Lao Sze Chuan
2172 S. Archer Avenue
(between 21st St & Cermak Rd)
Chicago, IL 60616 (312) 326-5040
102 Reviews for Lao Sze Chuan
Pretty decent chinese food here. This is one of the places I usually go to for chinese food. They have a tasty spicy eggplant dish that a couple of other people I know also order often.
Why is it that when it comes to ethnic fare, the Midwest magically turns it into the most bland thing possible?
Fortunately, there's Lao Sze Chuan, the exception to the rule. Been here a few times, excellent food, excellent flavors. Also, a work colleague who's Chinese-American and grew up in Chicago, tells me this is the best Chinese restaurant in Chinatown, and he is totally right.
One star off for ambiance. It's nothing fancy.
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I'm a fatalist. And, being a believer in the greater world order of things, this had to be my hundredth review. After all, in a few hours, I will be suffering from intense heart burn and a splitting chili-induced headache, and who knows if I'll ever recover enough to yelp again.
But at least the meal that caused all this pain was worth it. Absolutely delicious Chinese food, at hard to beat prices. Service was quick, efficient, dare I say even bordering on polite. And the food, ah the food. Tony's chicken, sauteed szechuan string beans (addictive!!!) and that Ma Po Tofu. No other ma po tofu will ever measure up to this one, in taste or spice. I may not be a huge fan of Chinatown, but this is a place I'll gladly return to again and again. And again. And again...
Yum! Husband and I headed to Lao Sze Chuan to get our Chinese Food Fix on and glad we found a seat there!
We started with the veg. spring rolls, quite good! Husband had the egg drop soup, which I couldn't recommend just by looking at it. It was VERY oily. He was only able to eat about 1/4 of the bowl, he realized that much oil would make him sick. Then we got our entrees. I had the three color bean curd which was really very very good. I'll go back, because I will absolutely be craving it within the next couple of weeks! Husband had the salt and pepper trio of shrimp, scallops and squid. He loved it. Really loved it!
By far the most efficient, friendly, service we've had in Chinatown. And we've been just about everywhere in Chinatown, lol.
This was the food highlight from my last trip to Chicago. This was the best Chinese food I have had in a long time -- authentic, delicious and unpretentious.
My experience was outstanding and I will remember eating here for a long time -- and dream of returning. I would be a regular here if I lived in the area.
Their menu is extensive and I would love to try many of their other dishes -- I have no doubt that it only gets better once you get to know the menu. The food was very flavorful, very well prepared and generally quite spicy as well.
This is a popular place -- and it can get very busy and you might need to wait, but your patience will be rewarded.
Prices were very reasonable and portions were generous. Service was friendly and efficient. A beer would have been nice with dinner, especially given the heat of many of the dishes -- but they don't have a liquor license -- at least upstairs.
Our dinner included the following:
Salt & Pepper Scallop: Perfectly cooked, very flavorful. Delicious.
3 Chili Chicken: Spicy, perfectly prepared, delicious and very memorable.
Pea Shoots with Garlic: Outstanding -- very fresh and perfectly cooked -- nice flavor with lots of garlic.
Dan Dan Noodles -- hot and spicy -- as well as delicious!
Special Hot and Sour Soup -- vegetarian -- spicy, chili oil, fresh vegetables, tofu and herbs. Delicious.
Lamb with Cumin: Good -- did not touch the Lamb with Cumin at Hong Kong Palace in VA.
Hope to return. Must return.
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My favorite Chinese in all of Chicago.
For those looking for spice, this place will set your GIRD in motion. I love the spicy and I take a few pepsid tabs as a amuse bouche.
From the pepsid course, I highly suggest the szechuan jelly fish. Certainly not the egg roll, crag rangoon or pot sticker, but delicious.
From there, I had, but one choice, the 3 Chili Chicken. The dish was sweet and extraordinarily spicy. On my next trip, I will skip the chili's and simply dine on the chili flavored chicken which was nearly perfect. No rice needed, just the Chicken Crack and a pair of chopsticks (an 2 tabs of pepsid).
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I can't shovel this food in my face fast enough. Very authentic experience and the menu is quite extensive with something for everyone. The veggies are fresh and perfectly cooked: szechuan string beans are crisp and delicious, the garlic spinach is totally addictive, the ma po tofu will burn your arse off, and the chili egg plant rocks. The chili chicken is an artery cloggin' favorite of mine--I can almost feel my thighs expanding as I eat it, but as a once-in-a-while thing I recommend it. Everything I've tried on the menu is excellent.
