Chinese restaurant serves up steak and nostalgia
House of Chan K (out of 4) GOOD
Address: 514 Eglinton Ave. W. (near Avenue Rd.), 416-781-5575, houseofchan.ca Chef: Danny Lau
Hours: Monday to Friday, 4:30 to 10:30 p.m.; Saturday, 4:30 to 11:30 p.m.; Sunday, 4:30 to 9:30 p.m. Reservations: No Wheelchair access: Yes Price: Dinner for two with pop, tax and tip: $80
If a restaurant stays in business for 59 years, it must be doing something right. Right? House of Chan is a venerable steak house/Chinese restaurant that recently relocated, clientele intact. I ate at the new location to taste for myself. Nostalgia The city expropriated the 1957 original Eglinton Ave. W. location for the Crosstown LRT Bathurst station. This summer, the restaurant moved one kilometre east, losing half its space but replicating the green facade. (A bylaw shrunk the red neon sign.) To say “House of Chan” to certain Torontonians is to open the floodgates of nostalgia.
House of Chan hearkens back to a time when button mushrooms and green peppers were considered Chinese vegetables, bowls of fried noodles started every meal and moo goo gai pan was home-delivered in brown paper bags.
North York had many such westernized Cantonese restaurants — China House, Moonglow, Sea-Hi (still open) — where Jewish kids got their first taste of pork. Vibe House of Chan made the move with retro decor intact. Bow-tied waiters proudly point out the same red booths, mirrored entrance, dragon murals and chevron ceiling.
(Full disclosure: I never ate at the original. I also once erroneously wrote that House of Chan had closed.)
The dark, buzzing dining room holds a clean lobster tank and a passel of children. Diners table-hop to say hi. In a photo, former owners pose in red academic robes. Penny Lyons assumed majority ownership after the 2009 death of her husband, Don Lyons. Service Manager Peter Pau greets returning customers by name and, sometimes, with hugs.
He oversees a flotilla of staff that, on busy weekend nights, seamlessly covers tables, pours drinks and prepares bills.
The service aims higher than a runof-the-mill chop suey house. Diners are handed hot towels after they eat red lacquered ribs ($15.50). Fancy bowls are meant for bones and shells.
And it’s as fast as lighting. Each meal ends with fortune cookies and homemade almond cookies that evoke Jewish mandelbrot cookies. Chinese Nostalgia aside, House of Chan doesn’t make particularly good Chinese food.
For soup, there are mushy wontons in a broth that tastes of powdered soup base ($5.95). Breaded chicken balls ($15.95) are cloaked in a sweetish batter not much different than corn dogs. Cantonese chow mein ($18.95) is gloppy.
There is, however, a commendable shrimp with lobster sauce ($21.50). The shellfish snap in a sauce deliciously thick from beaten eggs, nubbins of pork and preserved black beans. Steak Chan works much better as a steak house, its self-identified genre.
The meat is a treat, with precision timing and high-quality beef. A 12ounce USDA prime rib steak ($44.50) is grilled over gas exactly as requested.
Steak chef Ken Zhao seasons it judiciously and slices it for sharing. On the side are nicely fried potatoes and battered onions.
Lobster is another high-ticket item. At around $30 a pound and a minimum of two pounds each, you’d hope they don’t flub it. They don’t. Steamed lobster is prepared well, its tail meat a titch bouncier than optimal and its $77 price tag revealed only on the bill.
At these prices, Chan should do better than serving a primitive plate of raw celery, Vidalia onion and brownedged green pepper rings as a side “salad.” Or relying on bottled dressing. Such accompaniments are not of this century. I later learn customers like it so.
Just as I wonder what happens when Chan’s clientele dies out, in comes the next generation: a newborn in a car seat who consumes only breast milk.
“For now. Then they teeth on the back ribs,” says Lyons.
House of Chan has stayed successful, not by innovating, but by giving customers exactly what they remember.
Is this the right approach? For Chan, the answer is a qualified “yes.” apataki@thestar.ca, Twitter @amypataki