Lyla D.
Yelp
During our recent stay in Los Angeles, while "eating our way around the City," the daytime temperatures rarely exceeded 60° F and nighttime. Early mornings were even colder, dipping to the low 40°-50° F. Our palates often craved hot noodle soups or spicy foods. I referred to my Yelp bookmark list and suggested Arcadia's 1919 Lanzhou Beef Noodle, which specializes in the Chinese-Muslim style of beef noodles, also known as clear-broth or consommé-stewed beef noodle (兰州拉面) with one hand pulled noodle (lamian) per bowl. This one-bowl meal can be spiced up with red chili oil, too. Alternatively, I thought about other common varietals, the red-braised beef noodle soup (紅燒牛肉麵) from Taiwan, Cantonese braised or stewed beef noodle soup (清汤牛腩粉), and Thailand's kuaitiao nuea pueay. However, since we were hangry and cold, my BIL suggested that we find a restaurant closer and not requiring a 40-minute drive which we wholeheartedly agreed with.
The Yelp app proved valuable and led us to Qin West Noodle in LA's Chinatown. While inputting the address into my BIL's car GPS, he recognized the address from his visits to Howlin' Rays in the Far East Plaza, so we didn't even need the GPS. We were already on the road taking care of errands, so the Chinatown location was closest and averaged 4-stars. Although the Far East Plaza has an attached parking lot, we lucked out and found metered street parking on N Hill Street, which someone had graciously left an hour in that metered stall.
As we stood outside of Qin West Noodle, we were mesmerized by the menu selection, which offered cold and hot noodle dishes from different regions of China and the ability to request your desired spice level. I considered getting the famous Liuzhou snail noodles or popular Guilin rice noodles but seeing the photos of the red chili pepper soups made me reconsider. Bok Bok Bok... I chickened out from spicy to the milder yet flavorful and familiar broth of Qin West's Beef Noodle Soup. I could add in some chili oil or paste if needed. Both my husband and I ordered the Beef Noodle Soup, while my BIL ordered the Spicy Wonton Soup and added ramen noodles. My BIL, who has a very high tolerance for chili peppers and asked for his spicy wontons to be served the way Qin West usually does. He admitted that the soup was spicy for his palate as beads of sweat formed on his forehead.
Since this was our first visit, we were unsure of the portion size and requested a couple of side dishes of Salty Pork Chop and Beef Tendon. The male worker told us their portions were generous, so it would be too much food to get side dishes. By golly, he was right! My BIl's Spicy Wonton Soup ($11.95) had about 15 wontons and over a cup of ramen noodles (an additional $1). The braised beef in my noodle soup ($12.95) was melt-in-your-mouth tender, and although I requested the wide, flat noodles, I ended up with flat rice noodles, which reminded me of pho rice noodles. Tsk, it was a hiccup between the server and me, but still, the beef noodle soup tasted perfect. All of the noodle dishes were served in disposable deep bowls and served with disposable utensils. We were stuffed but not bloated from eating.
Unfortunately, this restaurant doesn't serve water from a pitcher, so you'll be asked to purchase bottled water or other iced beverages from their refrigerator. However, bottled water only costs $1.50, and I'm not sure if one can bring in an insulated water bottle or drink.
Despite the "hiccup" of not getting the preferred wide flat noodle and being discouraged from ordering side dishes to try by the server, we'd return here or go to Qin West's other locations to get our noodle soup fix and to try their other specialties.
