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Dining Guide: World Class

A jet-setter's guide to great ethnic restaurants--right here in Delaware.

Photographs by Thom Thompson

www.thomthompson.com

The wok-steamed Alaskan halibut fillet
is topped with shredded ginger and scallions
at Confucius in Rehoboth Beach.

Research assistance by Deanna Candeloro

Real Chinese: It Ain’t Takeaway
General Tso didn’t make chicken and he wasn’t commanding officer to Colonel Sanders, orange beef isn’t a specialty of any Chinese chef, and fortune cookies were invented in San Francisco.

The proliferation of American Chinese takeout has cast a serious cloud over authentic Chinese cuisine. Not that there’s anything wrong with a little sesame chicken, but the truth is, it’s about as Chinese as stromboli.

Wipe-down Chinese takeout was spawned by immigrant laborers—not trained chefs—who cashed in on Western palates during 19th-century expansion, says Joe Chan, owner of the Crownery Restaurant in Hockessin. The resulting cuisine was stripped of fresh vegetables and seafood—hallmarks of Chinese food—using instead frozen meats and cheap cuts of poultry. Dishes often swim in oil and salt. The salty, brown fried rice you get from the shopping mall food court? It’s drenched in soy sauce. That’s not how it’s done in Chinese homes.

That’s hardly the case at authentic Chinese restaurants like The Crownery, where the kitchen is teeming with chefs and cooks who prep ducks fresh from a New York market.

Chinese cuisine uses ample amounts of hearty, leafy vegetables like bok choy, gai-lan and green kale. The same goes for fresh fish and seafood. Starch, like rice and noodles, are equal components to the vegetables and protein—not side dishes.

At The Crownery, there’s a three-level steamer churning out handmade dim sum and 10 woks fired up in unison—and no general in sight.

The Authentic Chinese Restaurant
200 University Plaza, Newark, 368-0660 • It’s the little touches that make Authentic Chinese, well, authentic. Sa-cha main fun, or thin rice noodles with chicken in a savory sa-cha sauce, is something you won’t see at an average take-out joint. The house chicken throws a change-up too: lightly coated white meat is fried, then topped with a honey mayonnaise and walnuts. Wonton soup is complimentary with orders over $25. The expansive vegetarian menu is a bonus.

China Royal
1845 Marsh Road, Wilmington, 475-3686 • Tucked away in a meager, easy-to-miss North Wilmington strip mall, China Royal is a well-kept secret to its loyal customers. The menu may be difficult to crack sometimes, with dishes like Chicken Amazing and Neptune’s Blessing appearing without description, but the friendly and helpful wait staff might help you uncover a new favorite. Plus, they’ll carve up roast duck and prepare the accompanying pancakes tableside.

Confucius Restaurant
57 Wilmington Ave., Rehoboth Beach, 227-3848 • With its sleek, clean interior and beautiful plating, Confucius is a true upscale dining experience. The diverse menu reflects that same class, paying homage to several styles of regional Chinese cooking. Traditional favorites like Peking duck sit alongside lesser-known items like cold jellyfish, and thinly sliced Woo Shien beef. American favorites General Tso’s chicken and orange beef appear, but they are more like footnotes among original creations like the ginger-marinated salmon in a bed of shredded onions.

The Crownery Chinese Restaurant
Lantana Square Shopping Center, Hockessin, 239-3825 • Customers dubbed it the Moon Gate—the beautiful carved crimson and golden arch that separates dining areas in The Crownery. It might be the main photo-op at the Hockessin classic, but customers return to The Crownery for the authentic Chinese cuisine. Chefs at Crownery were trained in Hong Kong and inland China, so they do a bit of mixing in their styles, cherry picking dishes from the Cantonese, Szechwan and Hunan styles of cooking. The result is dishes like the popular crispy prawns drizzled with a delicate cream sauce and honey walnuts. It’s no surprise Chinese Restaurant News named The Crownery one of the top 100 Chinese restaurants in the nation.

Szechuan Restaurant
3615 Kirkwood Hwy., Wilmington, 999-0286 • Szechuan isn’t limited to the regional style of its name. This suburban classic—30 years plus—was one of the first to introduce fiery Szechuan to local taste buds, and it’s still great. The decor now seems non-descript, given the upscale-contempo feel of livelier pan-Asian places, but food on the dinner buffet is of far better quality than that at the big Asian buffets.

