For All That Ails You…

As I have known for years, there isn't much that Chinese cannot cure but, finding a great Chinese restaurant or decent take-out is not as easy as one may think. It took me over 3 years to find a decent place in downtown Chicago and then another couple of years after that to find the greatest beef fried rice. It was especially difficult for me as I grew up going to the most-excellent place, Hunan Chef in Northfield, which had the perfect combination of deliciousness, cheap prices and non-trendy/chain atmosphere. But, I digress as this blog is about Washington, DC. Recently, I found my current favorite Chinese restaurant here in DC and it only took a little over 6 months—new record! This could possibly be related to the fact that I find myself in Chinatown here much more often than I dared to venture to Chinatown in Chicago but again I am getting off topic.

The place of choice is Ming's Restaurant located between 6^th and 7^th streets on H St, NW. It was discovered randomly not too long ago when all we wanted was some fast, decent priced food as it was getting late and too cold to be outside. What did we ever do before smartphones? Unfortunately for my waistline, I have dined at Ming’s three times now. All three times I went on Friday evenings, never had a reservation and never had to wait for a table. Score! And best part is that it is actually pretty reasonable for DC in terms of price.

To quickly dive into their menu, the chicken fried rice is awesome. Beef fried rice has always been my preference and I never thought I’d say this but, at Ming’s the chicken fried rice is actually better than the beef fried rice—gasp! Nancy, I hope you didn’t just pass out from the shock of that statement. The moo shu pork is possibly the best I have ever had—very thin pancakes. I also very much enjoyed the Mongolian beef and sweet & sour chicken. The sushi is just ok but I only made that mistake the first time I went. I now only go for the Chinese food, with the occasional edamame appetizer. Ming’s even has fun cocktails to play with such as the Jade Martini that tastes like candy.

So I highly recommend going to Ming's Restaurant in Chinatown. And to all you DC residents, I challenge you to show me a better Chinese restaurant. But in the meantime, this is where I will go to cure all that ails me…