Guang-Dong offers simple, tasty dishes at budget prices
Guang-Dong offers simple, tasty dishes at budget prices
With lunch specials starting at $5.25, and the most expensive item on the dinner menu — shrimp in tomato sauce — costing less than $14, Guang-Dong Chinese Restaurant in Bernalillo might be the best bargain for Chinese food in the Albuquerque area.
First, the egg rolls cost only a buck, and they were delicious. Made by hand with ground pork and vegetables, they were hot out of the fryer and may have been the highlight of the meal. You never know until you bite into an egg roll what might greet you — a tender and savory inside or a soggy mess. Guang-Dong’s egg rolls are perfectly cooked inside and out, and at a dollar each, four or five on their own might make a respectable meal.
When I try a new restaurant, I usually start with a sure thing and then take bigger chances. At Guang-Dong, I decided to go for the surest bet possible at a Chinese restaurant, the sweet and sour chicken ($9.95). Although I’ve had better, it wasn’t a disappointment.
The plate was certainly worth the money. What must have been two or three large chicken breasts were dipped in thick breading, deep-fried, then sliced and smothered in signature sweet and sour sauce. Mixed in were thin onions and bell peppers but, disappointingly, not much else. The entree was mostly chicken, and the chicken was mostly breading, but both were thankfully pretty good.
The chicken was probably left in the deep-fryer a minute too long, but the flavors were great. The sweet and sour sauce was perfectly tangy and fresh, and the egg fried rice I ordered on the side was decently prepared but not necessarily plentiful. (Instead of peas or cubed carrots, the rice came unadorned, with hints of egg throughout.)
Still, the entree was a good amount of food with a good, fresh flavor. For less than $10, that’s a great deal. And the dinner portion is probably too much for a reasonable adult to finish in one sitting, so you’ll end up with leftovers.
Guang-Dong is a decent little spot for Chinese, but don’t expect a lavish interior or inspired cuisine — this is runof-the-mill takeout for hungry and frugal diners. The service is great and meals are served quickly, but you won’t find exotic ingredients or new takes on familiar dishes. Or even a soda fountain. In fact, that’s part of the charm of Guang-Dong, I think: simple, consistently good Chinese food at a great price. And no surprises.
Even the interior is exactly what you’d expect.
Whatever mental image you can conjure of the quintessential Chinese takeout spot, you are probably correct. The walls are covered in long-scroll paintings, the place mats are standard paper Chinese zodiac (we’re currently in the year of the rooster), bright light fills the small, clean dining room, even the fortune cookies are standard fare, promising me with absolute certainty that someone in that moment was speaking well of me.
For a quick lunch or takeout for the family after work, Guang-Dong has a lot going for it, starting with fair prices and including some darned good egg rolls.