The volcano roll at Kenny’s Pan Asian
Cuisine in Bear is made with fried tuna,
crabmeat and cucumber topped with
spicy mayo sauce and Tobikko caviar.

The Rise of Pan-Asian
Eating at a good pan-Asian restaurant should be the gastronomic equivalent of an hour-long tour of Asia. Given the stark rise in popularity of mixed-bag Asian places, Delaware diners have become more than willing tourists.

At Kenny’s Pan Asian Cuisine in Bear, the menu ranges from China and Japan to Malaysia and Thailand. Pan Tai in Wilmington mixes in some Vietnamese and a little Indian. Jasmine in Wilmington has a few Korean favorites on its menu.

Rather than specialize in one ethnic fare, pan-Asian cuisine selects dishes from everywhere. It gives Kenny’s owner Kenny Wang the freedom to get creative with his menu. That, in turn, he says, gives his customers more freedom to choose.

“The style and presentation of the mix allows us to be more contemporary versus the old styles of Asian food,” Wang says.

For Corby Spruance, co-owner of Pan Tai, it means boiling down an oft-intimidating range of styles to its elements. “It’s not like when you go to Chinatown and have a menu with 300 things on it,” he says. “We have the best of the best.”

Take for example, the omnipresent General Tso’s chicken. “It’s a popular dish for Americans,” Wang says. But Kenny’s transforms delicate white meat chicken with a blend of sweet, sour and crunchy. “That way it appeals to a range of backgrounds. We have a lot of Filipino and Indian people in this area, so I wanted to make a menu for them, too.”

Abstractions Sushi Bar and Restaurant
203 Rehoboth Ave., Rehoboth Beach, 226-0877 • When Abstractions opened in 2004, it immediately became a hit with sushi novices because all the work of choosing entrées was left to chef-owner Spencer Derrickson. But the cosmopolitan Rehoboth restaurant also boasts innovative house Maki rolls like the Abstractions—a colorful and beefy combo of tuna, yellowtail salmon, Tobikko and lump crab meat.

Bamboo House
721 College Square, Newark, 368-9933 • House specialties like luscious green tea-smoked duck only begin to tell the story at Bamboo House. Locals love the quality sushi menu and value that comes with it: sizable portions at a reasonable price. Original creations like the College Square roll (yellowtail tempura with asparagus) and the toasted Pocono Mountain roll (ebi with crabstick and masago) are under $10.

Cultured Pearl Restaurant
301 Rehoboth Ave., Rehoboth Beach, 227-8493 • Featuring a menu that’s dotted with Japanese and American classics and a dining area dotted with bamboo, soft lights and Koi ponds, the Cultured Pearl is a true comfort dining experience. The sushi menu, overseen by chef Kiyomi Yamanaki, contains the house favorite Cultured Pearl roll with tempura tuna, scallops, avocado, cream cheese and cucumber. Fusion entrées include the cashew chicken with bell peppers, scallions, and cashews in a sweet-and-spicy sauce over jasmine rice.

Jasmine Restaurant
3618 Concord Pike, Wilmington, 479-5618 • The menu features eclectic elements of Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese and Thai food. The sleek interior and incandescent lighting scream high end, but it’s not uncommon to find families with kids dining there. The expanded Jasmine Lounge has even provided North Wilmington a bona fide cool place to hang out.

Kenny's Pan Asian
Cuisine Governor's Square II, 1255 Quintilio Drive, Bear, 838-1725 • Customers flock to Kenny’s for its fresh take on General Tso’s chicken and fried rice, but regulars come back for the mammoth Kenny’s Delight: whole lobster tail, chicken, beef, scallops and vegetables. More adventurous devotees go for the crispy whole red snapper with spicy mango sauce. One can’t-miss dish is the volcano roll, a concoction of tuna, crabmeat and cucumber, lightly fried and assembled lengthwise to form a mini mountain—with lava of spicy mayo sauce and tiny red Tobikko caviar.

Mikimotos Japanese Restaurant
1212 N. Washington St., Wilmington, 656-8638 • Haven for the downtown Wilmington crowd and crown jewel in owner Darius Mansoory’s collection of Cherry Tree restaurants, sleek Mikimotos is a true collaborative effort of sushi chef Al Chu, executive chef Sean McNeice and sous chef Darin Clower. The results are original fusion creations that are fun, fresh and mouth-watering. Take for instance the not-safe-for-search-engine Hairy Mexican, with its fried shrimp, avocado, crabstick and eel sauce. There are also bento boxes and dim sum, as well as entrées such as schichimi-blackened salmon.

