Ming Hing And The Nicely Fried Eggroll

I recently found myself in downtown Orrville on a Sunday night with an hour to kill before choir rehearsal was scheduled to begin. Finding my options limited to mostly fast food restaurants, I parked my car and began to walk around to see what was open. Fortunately on the corner of Market Street and Route 57, a single restaurant had it's marquee lit, Ming Hing. Knowing that I was unlikely to find a restaurant in the same league as Wonton Gourmet in Cleveland, I settled into the notion of having a more Americanized Chinese food experience.

Ming Hing was located at 100 East Market Street, Orrville, OH 44667 and can be reached at 330-682-8808. Unsurprisingly, there was currently no website attached to this restaurant.

As I approached the front of the restaurant, it occurred to me that due to the size of the storefront, this might be a take-out only kind of place. Here was a shot of the exterior of the store:


Once inside the front doors, I immediately realized how wrong I had been. Not only were there tables at which to sit, but there were multiple rooms of tables. Like many other Chinese restaurants with tables, I made a second assumption that there probably was not tableside service. At least I was correct in that assumption. I walked up to the front counter, looked over the menu and placed and paid for my order. I then sat at a table just off the main entrance and took a snapshot of the lunch buffet hot line that had been advertised in one of the windows visible from the street:


Looking over the menu, I had decided to go with one of their combination platters, the garlic chicken. I asked for it to be prepared extra spicy and when I heard my order taker utter "ma la" to the cooks in the kitchen, I nodded vigorously and said, "Yes! Very 'ma la'!" I counted on the fact that it probably wouldn't be too "ma", which is the numbing sensation you get when you consume actual Szechuan peppercorns, but if were remotely "la", meaning spicy, I figured it would be fine.

After about ten minutes or so, my food arrived at the table:


Here was a shot of the garlic chicken, extra spicy:


Composed of tender chicken slices, green bell peppers, broccoli florets, mushrooms, pea pods, and bamboo strips, the dish was clearly an American version. While the spice level on this dish was somewhere around medium for me, the amount of sauce used and the sweetness of it were tell-tale signs that this dish had been created or modified to fit American tastes. From an Americanized Chinese point of view, however, this was a tasty version of garlic chicken.

Along with my garlic chicken, the plate overflowed with pork fried rice:


The rice by itself was a bit bland and one-note. The chunks of roasted pork were nice, but there weren't enough of them to really make a difference in the overall flavor of the rice. Once I finished most of the garlic chicken, there was plenty of sauce left over to combine with the fried rice. While the combination didn't elevate the fried rice to a new plateau, at least it made the rice easier to eat with chopsticks and the flavor was better than no sauce at all.

The third and final component on my plate was the fried egg roll with pork and cabbage:


Of all the components on my plate, the egg roll was probably the best executed. Crispy without being greasy, hot and juicy on the inside without the filling being too moist, this egg roll was very tasty. I longed for a little hot mustard to dip my egg roll into, but by this point of the meal, I was nearly done and didn't have the desire to walk back up to the front counter just for a little bit of the spicy condiment.

On the whole, Ming Hing did a decent job of Americanized Chinese food. While the fried rice was a bit on the dull side, the food was hot and tasty and the egg roll was nicely done. I will be the first to admit that Ming Hing is not a destination restaurant and in fact, if it weren't a Sunday and other restaurants were open, I'd probably recommend other establishments over this one. But, if you are driving through Orrville on a Sunday or have a serious craving for Americanized Chinese food, you won't do too badly at Ming Hing.

  

How To Build A Killer Sandwich In Two Stops

Continuing to document a recent weekend trip to Cleveland, it became clear to my traveling companions that I had never tried Mr. Brisket and the amazing pastrami that they produce. Located at 2156 South Taylor in Cleveland, Ohio, Mr. Brisket was actually located between where we were currently located and where we wanted to go. It wasn't even that I was insisting that we make a stop, but the driver of the car was dead set that today was the day I lost my Mr. Brisket virginity.