For those looking for adventure, the Very Chinese Special Menu will satisfy. I, myself, went this route just once...and it's not for me...not for the weak of heart (or stomach). But the chef can guide you if you're looking for something out of the ordinary.
There's almost always a line and there isn't much ambiance outside of the fact that you're in a more authentic area, slightly off the beaten path in Chinatown, but it's the best choice in the area and--in my opinion--in all of Chicago.
I didn't know this was a BYOB...I'm delighted to find that out! And I confirmed on the phone...no corkage fee.
My favorite szechwan and chinese place in chicago. If you like hot and spicy food, you have to be a lao szechwan fan. The chili platter is my favorite appetizer, followed by boiled beef. Don't be fooled by the name - it is beef and it is boiled, but the dish is not about beef or being boiled. it's about the sauce infused with szechwan peppers.
Just like everyone else, I also like the green beans and 3 chili chicken.
This is my most favorite in all of Chinatown. They have a ton of options. I always get the spicy garlic string bean appetizer. The service is excellent. They bring you're food out as soon as it is ready. You also get a free pot of tea. The prices are cheap and the food is great. Many vegetarian options.
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I should've prepped for the heartburn. Best dish of the night was probably the artery clogging Tony's Chicken. That stuff is seriously like crack. It's heavily breaded but the chicken is super tender and it's spicy and sweet. As equally good was the garlic peasprouts--mostly stems (which my bf didn't prefer). The shui-zhu niu rou ("water boiled beef")--beef was rather rough and the flavor wasn't up to snuff. The dandan noodles were completely soaked with soy sauce on the bottom so if you let it sit too long, you might as well be eating soy sauce flour.
Value? Dude, Chinese in my book should never be more than 20/person! But we came here relatively early on a Fri evening and service was actually one of the better I've seen in Chinese places. Still, 3.5 stars. I'd go back to try other dishes but it's not OMG GOOD.
My most favorite chinese restaurant in the whole wide world, need i say more??? *winks*
The Owner, Tony, just open up another restaurant, Lao Beijing, do try the House style Fish, my new fave!!!
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The BEST RESTAURANT in China town that I have ever experience, although it can be a little pricey for China Town's standard but the food is good. My All time favorite everytime I go there is the "Steamed Fish", the fish is sooo freshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!! Love it Love ittttt.... I have never tried their Hot Pot though, but from the looks of it.. everyone seems to be enjoying it. Would try it next time if I can resist my Steamed Fish temptations. :P
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Sweet Lord, go now! Please go there as soon as you can! Order one of everything as I've never had a single bad dish. It's BYOB, and not a liquor store in sight (that I found), so come prepared as well. Seriously, hurry up & go.
Let me start off by saying that I'm not really a huge fan of Chinese food mostly because I've not really found a dish that I love and the large amount of oil used to prepare the dishes is frightening to me. That said, when I was asked to join some friends to go to dinner down in Chinatown, I jumped at the chance. I was excited to try some authentic Chinese food (no matter how unhealthy it may be) and to hang with some great friends.
Lao Sze Chuan did not disappoint. We ordered two plates of Tony's Chicken, a tofu veggie dish, spicy basil chicken and an order of The Phoenix and the Dragon (a shrimp and chicken dish that's prepared two ways). What you've heard about Tony's "crack" chicken is nothing short of true. It is the perfect mix of savory and sweet. The tofu vegetable dish was well received and the spicy chicken basil was excellent. I preferred the chicken to the shrimp in the Phoenix & Dragon dish. However, both were full of flavor. I would love to go back again sometime and taste a few other dishes.
Wife and I went there on a weeknight a couple weeks ago. An encouraging sign to see the place 90% full at 9:15 on a Thursday night. Shortly after we sat down we were personally greeted by Tony himself. I had read about Tony's Chili Chicken in Yelp reviews and after meeting Tony I felt obligated to order it. Started off with String Bean Spicy Black Sauce. Great start! Tony's Chicken is quite good. We made the mistake of ordering another dish that has that sweet and sour/spicy taste. Too much of one style of food. Next time (and there WILL be a next time) I would be more adventurous and try new things. ENORMOUS menu with many fun things to try. Place is not that big, so I would expect a wait at peak times, but I haven't experienced that yet.
