Tayyibaat Meat And Grill

Location: Milpitas, CA
Cuisine type: Afghan, kebab
Atmosphere: ultra-casual, very basic decor
Meal: dinner
Overall score: 7.9

Nina

Not much to describe about this place. It’s a small, bare-bones fast food style place, where they prep their meat fresh in house (and sell some cuts fresh or marinated in the back too). Their menu is made up of two distinct sections - middle eastern style food and classic American, though we only tried stuff off the former.

I ordered the lamb chili, since I always go for lamb when it’s on the menu. It’s essentially ground spiced lamb, molded on a skewer and cooked to juicy perfection. It was served with a side of rice, fresh tomato salad (almost like a pico de gallo), flatbread and yogurt sauce. We also ordered curly fries with the meal (I guess we did try something from the American menu after all :) ), which were a delicious balance of crispy and chewy.
For dessert we shared a piece of baklava, which is a sweet and sticky treat of crispy layered filo dough and and honey nut mixture.
This place is definitely going on the list of affordable and delicious meat based meals, I’m also interested in trying out their burgers next time.

Food	9
Drinks	7
Atmosphere	5
Service	9
Value	10

Ben

A restaurant / butcher shop with a wide array of fresh raw meats and various spiced meat dishes. They offer classic kabobs, rotisserie chicken, and burgers at reasonable prices. We ordered a lamb chili kabob (ground lamb, onions and various peppers / spices) and a chicken tikka kabob (cubed chicken breast with tomato spice blend), with a side of curly fries and a baklava - which was free with a yelp checkin. I find this is one ideal type of restaurant - simple and forward, with quality ingredients (and, of course, I love meat and I love spicy foods...). The lamb dish was fantastic, a generous meaty portion with a lot of flavor and just enough kick. The fries were served with a sort of tzatziki sauce,complementing the spicy food well. The seating area is a bit small - it can feel like a butcher shop first and a restaurant second - but the service is friendly and gives the place an overall cozy hole-in-the-wall feel. If you appreciate good meat and a fair amount of spice, it is definitely a quality bite (and we noticed it is pretty popular for take-out).

Food	9
Drinks	6
Atmosphere	6
Service	8
Value	8

Milpitas Buffet

Location: Milpitas, CA
Cuisine type: Chinese, Japanese, other? buffet
Atmosphere: cafeteria style, ultra-casual
Meal: dinner
Overall score: 6.5

Nina

Finding ourselves in an impasse and looking for an easy to access, easy to please place, our eyes fell on one of the most recently received bulk coupons in the mail - Milpitas Buffet. It promised an incredible variety of dishes for a more than enticing price, and honestly I wasn’t expecting anything more impressive than the common run of the mill Chinese fast food buffet.

The array of options was indeed impressive - everything from a section of seafood (giant raw oysters, mussels, conch, crab legs, shrimp), to another dedicated to dim sum (a wide variety of dumplings and steamed buns), a couple of rows with classic Chinese buffet options (think General Tso’s chicken, beef and broccoli, sauteed mushrooms etc), an array of Japanese fast food selections (teriyaki chicken, satay skewers, sushi rolls and nigiri), and finally quite a few desserts (puddings, cakes, fried options and fruit). The quality of the food was by no means impressive, which was not surprising for the cost of the meal. The meat was often chewy or dry, the seasoning was a little off (often on the side of too salty), and the ingredients were not the epitome of freshness. All in all, it was a classic example of an experience that sounds pretty impressive from afar but does not deliver in quality and execution.

In the end, I would definitely choose to pay more for a more focused and satisfying meal than to repeat this experience and be left with an overstuffed and unsettled stomach.

Food	4
Drinks	5
Atmosphere	5
Service	7
Value	8

Ben

I’ve been to many Chinese buffets around the U.S., but I’ve never been to one this large / impressive. As we basically stumbled upon it and it is likely one of many, it opened my eyes that I am a major newbie to the magnitude of Chinese buffets in the Milpitas area. To me, the buffet appeared to have everything one could think of: starting classic chinese dishes (pork, shrimp, halibut, chicken, beef … in various sauces), mussels, oysters raw and cooked, crab legs, an aisle with 8-10 soups (chinese and japanese), various japanese classics from skewers, a sushi and sashimi bar, snails in shell, octopus, various rolls, dumplings, fruits, even fried chicken, pizza, and ice cream.

Due to a large crowd, most of the food is reasonably fresh. The food was overall pretty decent-tasting for a buffet, particularly with such a large variety. The price was all pretty fair ($12 or so?), so it is a great place to stuff your face or go with a large appetite.