Pan Tai Restaurant
837 N. Union St., Wilmington, 652-6633 • The 23-year-old Union Street staple, under the wing of founder Jim Olivere, has sustained an air of quality Southeast Asian cuisine with a deliberate nod to Vietnamese food. “Fresh, fresh, fresh ingredients,” are the key, according to co-owner Corby Spruance. “Everything is cut right before cooking. It sounds simple, but it’s the most important thing.” Fans of the restaurant love challenging the heat scale printed on the menu. “Chilis are where you get that kick,” Spruance says. “But we also use lots of fresh ginger and garlic.”

Potstickers Asian Grill
1247 Churchmans Road, Newark, 731-0188 • With its heavy wood tables, warm, red glowing hanging lamps and Buddha statues as far as the eye can see, Potstickers blends Cantonese, Chinese, Japanese, Thai and Vietnamese with a European flair. The restaurant’s inspired take on the angry tuna roll is black peppered tuna and avocado. And you can’t leave without sampling some actual potstickers—part crispy, chewy, all savory—stuffed with pork, chicken, Shanghai shrimp or Peking duck.

Discovering Japan—Again
It’s been a long time since recent immigrants and World War II vets brought a taste for Japanese home to the state. Thanks to its ongoing popularity—and the ascent of sushi 20 years ago—most supermarkets have a tiny corner devoted to sushi. Sadly, these have little to do with actual Japanese cuisine. Real sushi demands impeccably fresh seafood and the expertise of an experienced sushi chef, such as Kailon Yeung, chef at Okura in Hockessin. “Our restaurant gets fish in daily and from three different suppliers,” he says. “Our steady customers know our fish, and they appreciate the freshness.” Sushi and sashimi must be crafted by a skilled hand. “A sushi chef must have experience,” he says. “Each roll must be a clone of the last. A slight difference in cutting or handling can alter the shape or taste.”

Hibachi Japanese Steak House
22 Fox Hunt Drive, Bear, 836-2498; 1160 Pulaski Hwy., Bear, 838-0414; 215 Astro Shopping Center, Newark, 456-3308; 5607 Concord Pike, Wilmington, 477-0194 • The flat-top grills chefs use to entertain diners—by building smoking volcanos of onions, cracking eggs mid-air with the edge of a spatula, flinging sautéed shrimp into the mouths of patrons—are the center of attention in these popular local restaurants. The experience may be more about show than four-star cuisine—though the sushi is remarkably good.

Ichiban
737 N. Dupont Hwy., Dover, 677-0067 • The entryway lets you know what you’re in for once inside. Yes, there are bento boxes and sushi, but there’s also Korean bulgogi.

Kyoto Japanese Restaurant
4563 Linden Hill Road, Wilmington, 368-9882 • Start with hamachi: succulent pieces of yellowtail sashimi coated in mirin wine in a cup of tropical leaves. Follow with the popular Pike Creek Roll: salmon and avocado topped with crunchy tempura flakes and teriyaki sauce. Then sample the signature yoyo roll, with its lobster tempura and tuna mixed in a spicy sauce, then topped with avocado slices and eel sauce.

Mayflower Japanese Restaurant
230 E. Main St., Newark, 292-1850 • It’s not just the sushi that UD students love—it’s the price. Rarely does a menu item at Mayflower breach the $10 mark. The house roll is a crispy shrimp tempura creation mixed with caviar and topped with steamed shrimp and crabstick. Teriyaki combos can be had for around five bucks and come loaded with rice, broccoli, salad, and either tempura, a California roll or Gyoza dumplings.

Niwano Hana Restaurant
3602 Kirkwood Hwy., Wilmington, 995-8905 • Formerly Mikasa Restaurant, Niwano Hana is the new name from the same folks who brought Japanese to Kirkwood Highway. And though the circular wooden front door looks like something from “Lord of the Rings,” the restaurant is all about combo deals. A popular $6.99 spread called the lunch box comes with an inside-out California roll, shumai, edamame, fruit and tempura. The dinner box combines four pieces of California roll with rolls of shrimp, eel and tuna, as well as tempura, oshinko and teriyaki.

Okura
703 Ace Memorial Drive, Hockessin, 239-8486 • Eight-year-old Okura likes being the friendly neighborhood sushi shop, says chef Kailon Yeung. The Hockessin roll is a natural local fave, with fresh tuna and avocado rolled, tempura fried, then drizzled with spicy mayonnaise sauce, scallions and caviar.