One strange aspect of our experience was how fast they brought the food. Too fast.
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OK. Listen vegetarians. The vegetarian Buddha chicken is absolutely fabulous. It's yuba (tofu skin) with a mushroom stuffing rolled and cut like a jelly roll. Served cold and delicious.
Tri-color tofu is another winner. They use rehydrated frozen tofu, a green vegetable and carrots to create three colors. The texture is sublime, and the flavor subtle but very pleasing. Perhaps too subtle because it can be lost among the other strongly spiced food.
The tofu appetizer with peanuts was a hit with the rest of the table. It wasn't anything I couldn't make, but it was done proper. Uniform small cubes of tofu, probably from frozen tofu as the texture was very firm with no hint of softness, well-sauteed on every side and served with fresh peanuts.
I had the eggplant on the recommendations of other yelpers and the whole table enjoyed it very much.
On my last visit I went with a much stricter vegetarian than I. After 14 years I've learned that, in places with a slightly disengaged waitstaff, that even if you ask if something is vegetarian and it has chicken broth they will probably tell you it is vegetarian. So don't ask don't tell.
Be sure you ALL get the white fish with black beans. I think they are black soybeans. I've never eaten anything better in my life.
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From the boards on chow.com and lthforum.com, we ventured to Lao Sze Chuan last night to try what people have been calling "Chicken Crack" otherwise known on the menu as Tony's Chicken With Three Chili. The dish was everything everyone said it would be, sweet, savory and spicy. Delicious. It was also very greasy but that's okay.
Looking through the menu was like perusing a high school yearbook. The hardcover menu has over 800 items and very, very overwhelming but that's okay. I thought the misspellings were funny - Carlic Chicken, Noosles.
When you sit down, they bring you a small appetizer of spicy cabbage. If you can't stand the heat, don't try this. We consider ourselves lovers of all things hot but even the free cabbage was almost too much for us to eat. We finished it anyway with a lot of water.
Along with the Crack, we had Spicy Noodle with Beef and the Chengdu Dumplings as the appetizer. The jus that came with the dumplings was so good, I drenched my rice in it.
The dumplings, crack and noosles came to $26, not bad. When we asked them to doggy bag our left overs, we asked to take the left over rice as well. The waiter said he would give us fresh rice instead, nice touch.
I might go back today to get another fix.
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One of my favorite restaurants when I have a craving for some good sichuan food. The neiro mien (or beef noodle soup) here is delicious. The noodles, beef, and veggies are excellent... and there's a perfect amount of spicyness in the soup (just enough to rile up your intestines, but not quite enough to give you reflux) (but i think spicy preference is all relative).
Also good here: sichuan dumplings, huo guo (hot pot). I forgot what else. Oh, fish. But forgot the name...
I realize this is supposed to be one of the best Chinese restaurants in Chicago but I won't be going back ever again. My friends and I went there for lunch today and we were left speechless. None of us had ever been there before, but one on my friends was especially excited because she was considering having her graduation dinner there. Well, midway through our meal, Erin asks with her fork in mid-air, "Hey, you guys, can you take a look at this? What do you think this is?" Yep, we looked, eye glances were exchanged, and everyone put their forks down. It was indeed a cockroach! Gross. Needless to say, we told our server, got a lame excuse and were told the bill was on the house, as if there was another option. We were completely disgusted and left immediately.
The worst part is that because Lao Sze Chaun is a family style restaurant, we have no idea which dish had the cockroach nor could any of us at the table be certain we hadn't already had a roach with our food...
Two words - TONY'S CHICKEN! It's also referred to as "Chicken Crack". It's the perfect mix of crispy, fried chicken bites in a spicy-sweet sauce with sauteed garlic and jalapenos. It's so delicious! I have also tried their Ma Po tofu, which was good, but next time I will ask them to add ground pork to it for extra flavor. Their salt-and-pepper green beans are the best. I also recommend their *spicy* pork and squid noodles. Their menu is HUGE, and it's very authentic. Be adventurous and try something from the "very-chinese" portion of the menu :)
The service isn't great, but we come here for the fantastic food.
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When I lived in ChinaTown I would eat here at least twice a week. This may even be the best place in China Town. They have really good fried rice and the portions are huge. The service is really friendly. I *really* like their Chili Chicken, but everything on the menu is good really. Also, it seems to be authentic, which is always a plus in my book.
