Where to find authentic Chinese food in Madison

December 31, 2007 6:48 PM

Where can I find authentic Chinese food in Madison, Wisconsin?

I mean authentic Chinese food from a restaurant. And I know that some Chinese restaurants offer two menus--one for "American Chinese" food (i.e. sweet-and-sour chicken in a fluorescent pink sauce) and one for "authentic Chinese" food. I'd be interested to know which restaurants in Madison do this, too. Thanks!

posted by chippie to Food & Drink (8 answers total)

Oooh, I know this one!

The place you are looking for is China Palace, up near the airport in a big shopping center on N. Sherman Avenue. Now I will be honest and say that I've found it to be very uneven (which is to say, never worse than good, but only sometimes great.) But when it's great, it's great. There's definitely a separate Chinese menu, which I can't read, but even the English menu is very far from the standard "American Chinese" (or worse, the standard "Wisconsin Chinese") offering. The West Lake beef soup and the pig stomach are both excellent. And if you put yourself in the waiters' hands they can usually be trusted to put together a good meal for you -- we certainly got stuff that wasn't on the American menu, so perhaps it was from the Chinese menu.

Here's a Chowhound thread on the place.

Another option, closer in if you live on the West Side, is Hong Kong Wok in the food court of Hilldale Mall. Not as good as China Palace, and the menu is a bit more familiar, but they do sell chicken feet, and on weekends they have congee, the only place I know in town that does. They certainly attract a predominantly Chinese clientele.
posted by escabeche at 7:28 PM on December 31, 2007

Well, from my experience, you can't, although I never went to escabeche's place. On top of bad chinese food, and soggy pizza, they make the stores put bread into plastic bags which kills the crust. Fuckin' politically correct do gooders. Despite these minor drawbacks, it is still one of the finer places to find yourself living.
posted by caddis at 10:26 PM on December 31, 2007

Wow, thanks, escabeche! I've never been to either, though now that you mention the place in Hilldale I recollect someone else talking about it, too. Looking forward to trying these!
posted by chippie at 6:53 AM on January 1, 2008

My wife's family in Madison loves Yen Ching over on Midvale Blvd.
posted by mrbula at 9:48 AM on January 1, 2008

I can vouch for both of escabeche's suggestions. I'm a big fan of the bok choi with mushrooms on the China Palace menu...perhaps more tame than a lot of the menu options, but super good.
posted by divka at 11:48 AM on January 1, 2008

Seconding Yen Ching. Awesome, high quality food and friendly people.
posted by stephthegeek at 5:19 PM on January 1, 2008

Is Wah Kee still around?

caddis, what is "politically correct" about putting bread into plastic bags? That strikes me as the very worst sort of political INcorrectness since the trendy PC'ers would be disgusted by the inauthenticity of plastic bags for fresh bread.

Madison used to have some superb pizza.
posted by ethnomethodologist at 8:31 PM on January 1, 2008

Only tangentially related to the question, but I have to stand up against the slander on Madison's pizza, which is great -- Ian's, Roman Candle, Glass Nickel are all very worthwhile.

I should say something about Chinese food, though! So: I've also heard good things about Hong Kong Cafe on Regent St., but haven't been there myself.
posted by escabeche at 10:08 AM on January 2, 2008