Tokyo Steakhouse
1220 Highway One, Lewes, 645-9728 • The Tokyo Steakhouse serves prime quality fish and the finest cuts of poultry and aged beef. Customers can’t leave without trying the negimaki, tender strips of beef smothered in a teriyaki sauce and wrapped in scallions.

Utage Japanese Restaurant
1601 Concord Pike, Wilmington, 652-1230 • The Oka family has delivered authentic Japanese cuisine to the area for more than 20 years, as well as chef-owner Chihiro Oka’s fresh ideas for sushi rolls and presentations. The Aurora roll is an eye-catching combination of salmon, shrimp, steamed asparagus, seaweed, dry tuna flakes, and marinated daikon.

The ped kra prow at Bangkok House is made with crispy
boneless duck served in Thai basil leaves sauce.

Thai: It’s About Time
The spicy-sweet-sour-salty cuisine of Thailand has never been more popular. Western diners and restaurateurs alike love the balance of fresh (never dried) herbs, smooth coconut milk, salty fish sauce and hot chilies. Fresh ingredients make for clean and bright flavors, says Norrawit Jeenwong Milburn, chef and co- owner at Jeenwong Thai Cuisine. “We go to the market every morning and handpick beef, chicken, vegetables,” he says. Dishes tend to vary slightly by region, but a few key ingredients tend to pop up. Coconut milk, lemon grass, chilies, garlic and basil are blended in lots of dishes. That harmony is the key to great Thai food.

Bangkok House Restaurant
104 N. Union St., Wilmington, 654-8555 • For years, Bangkok House has been the flagholder of Delaware Thai cuisine, and with good reason. Owner Tom Wechkul adheres to the tennets of great Thai food from this low-key Union Street eatery, with dishes like Panang with coconut milk, red curry paste and basil. Wash it down with a Singha beer and get ready for the sublime duck with basil sauce. Consider ordering to-go to avoid the occasional long wait.

Jeenwong Thai Cuisine
200 Water St., Wilmington, 655-5140 • Inside the bustling Wilmington Riverfront Market, Jeenwong is the place where businessmen get their Thai on. “All of our Thai food is our own family’s style,” says chef and co-owner Norrawit Jeenwong Milburn. “You’re not going to find another egg roll like ours.” Jeenwong uses special imported Thai ginger to flavor the egg rolls, then double cooks the tasty bundles to remove the fat and add the flavor. The corporate crowd loves the curry, but for transcendent Thai greatness, try the Ba Mea Lad Nar, stir-fried beef, shrimp and chicken with Thai-style garlic brown sauce poured over egg noodles.

Seaside Thai Cuisine
19 Rehoboth Ave., Rehoboth Beach, 227-9525 • A favorite spot for locals, Seaside Thai is a casual answer to many of Rehoboth’s high-end ethnic restaurants. The interior is colorful, but laid-back. The menu is traditional and reasonably priced. But the real highlights here are signature “seaside grillers” that pair tender grilled meat and seafood with fresh steamed veggies. One standout takes fresh, grilled Atlantic salmon and adds a few simple accompaniments—garlic, black pepper and teriyaki sauce.

Sweet Basil Thai Cuisine
275 Wilmington Pike, Chadds Ford, Pa., (610) 358-4015 • Sweet Basil is the newest entry in Delaware’s Thai Rolodex. (OK, so it’s just over the Pennsylvania line in Glen Mills). But it’s already made an impact on Delaware diners. The cool and sophisticated atmosphere—with white candles and matching orchids—sets the stage for razor-sharp interpretations of Thai classics. Soups and curries laced with coconut milk are menu standouts, as is the crispy duck.

Tasti Thai Restaurant
287 Christiana Road, New Castle, 322-1306 • Bright and colorful parasols dangle from the ceiling and 80-year-old tapestries decorate the walls of this unassuming Thai eatery—hidden in plain sight in a strip mall on Del. 273. It’s worth discovering. Owner Sung Falk has assembled a menu that’s fresh and diverse, with favorites like spicy, crispy softshell crab, three-flavor chicken topped with crisp basil leaves, roasted duck curry accented with tomatoes and pineapples, and refreshing papaya salad. The restaurant imports herbs from Thailand and uses fresh veggies like broccoli, snow peas and Thai eggplants called makua.