My only complaint(s) is that the location is small so a reservation is (probably?) required if you want to eat there. I also wish it were open a bit later.
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Just not that impressed. Granted, I'm not a Chinese food expert, so I went with the "safe" choice -- the famous hot pot. It was alright, and a novel way to eat, but at the same time way pricey for what it was ($16 per person). Of the 40 fondue-dipping ingredients the menu promised, probably only half showed up, and while there was plenty of meat selection to chose from, the vegetables that we were interested in never really showed up. The hot broth is hot and little else, and it just wasn't a very interesting mix of flavors at all.
OK, people, first of all, this is a biased review. If you don't like spicy and oily food, don't even think about going there, because you will NOT like it at all. Since I am from Chengdu, Sichuan (Sze Chuan) and the owner of this restaurant is from my home town, and I am by default biased. That being said, this restaurant does serve the most authentic Sichuan food I have ever had in the US.
Here are some suggestions if you are into spicy food:
1. Ma Po Tofu--one the most famous Sichuan Dish, must try
2. Twice cooked pork--see above
3. Dong Po Pork Elbow--this dish is named after the famous poet, so,
of course it's excellent
4. Water boiled beef/fish/pork--don't let the name fool you, cos it's not
bland, it's spicy and tasty
5. Spicy peppery soup (Ban Tang Yu Pian)
6. Never forgotten chicken--appetizer
7. Lai Lai Lai Chicken (in a pot)
9. Crispy Eggplants
And many other more dishes that I can't remember all right now. But do try them if you like spicy food. If you are more adventurous, try the pig ear, rabbit meat, pig intestines, and perhaps blood soup. Although personally I am not too impressed by the last two.
They also have hot pot. I tried it several times, but I still love the dishes better. My boyfriend loves the Ma Po ToFu and Water boiled beef the best so they are our staple every time we go.
One last thing, the service is OK, and it's crowded during the weekends. They have upstairs, so ask for it when you get there if it's crowded and you might be able to be seated faster.
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this is exactly what szechuan food should be like.
all the time.
cold szechuan noodle salad.
you'd probably overlook it, but get it.
yeah, the chicken is rad, but get some pork belly.
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You have to understand I'm a San Franciscan who starts to shriek like a little girl when the temperature dips below 40. OK, maybe not shriek...just silently moan. OK, maybe not so silently since I hate how I have to take an inventory of all my clothing every time I move from place to place this time of year. Well, in the midst of this wintry turmoil, I was determined to try a Chinatown restaurant in Chicago, so I took the Red Line down to come to Lao Sze Chuan.
The editorial staff at Citysearch picks it as the city's best Chinese restaurant, so I took the leisurely walk down Cermak to find it since I loves me some Szechuan food. I was tickled to see the Yelp sticker on the door, so things looked promising. The elaborate hotpot dishes looked good from afar (...it's just sukiyaki to me!), but I was by my lonesome and didn't have quite the appetite to Hoover a whole hotpot myself.
I have to tell you they are none too pleased by the presence of single diners during the dinner hour. Every table accommodates at least four, so I must have represented a net revenue loss by taking a whole table to myself. You should have seen the face of the veteran waitress when she saw me. You would have thought I invaded Manchuria single-handed. I felt guilty enough to volunteer to share a table, but all the diners came in groups of four. I guess I could have eaten in the kitchen.
So my alternate plan was to eat like four people, not the first time my mind came to the feeble conclusion of overeating to feed my basic insecurities. I was first treated to their fiery pickled cabbage appetizer, which nearly burned my tongue and lips off concurrently. I loved it. Suddenly I went predictable and ordered a $1.95 cup of Won Ton Soup (see my photo). Small bowl, two won ton. That would be considered a double-fault at Wimbledon.
Things looked better with the $10.95 Chef's Special Crispy Duck (see my photo) - definitely a hefty portion, but the meat was strangely dried out. It came with a plum sauce, but I usually don't need that much lubricant when it comes to parsing out Daffy and Donald. I had to remind them to bring me my order of the $7.95 Chinese eggplant in garlic sauce (see my photo). They probably couldn't believe I was tossing it down my gullet. Well, they were kinda right since the eggplant gave me a long night of heartburn. But it was tasty going down.
The decor is very simple here, just a single room in a calming peach tone from what I saw (though I noticed a second floor when I walked outside, perhaps a private dining room?). Lots of people came in and out with a lot of regulars who knew what they wanted. The comprehensive menu overwhelmed me quite a bit. I wish I could have gotten more of a recommendation from the staff. By the way, except for the grizzled veteran, the staff was very nice to me throughout.
