Yang's Kitchen - Alhambra

Touted on LA's 101 best list and episodically headlining Eater LA as one of the SGV's best restaurants, Yang's very small kitchen sits on an Alhambra street surrounded by several powerhouses of Chinese cuisine. 

The first thing I thought when I glanced at their brunch menu was that it was not what I would expect. 

Despite the description of Asian fusion, there's nothing Asian about this Chicken Liver Mousse except the handful of chopped green onion. The mousse itself is rich and fatty, minerally savory with a hint of sweet, meant to be lavishly smeared across crusty slices of LA's best (Bub & Grandma's) bread.   

Yang's Fried Chicken Wings are so simple, skin stretched taut across firm flesh, finished simply with salt and pepper. 

Most people who don't like salmon have never had good salmon, and the Salmon & Ikura Bowl will silence any scorn. The salmon is melt-in-your-mouth quality, and the yuzu miso marinade makes it sing. Add gooey-fish poppin' bubbles of fresh ikura and a side of soft-boiled soy egg, and you've got yourself a feast. 

There's a basic Breakfast Plate for those who are just craving a good morning meal. The eggs have beautiful yolk, the super-crispy hash brown cake is the best in town, and the hanger steak is incredible.

There are more Asian-oriented items on the menu like sesame noodles and mochi pancake, but the westernized vibe is there. It feels to me like a representation of an upcoming generation of Asian children raised by more modern parents who celebrate their children's calling and might even support a chef. Instead of just kids who grew up running the family restaurant, future generations are combining classical training with what they learned from grandma, and if Yang's Kitchen is any indication of what's to come, the results will be spectacular. 

Jtyh Restaurant - Rosemead

In case you couldn't tell by my previous review, I don't have the best luck with men. Clearly I cling to the crazies, but there are other problems beyond my control as well. For example, I tend to go for manly men. By manly, I mean a wood-chopping, beer-guzzling guys with shirt-ripping muscles acquired from something other than a personal trainer who looks like Ben Stiller in Dodgeball.

I don't know how I'll find this man, but when I do I'll know. And when we dig into a dish of hand-rolled cold Noodles in House Sauce at an unpretentious cafe-style setup like Jtyh, he'll really dig in. No dainty dabbing of the lips here, just stuff so many noodles into your mouth you have to bite them and let the rest fall onto your plate. Bonus points if you drop some into the lap you forgot to put a napkin in because you're a bad Asian like me and never mastered chopsticks. And if I hear you slurp this ropy round with its unpretentious soy-based sauce, I'll kiss you by the end of the night no matter how many crudely-chopped cubes of garlic you just ate.

A dude-bro once told me that no one can be a bigger man than me. Unfortunately, it's hard NOT to be the bigger man in a city where the guys manicure their lawns AND their toes. Fortunately, Jtyh dishes out a good dose of MAN with the dao xiao mian. 

A guy who shaves noodles into a boiling broth with a huge knife? I will slurp him up even faster than the Beef Stewed Noodle Soup. This hearty, rugged broth is meaty minus the greasy and the stewed chunks of marbeled beef break apart in your mouth.

I'm not really a fan of non-facial hair...or facial hair, for that matter, but the SoCal pretty-boys could use a little more on the chest. It adds a little character with some texture and depth, the same way a little more thin-sliced lamb would have enhanced the Lamb Fried Noodles. But make no mistake, these stir-fried noodles have shaved sides curl like waves of sweaty hair after a day of lifting at the gym, and that glimpse of gamy flavor will fill you up like the Chinese version of a Hungry Man dinner.

It's hard to find a manly-man in a city where the guys are paying up to have their cuticles clipped and their chest hair removed, but Jtyh kind of restores my faith. Unsurprisingly, there are only five knife-shaved noodle houses in the LA area, where manly-men are about as common as unicorns. I guess you can wish me happy hunting because the minute I find one, I'm never letting him go.