Asian crepes are filled with shrimp, bean sprouts,
green onion and a choice of chicken or pork at
Viet Kieu in Dover. They are served with leaf lettuce
and Vietnamese fish sauce.

Miscellaneous Asia: Korean and Vietnamese
Great Asian food in Delaware doesn’t end with sushi. Loyal customers and countrymen flock to a handful of Korean and Vietnamese restaurants scattered throughout Delaware. Those who opt for Korean will enjoy tender and savory meats met with rice, garlic and ssamjang inside a lettuce wrap. Wildly diverse Vietnamese cuisine varies by region, so different chefs will have differing interpretations of pho (noodle soup), bun (rice vermicelli) and banh mi (think Vietnamese hoagie).

Kahl-Bee Korean Restaurant
2011 Kirkwood Hwy., Wilmington, 998-4310 • Kahl-Bee anchors a pretty international pocket of Elsmere; it’s flanked by the International Grill Buffet and an oriental grocer. For seekers of authentic ethnic cuisine, this is usually a good sign. Inside Kahl-Bee, the specialty is, naturally, kalbi—grilled, marinated short ribs. Try them with mandu dumplings, the Korean equivalent of pierogis.

Korean Barbecue & Sushi Bar
3 Liberty Plaza, Newark, 455-9100 • Korean Barbecue is about more than great food. The experience of ordering spicy, marinated maeun bulgogi, laying it on a hot grill alongside whole garlic cloves and broiled squid is truly singular. But don’t sleep on the restaurant’s assortment of spicy soups, stews and hot pots. The gae maeuntang with spicy crabmeat is a can’t-miss.

Little Saigon
2938 Ogletown Road, Newark, 737-6832 • Old World recipes from the Paris of the Orient highlight the menu at Little Saigon, where favorites include a tender ginger-marinated chicken called ga uop gung, a sweet-and-sour shrimp and lemon grass soup, a curried chicken called ga ca ri and a spicy, boneless duck seasoned with basil called vit xao la que. Don’t worry—you don’t have to pronounce them for your servers. They get it.

Saigon Vietnam Restaurant
207 Newark Shopping Center, Newark, 737-1590 • With its lush, green decor accented with hanging lamps and shrubbery, Saigon Vietnam is a tiny oasis in the Newark Shopping Center. Chef-owner Lan Chen’s menu is more than 100 items deep, filled with traditional Vietnamese food. The house chicken is Saigon Ga, a crispy, spicy chicken breast in a rice wine sauce. Servers here are attentive and eager to explain dishes, and the bar is stocked for cocktails like the lychee sake-tini.

Viet Kieu Restaurant
510 Jeffrey Blvd., Dover, 744-9300 • Vietnam is made up of more than 50 ethnic groups, each with its own way of cooking, says Viet Kieu co-owner Ray Hubbard. The menu at his restaurant is culled from the Northern region of Vietnam and was created by his chef—known to customers as Miss Lei. That means lots of vegetables, shrimp, bean sprouts and rice paper. Hubbard’s favorite is the banh xeo, sort of a Vietnamese stuffed crêpe. “It’s so different and so good.”

Vietnamese Restaurant
266 S. Dupont Hwy., Dover, 736-1606 • Another tucked-away gem, the aptly named Vietnamese Restaurant specializes in noodle bowls like pho and entrées for under $10. Butter-knife tender beef brisket curry is a favorite here, as are the smooth rice paper springrolls. The com ga roti—barbecued pork over vermicelli—simply must be tried.

Favorites at India Palace include
(clockwise from front) chicken tikka,
Kasmiri pulao, bayngan bhurta and
chicke tikka masala.

Passage to India
With at least five Indian restaurants on or near its busy lanes, Kirkwood Highway could be considered a passage to India. When traveling along this east-west thoroughfare, one can find Indian cuisine predominantly of North Indian approach, though the cooking styles of all four regions are present.

Just a bit north of this stretch is India Palace. It is here where one will find authentic Northern Indian cuisine prepared by Sushil and Anjna Sharma, both from Punjab, a state in the northwest part of the country.

Like many Indians who have brought the cuisine to the United States, Sushil became interested in its preparation as a young man. His mother taught him the ropes, and a friend who had formally trained in the style helped Sushil to master the tandoor (a clay oven used to cook with charcoal).

The Sharmas focus on preparation of tandoori and Mughalai cuisine. Mughalai came from the Moguls, Muslims who ruled much of India from the 16th to 19th century, thus, the prevalence of raisins, cashews, almonds and walnuts in the fare.

