans brought his wife here for Mother's Day. The food was a mixture of Indian and Malaysian.
We had just come from Asia Market (1010 W. Cavalcade St.) in the Heights District. Like many neighborhood restaurants, the food service is part of a mom-and-pop grocery store. They gradually have added Thai food, and it is awesome. Who knew a 1,000-year-old egg could taste so good?
In between gorging ourselves on wonderful food, our group visited one of the Asian supermarkets surrounded by video stores, dentists, and more restaurants. Viet Hoa (8300 W. Sam Houston Pkwy. S. #100) is an experience. It has one entire aisle filled with rice noodles. Nearby, Hong Kong Mall (11205 Bellaire Blvd.) is one of the largest Asian markets in the U.S.
Our tour ended at London Sizzler (6690 Southwest Freeway); funny name for great Indian food. The owners are East Indians and speak with a British accent. The tables groaned with all of the platters laid before us. The chicken masala and goat leg were outstanding.
For information about the Houston Culinary Tours, go to www.houstonculinarytours.com. Once a month the tours explore a different facet of Houston's rich dining landscape. You can't get a better insider's taste of Houston than with a bunch of passionate local foodies as guides.
1,037th in a series. Collect them all. Day Trips, Vol. 2, a book of "Day Trips," is available for $8.95, plus $3.05 for shipping, handling, and tax. Mail to: Day Trips, PO Box 33284, South Austin, TX 78704.
