The Chinese Noodle Restaurant

On Monivong, four blocks south of Sihanouk lies a nondescript restaurant with a red and white sign reading "The Chinese Noodle Restaurant." It doesn't look like anything special, but it most definitely is.

Entering the restaurant, you first pass the main kitchen which is, in fact, outside. To the left are pots of boiling water and a glass case which features some of the signature dishes. To the right is a metal butchers table used for rolling out several varieties of noodles by hand; during the lunch and dinner hours, one of the employees is usually tossing the dough into the air, kneading it, and stretching it out, certainly in and of itself worthy of a trip. Inside the restaurant are a dozen metal folding tables, each of which has four pink plastic lawn chairs around it. To the back of the restaurant is a sort of bar and refrigeration unit as well as a wall-mounted television which usually plays Chinese-language kung fu movies, the news, or more recently, the Olympics.

The clientele at the Chinese Noodle Shop is quite diverse. It is certainly a popular spot with westerners (as many NGOs are close by), but there is always a mix of Cambodians and Chinese and often with an odd and seemingly out-of-place sprinkling of Mormons. The staff is all Cambodian, save the "manager" who is Chinese. We have never seen her smile, but she is courteous and direct when handling the bill. We're not sure that she speaks any Khmer, so upon leaving, we are sure to utter "shay shay" (thank you in Chinese) instead of "aw koon."

As soon as you are seated at one of the extremely ordinary tables, you are brought mugs of Chinese tea. On each table is the menu, under a layer of clear plastic, napkins, bottles of fish, soy, and chili sauce, sugar, a mixture of soy sauce and chilies, and toothpicks. As one might expect of a noodle shop, noodle dishes feature prominently on the menu, but there are also dumplings and veggie and tofu dishes.

I was lucky enough to be brought to the Chinese Noodle Restaurant shortly after arriving in Cambodia. As suggested by my host, I ordered the boiled dumplings and created a concoction of soy sauce and the soy/chili mixture. A few minutes later a plate of a dozen steaming dumplings arrived. Though fresh out of a pot of boiling hot of water, I dug in and certainly did not regret it. The dumplings were probably the best I've ever tasted, though to this day I'm not entirely sure what they're filled with; I think pork and chives.

The first several times that I went with Shanti and others, we ordered only dumplings, sometimes getting boiled, sometimes getting fried and sometimes getting both. It was not until a few months after we began to frequent the noodle shop that we expanded our repertoire. At first we expanded to a fried noodles with beef dish - phenomenal - which is a mix of the fresh noodles, egg, onions and carrots. Eventually, we added the fried green beans with garlic and mushrooms. Now I'm not one to get excited about vegetables, especially cooked ones, but these green beans, just drenched in garlic, are the best cooked vegetable I've ever had and are quite possibly, my favorite dish. We have tried a number of other dishes, including some of the other veggie dishes and some of the tofu dishes, but I think we're pretty happy with the combination of dumplings, fried noodles with beef, and green beans.

It's quite difficult to describe how good the noodles, dumplings, and green beans actually are, but if the number of trips made to the noodle shop by people visiting Phnom Penh is any indication, well, they're pretty damn good. In just four days in Phnom Penh, my parents and sister went three times. In about two weeks in town, Justin and Ashley went about a half dozen times. Shanti and I usually go at least once a week.

Wouldn't going out so often get expensive, you may ask? Ah, now that's where the true beauty of the Chinese Noodle Restaurant takes effect. A dozen dumplings: $1.20 (formerly $1); fried noodles with beef: $1.70; the green beans: $1.50. Thus, a typical lunch costs roughly two dollars a person, a price as easy to swallow as any of the restaurant's specialties. When I return to the US, the Chinese Noodle Restaurant and the tradition of going weekly, will be one of the things I miss most.