The key to authentic Indian cuisine, the Sharmas say, is fresh ingredients and the proper masala—blending of spices such as curry, ginger, garlic and cumin seeds. Turmeric powder, a deep yellowish-orange, helps give dishes their color.

Spices are added to oil and cooked until a reddish or copper color. Then the meat or vegetable is added. It is mixed and left to cook, spreading the flavor throughout. Each dish contains a minimum of eight spices. Meats are marinated and cooked either curry style (in gravy) or in the tandoor.

Another key ingredient is patience. “Indian cuisine takes time,” says Sushil. “It can be expensive because it takes time to prepare.”

Himalaya Indian Restaurant
2671 Kirkwood Hwy., Meadowood Shopping Center, Newark, 369-3993 • Owner Krish Obillaneni favors the South Indian style of cooking, which he refers to as homestyle. Himalaya’s focus on the southern cuisine is meant to distinguish it from the many Indian restaurants along Kirkwood Highway, most of which lean toward Punjabi cuisine. Obillaneni keeps a number of northern dishes on the menu for customers who prefer that style. The Chicken 65, an appetizer from Hyderabadi in southern India, is cooked with fried curry leaves, yogurt and spices. The masala dosa—a crispy rice crêpe layered with a special paste, potatoes and onions—could be addictive. Biryani of vegetable, chicken, lamb or shrimp is marinated in exotic spices, stirred with onion, ginger and green peppers, then steamed with basmati rice to spread the flavors throughout.

India Grille
3456 Naamans Road, Tally-Ho Shopping Center, Wilmington, 478-2428 • If variety is the spice of life, India Grille’s got kick. The menu of more than 100 dishes, including soups and salads, welcomes you “to the land of one thousand and one spices of Indian cuisine.” The non-vegetable appetizer is a combination of meats: meat samosa, chi-tikka, shish kabab and shrimp pakora (or shrimp fritters). A selection of five soups includes the standard offering of tomato with spices and curry seasoning, lentil, coconut cooked with pistachios and cardamom, chicken and mulligatawny—an East Indian soup with a lentil base and vegetable and curry seasoning. For dessert, try the coconut kulfi—frozen milk and cream flavored with coconut.

India Palace Indian Restaurant
101 N. Maryland Ave., Wilmington, 655-8772 • Sushil and Anjna Sharma welcome you into their corner restaurant as if it were their home. The couple, from Punjab, India, has brought locals Mughalai and tandoori cuisine since 1991. The Mughalai style originates from the Kashmir region along the northern Indian border and features nuts and dried fruits. A classic Mughalai entrée is chicken shahi korma: marinated chicken simmered in cream with spices and cashews. Other popular dishes at India Palace include the chicken saag: boneless chicken pieces cooked with creamed spinach and enhanced with mild Indian spices; and lamb korma, cooked in mild cream sauce with cashews. Breads such as tandoori roti, made from whole wheat rather than flour, and the garlic naan are baked fresh in the tandoor each day. Some regulars visit often for the kheer—cardamom flavored rice pudding garnished with nuts.

Maharaja Indian Cuisine
1450 Kirkwood Hwy., Shoppes of Red Mill, Suite 121, Newark, 369-1202 • Maharaja offers fine Indian dining in an elegant but casual setting. Leaving the strip mall facade behind, as is required in most Indian restaurants in this area, you are welcomed in the foyer by ornately framed paintings of jeweled elephants. The light yellow faux bricks that form the walls in the dining room are complemented by the deep burgundy of the curtains, booth cushions and tablecloths. Classical music completes the feel. The extravagant dinner buffet offers favorites such as gobhi Mancurian, mutter pamner, sambar, aloo gobhi, yellow dal, malaikofia, green beans and lamb vindaloo, to name a few. From the menu, the spicy shrimp pakora is made with jumbo shrimp marinated with chick peas, flour and aromatic spices. Vindaloo dishes—spiced cubes of your choice of meat—are cooked with potatoes in a tangy goan sauce made from coconut and mangosteen, a sweet, juicy tropical fruit. Warning to those who avoid spicy heat—this dish is a hotty.

Palace of Asia
3421 Kirkwood Hwy., Wilmington, 994-9200 • Located next to the Blockbuster at the former site of Café Bellissimo, Palace of Asia is a regional chain worth checking out, albeit a bit pricier than its local relatives. The ornate dinin