FOOD - 3 stars...not the best Szechuan I've ever had...I shall be prepared to be pelted with stones
AMBIANCE - 3 stars...pretty simple set-up though it would be nice if they could accommodate single diners with large appetites like me
SERVICE - 3.5 stars...if it weren't for that initial glare, I would have given them four stars
TOTAL - 3 stars...I need to bring friends with me next time 'cause those hotpots looked pretty darn good
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Really good food, service is great but ordering the hot pot meal is confusing as hell! Apparently its a charge of $16.95 per person no matter what if u want the hot pot. No way was I going to pay 80 dollars between the 4 of us at the table. Though I got it for 38 dollars one time just for 2, but the lady couldn't explain why we couldn't get the "for 2" amount and share it amongst 4 people. So confusing. Other than that I can't really complain.
In a word, disappointing. Shortly after we sat down, a group was seated at the table adjacent to us. One in the group had a cough that made you wonder about what disease he was carrying. We asked the waiters if we could move and their limited english, it seemed, was a challenge. They did not quite understand our request, or perhaps did not care. So, we enjoyed our meal next to another patron who sounded like he was coughing up a lung. We tried the recommended favorites from the reviews listed here: Tony's Chicken Three Chili and the Green Beans in a Black Bean Sauce appetizer. And, we each had a bowl of hot and sour soup. The only thing noteworthy was the tea. The soup was simply tangy broth with tofu, but it did arrive at our table quickly. The green beans had grains of salt (or was that MSg?) making it terribly salty, and the chicken was fried chunks of chicken dust. It has been fried so long that there was virtually no chicken, only dough in every bite. Plus, the dish was so overpowered by sugar that I felt like I had eaten a bowl of Frosted Flakes. The final tab was insulting: $22 plus tip. Never again will we return to this restaurant. We left there and found a bakery selling BBQ pork buns just to eat something that had a bit more protein and was pleasant to our palates. I do not recommend this place, EVER!
You have to try Tony's Three Chili Chicken---its the best chicken dish ever!! A little on the spicy side but its absolutely amazing. It will change your life.
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Best Chinese I've had in Chicago. It can be inconistent sometimes though. When you get take out you have to ask for soy, mustard and sweet and sour, they will never ever just have it in the bag. And still only give you 1 or two of each on a $50 take out order. That being said try the Spicy Pan Fried Pork. Be sure to eat it with some rice or I gaurantee you will be on the toilet all day the following day w/ flaming diarhea coming out of your ass. The Dry Chili Beef is also excellent.
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Chef special dry chili chicken is the boooooooooooooooomb. Seriously. If you like spicy and you like chicken, this one's for you. Like nothing you've ever had before.
This place is just great. I've been back many times. The mood is just right and the food is awesome. If you're in Chinatown, go there.
As someone who grew up eating amazing Chinese food (thanks grandma and mom), I am absolutely certain that Lao Sze Chuan is as good as it gets in Chicago. If you crave authentic Chinese food, then do as I say. Go there on a week night, and order the string beans with spicy black sauce, ma-po tofu, and sole fish with chili sauce. Or if you're feeling really brave, bring some friends and get the hot & spicy hot pot. It's more work, but I don't mind getting a little dirty for good food. Should you decide to venture into the menu on your own, here is one last piece of advice: Don't be that guy/girl who orders the Americanized dishes (sweet & sour shrimp, kung pao chicken) because I'll be the girl sitting near you, laughing.
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Some of the most amazing Chinese food I have eaten in Chicago. Almost everything has been exceptional - though our favorites are the Sole fish fillet with Chili Bean Sauce, the Pork with Cilantro, Twice cooked Pork and the String Beans. Have probably been here more than 50 times. If it were closer, would probably go even more often.
Tony and Vincent are the owners and are great. Some folks have mentioned problems being seated... We (usually just 2 of us) have never had a problem with being seated in the order in which we arrived. One just needs to wait in line and let the servers know when you are next. Of late they have started opening up the space upstairs on busy days.
Service can be a bit hurried on weekends so weekdays are definitely preferable. Of late even weekdays can get crowded at peak mealtimes. Definitely worth the wait though.