As we got close to the retail location of Mr. Brisket, I was regaled with stories from Debbie of how wonderful the pastrami was. It was so good, in fact, that the pound or so that my companions normally would order wouldn't even make it home. Apparently the stuff is so desirable, it can be used as culinary cash to pay someone for a job well done or as a thank you. I suddenly had the image in my head of Debbie driving her car and weaving back and forth, her eyes furtively darting from the road to the open package of warm pastrami sitting on the passenger seat in the car. As the cop inevitably pulls her over, she tries to think of a plausible story as to why she was weaving so badly. And when the cop finally approaches the window and gets the heady aroma coming from inside the car and finally sees the half-eaten mound of glistening shaved meat and the half-mad look in her eye, he can only chuckle a little bit to himself before saying to her, "Um, ma'am ... while technically not illegal, you shouldn't be operating a motor vehicle while consuming Mr. Brisket pastrami. Please put away the pastrami until you reach your destination."

With that little scenario played out in my head, we finally pulled into the parking lot and walked up to the front door of Mr. Brisket. Here's a shot of the front door:


And a shot of part of the offerings to be found inside:


After talking with both Sanford, the owner, and Hank, Sanford's partner, they got down to business and took our orders. All of us decided to buy one pound of sliced pastrami. That is, except Debbie who decided to get two pounds. Wait! Would the scene I had just imaged actually come true? Two pounds of Mr. Brisket pastrami made me think twice about taking Debbie's keys away from her so she wouldn't be a danger to others. Fortunately, all the pastrami stayed wrapped for the remainder of our journey. Whew, catastrophe averted!

Because I had never tasted the pastrami before, they shaved off some samples for us to try.


What can I say about this but, "Yum!" You could taste the clove, coriander, and black peppercorn spice on the outside and the meat had the perfect level of saltiness. Enough to flavor the meat and make your mouth water, but not so much that you went running for a glass of water. The meat was tender and moist and had just the right amount of fat so that it had a nice unctuous mouthfeel to it. I could already tell that this was going to make one heck of a good sandwich.

Although Mr. Brisket does sell fully made sandwiches, my associates INSISTED that we travel just up the road a little bit to another local Jewish bakery that makes amazing breads and pastries. Located at 2181 South Green Road in Cleveland, Ohio, Pincus Bakery offers up many homemade baked goods for all tastes and all budgets. They can be reached at (216) 382-5120 and currently have no website (at least none that I could find).

Located in a small strip mall, here is the shot of the exterior:


Before I sit here and talk about what I did end up buying at Pincus, here are a few shots of the various display cases housing the myriad of goodies you can purchase on a regular basis:




And finally, a shot of the half-dozen egg rolls I purchased for my sandwiches:


I couldn't help myself and had to have one of these rolls naked on the way home from my trip to Cleveland. Just the aroma from opening the bag was heavenly. The "eggy" smell was overwhelming and as I bit into the amazingly fresh roll, I could tell that this was going to make a spectacular sandwich. The roll had just the right amount of "pull" to the crumb and I knew it would withstand a large mound of hot Mr. Brisket pastrami.

Deciding I wanted to share my spoils, I stopped in at a friend's house and we gently reheated the pastrami and split open the remaining rolls. I opted for a little bit of stone ground mustard and my friend went with just a little French's yellow. Unfortunately, gentle reader, I must be taken to task because even though I got all of these wonderful photos of the places and ingredients that went into this sandwich, I forgot to take a picture of my ACTUAL sandwich until it was too late. My bad. But I can tell you this, it was absolutely delicious. The meat was tender and juicy, the spices from the rub continued to sing through even though I had applied mustard, the sturdiness of the roll allowed me to take bite after bite without the sandwich falling apart. My friend, also a Mr. Brisket virgin, started peppering me with questions about where I had gone to get these ingredients. I regaled him with the same story that I just told to you and he vowed to stop into Mr. Brisket and Pincus Bakery the next time he is on the east side of Cleveland. I hope you do, too.

I'm planning another Cleveland weekend soon. My usual stop for a good sandwich is Grum's Sub Shop. I may have to have a Mr. Brisket sandwich instead. Aww, who am I kidding? I'll have to stay an extra day so I can have both.