Back to school—for parents—means seeing each other again after the long break. For me, it is always a happy experience for I know that after we parents get our tasks done for our kids, we will be off to eat somewhere.
Recently, after a parents’ orientation at Xavier School, we parents headed to Mien-San Noodle House on Granada St., San Juan. According to food aficionados Joseph Tiu, Christine Tan and Melody Cheung, it is one of their favorite places—where they go when they don’t want to cook.
Mien San’s cuisine is home-cooked Taiwanese, done in a non-flashy but delicious manner.
There was a debate about which soup to order. One said beef noodle, another, beef tendon. We ended up ordering beef noodle. It was nice and beefy but in a subtle way. You can have it alone but when taken with other dishes, its taste is overpowered.
In the end, the group agreed that we would have been better off with the beef tendon and requested the cooks to make it a little spicy.
Our favorite became the spicy dumpling, a steamed dumpling swimming in a bowl of sweet and spicy sauce. I liked it but found others more interesting.
We had pork chops that were so crunchy. Each bento box comes with rice. Hayayay.
The fish fillet with mushroom was equally delicious. So easy to eat, so tasty!
Everyone also liked the steamed white chicken generously topped with spring onions.
Mien San serves Xioalongbao, steamed soupy dumplings, which are done three ways. We asked for the patola xiaolongbao, a twist to the classic, rather different, with the taste of patola very prominent.
But what was exceptional was the mini fried siopao. Instead of being wrapped in typical dumpling skins, it was wrapped in siopao dough. Every bite was akin to a sip of soup. Yummy.
The chilled tofu with century egg was excellent—similar to Chinese lumpia in taste but in silky tofu form, topped with mustard greens with loads of garlic served with sweet soy sauce.
Considering that we had what seemed like lauriat at Mien San and paid only P500 per head, inclusive of drinks and dessert (monggo pancake, a large flattened buchi, also delicious), it wasn’t bad at all. (Their main dish servings are good for two.)
If you’re looking for a casual and reasonable place to eat, Mien-San is it. Its food is the kind that one can have every day. Call 7215794.