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I came here with a friend who sang praises about the place. The unusual offerings you can find in the exhaustive menu (although most of them are similarly prepared, just different meat) and even more unusual specials (frogs cooked in a dozen different ways, anyone?) can certainly dazzle the eyes.
The food was admittedly pretty good. We had the orange beef (crispy with strong orange rind flavors), chinese broccoli (seasoned just right -- salt and garlic) and dry-chili chicken (not my favorite, a tad too salty, but okay), and they were definitely above average / pretty good.
Service, however, leaves much to be desired. The vegetables didn't arrive with the rest of the dishes, and when prompted, the server told us that he'll check on it. Then 15 minutes later, it shows up -- he definitely didn't put in the order first. As typical of most restaurants in this area, we did find less-than-sparkly-clean water glasses and even found a speck of chili powder in our rice bowl. Well, some might gag at the sight, but if you frequent any of the area establishments, you probably won't bat an eye.
I'd go back again to try their different dishes, but will probably move on once the initial romance passes away.
After the rave reviews on Yelp and Chef Tony being interviewed on the news, I had to come check this place out. Going to lunch here before the Chinese New Year parade hit the spot. It was perfect. They have good tea here, and they placed a plate of spicy cabbage on the table as well. I'm not sure if this was typical or for the new year. My interpretation was that it would make for longevity, hence the long slices of cabbage and the spiciness adds to an interesting year! Of course, it meant that I had to eat some so that I could have some of that spice in my life. I had to be selective of the items to eat since my friend doesn't love Chinese food the way that I do, and she has specific allergies. The crab rangoons here are some of the best in the city. You actually see the pieces of the crab in there when you take a bite out of them. They added broccoli to our orange chicken per our request and made salt and pepper shrimp for us even though the shrimp wasn't really an option on the menu. As large as the menu was, they were very accomodating. The food came out piping hot, and the presentation was terrific. They totally impressed me, and I can't wait to take my family here the next time they are in Chicago. My friend said she'd come back and even try something new. The boss came out to pour us each a cup of hot tea and wish us a Happy New Year as well. I'm very tempted to try the new Lao Beijing and Lao Shanghai now. Oh my fortune cookie says that I will be showered with good luck before my next birthday. What a way to start the New Year!
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Alright, this place already has plenty of good reviews, but I will would like to take some time and recommend this joint. I love Chinese food, and I love spice food. Lao Sze Chuan is the most authentic Sze Chuan restaurant I have ever been to here in U.S.
Now days, food alone is not the only indicator of a great dining experience. Service and cleanness are just as important. The service at this place is great. People are very friendly and your food comes out really fast! I have been there many times, and have always been satisfied with the food and service, and have overtipped every time.
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this restaurant is def on my top 3 fav chinese restaurant in chicago! love the dishes here specifically the shui zhu niu and wu geng chang wang.
i personally feel is a waste to get hot pot at a restaurant since it's something you can easily do at home but my gf loves it (i guess koreans dont do hot pots at home) and it's very well done at this place. but be forewarned: be ready to get very acquainted with the bathroom after eating here, especially if you ask them to make everything extra spicey!
Always a delicious time at Lao Sze Chuan.
I was first introduced to the restaurant by a friend who works in China, who claimed it was the most authentic Chinese in Chicago. Etc etc. She's right, and so are the denizens of Chinese-food lovers in Chi-town who flock to this unpretentious, delightful corner of Chinatown.
One of their best dishes is the ***tea-smoked duck***mmm-mmm--don't be fooled by the image of shreds of pink limp meat in a stir fry; this dish is closer to a rustic duck confit in a parisian bistro. NO: this baby comes on the bone, with shatteringly-crisp duck skin, dark and white meat portions, all chopped up in gnaw-friendly morsels and served with a lovely dose of hoisin on the side.
For our most recent dinner, we opted for the truly perfect Szechuan dumplings (savory ground pork folded into delicate wonton skins, topped off with chili oil--what not to love?) and kept our little fingerbowl of chili oil to mix with the hoisin as a rich, more complex condiment for our duck. We then cleansed our palates with neverending tea and chinese broccoli in garlic sauce--bright green, fresh, crispy, with mellowed shards of lightly toasted garlic.
I give Lao Sze Chuan my highest recommendation as a chinese food restaurant in chicago--follow the other posters on this website and order what people recommend. The menu is vast and they have some real standout dishes.
All this from a girl who would rather eat most any other cuisine other than chinese--except if it's LSC (or Mandarette in LA).
My Chinese significant other and I stumbled across Lao Sze Chuan by chance while wandering around Chinatown; neither one of us had heard of it so we had no expectations going in. But I've spent a while in Sichuan, and finding a place in the States that can accurately recreate the flavors I got addicted to in Chengdu and Chongqing is not an easy feat.
We ordered three dishes, some sort of a cold tofu-skin-and-mushroom appetizer that my companion wanted, and two fairly signature Sichuan dishes: homestyle tofu and kung pao chicken.
Both of the Sichuan dishes disappointed. The homestyle tofu had nicely fried chunks of firm tofu, and the flavor of the sauce was pretty close (though missing the flavoring accent of sauteed minced pork that it normally contains in China)...but what is usually just a tofu-and-sauce dish came with a hodgepodge of random overcooked "Chinese takeout" veggies mixed in as well. I'm not sure who thought homestyle tofu needed spicing up with some snow peas and canned bamboo shoots, but it wasn't me. It wasn't a huge deal, but it didn't really add to the dish either.
The kung pao chicken, on the other hand, was the big disappointment. This might be my favorite Chinese dish of all time, and what I got at Lao Sze Chuan was basically the same Americanized version you can get at any el cheapo fast-food takeout place in any town in America. This should be a fiery dish swimming with dried chilies, chunks of chicken, and fried peanuts. I got a couple of lone chilis swimming forlornly in an overly-sweet sauce with, yet again, the hodgepodge of "takeout" vegetables, and the hua jiao peppercorns that give true kung pao chicken its mystical mouth-numbing powers (which I expected to find in an authentic place such as this) were absent as well.
Ironically, the best and (according to my companion) most authentic dish of the three was our appetizer, whose name escapes me at the moment - and it was actually a Shanghai-style dish, not Sichuanese.
I get that this place has a devoted, loyal following among Chicagoans, but frankly the next time I'm in Chinatown I'll hit up one of the hole-in-the-wall places with nothing but Chinese on the menuboard and nothing but Cantonese being spoken among the patrons instead. I suspect that's where you'll find authentic Chinese food in Chinatown...not here.
Let me start out by saying that the food alone is definitely worth 5 stars, so if it is just food that you're looking for, then go and enjoy a unique and exceptional meal there. Where I dock them an entire star for is their service.
My table began by ordering crab rangoon (yes, I know, it is one of the Americanized foods there, but that doesn't make it any less delicious) and it very well might have been the best crab rangoon I've ever had. For the main course we decided to get adventurous and order a hot pot. Having never had anything like it before, when the waitress threw down a plate of raw meat and a boiling kettle of God knows what in front of us, we were thoroughly confused about what to do. After sitting there for a minute simply staring at the plate of raw seafood, with it's side dish of raw beef and lamb we decided to ask some fellow restaurant goers how you go about attacking such an intimidating dish. After help from some very nice people we figured it out, and the meal itself was fantastic. I think the hot pot was one of the most unique dining experiences of my life, and I highly recommend it to anyone who is looking for something different out of their Chinese food experience.
Overall the food was so good that it almost made us forget that we had a plate of raw meat thrown in front of us with no explanation, but I did have to knock them a star for it.
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This place has so many fans and so many reviews, I almost wondered what I could add that was new. But given that this is a Szechuan restaurant among a majoity of Cantonese places, it's worth pointing out a couple of things about this particular dining experience that's distinctive from many others in Chinatown. Also, while there are a lot of hot and spicy items on the menu, and you're in heaven if that's what thrills ya, there are also a fair number of non-spicy items, so more sensitive palates need not fear. Nor do vegetarians have to struggle to find what's doable for them.
Here are a few of my veggie-friendly and non-flammable favorites:
--the peanut and pressed tofu appetizer--little cubes of smoked, pressed tofu (very firm) tossed with peanuts, scallions, a little chili and sesame oils. addictive.
--the vegetarian "chicken" appetizer--rolls made with dried, reconstitued tofu "skin" with mushrooms rolled into them, sliced on the bias and served cold. tasty and refresing.
--pea pod greens sauteed with garlic or another green like Chinese broccoli sauteed with garlic or with oyster sauce.
I like that they have beer to go with all that spicy, salty food. My one gripe is that often the food is overly salty. Sometimes the wait is outrageous, but when their upstairs annex is open, that tends to relieve some of the congestion.
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