Food	7
Drinks	8
Atmosphere	8
Service	8
Value	9

Wang's Kitchen

Location: Milpitas, CA
Website: wangskitchenusa.com/
Cuisine type: Chinese Indian fusion
Atmosphere: cafe style seating, open dining room
Meal: dinner
Overall score: 7.5

Nina

We stumbled on this place on its grand opening day - it’s a medium sized restaurant with cafe style seating and glass walls on three sides which identifies itself as a Chinese Indian fusion. There wasn’t a big crowd as one might expect on an opening day, even though they were offering an amazing deal - 50% off the entire bill today and tomorrow to launch their new place. The down side was that with this deal they didn’t offer carryout for these two days, but we were intrigued enough to change plans and eat at the restaurant. The menu seemed more Chinese than Indian, but there were a few dishes that seemed to represent the fusion aspect nicely.
The service still needed some kinks ironed out, as one might expect from a brand new place with new staff. The waiters were a little awkward, there was a guy walking between the tables collecting dishes on a rolling cart that was a bit of an eye sore and also making somewhat arbitrary decisions on what to take and what to leave (he took away my tea cup even though I was still drinking from it, but left the dirty bowls on our table for a little while even though we were done).
My first course was a Lung Fung soup - I ordered a little bowl which was definitely plentiful. It was a garlic creamy soup with mushrooms (which seemed like they might have come from a can, but were still tasty), chicken and egg whites, and garnished with parsley and scallions. The flavor was quite a bit richer than any egg drop soup I’ve had before, and the creamy texture contrasted nicely with the crispy scallions and tender mushrooms.

Even though it took quite a while to get the soup (almost half an hour), my entree came 5 or 10 minutes later, so I had both on the table until I was able to finish the soup. I ordered the Manchurian lamb, which seems to be one of the most representative Chinese Indian fusion flavor profiles. The dish, as most others, came with two options - dry or gravy. It wasn’t gravy in the traditional American sense, but rather a thick sauce that came with the meat as opposed to a dry rub. My dry flavored lamb was perfectly cooked and had a warm spiciness that was just hot enough to be fun, but milk enough to not be overwhelming. The Hakka noodles that we shared on the side were a noodle version of fried rice - with vegetables and bean sprouts, and a lightly oily sauce that was just enough to flavor the dish wihout making it too heavy.

Food 8
Drinks 7
Atmosphere 7
Service 6
Value 8

Ben

We were looking to grab a meal by a plaza near our place with primarily Chinese markets / restaurants, and stumbled on this place and saw it happened to be their grand opening. A Chinese / Indian fusion restaurant with locations around the world, this is their first restaurant in the in the U.S. They wouldn’t let us take food to go, since they had a 50% off special for their opening so we stayed anyway. Aside from the lack of an option for takeout, there were quite a few other growing pains (which I do find completely forgivable as it is their first night in operation, but I will list anyway). The service was a little awkward between the waiter and hostess to seat us, and they split a double table as we sat down, despite several empty tables. We ordered two soups, a Manchow chicken (which lacked the fried noodles in the description), and an egg-white chicken soup. We did wait about 30 minutes before the soup was out after we ordered. They were both very intricately flavored, served with fresh herbs and strong flavors (though with what we presumed were canned mushrooms) , definitely a full step above most soups I ever have at Chinese restaurants.

After such a long wait for the soups, the entrees were brought out only a couple of minutes later, before we were halfway through the soup, crowding the table. We ordered a manchurian lamb (dry, with the option of gravy or no gravy.. they even said they can’t serve the gravy on the side.. weird) and a blackbean gravy spicy prawn dish. They were both very generous portions and I found them to be delicious and both the lamb and prawns were perfectly cooked. We also had a good noodle dish that was randomly brought a couple minutes later. While the whole time we were chuckling at the little awkwardnesses, I have to say they had someone who knew what they were doing in the kitchen, amongst the chaos the food surprised me that it was really spot-on. They serve a fresh oolong tea with the meal, and the drink menu is pretty limited, with tea/coffee, salt lassi, sweet lassi, mango lassi, milk, and soda. The restaurant is one large open room with several tables, which gives it a little bit of an empty feel despite having a good amount of customers. The decoration is a little in-progress, with oriental panel walls along the entrance, and the rest of the restaurant sparsely decorated. The value is pretty good (even without the 50% discount), with most entrees around $10. Overall I think it is a pretty quality place, especially once they iron out a few of the small issues, and think based on the food itself, they have a chance to establish themselves among an area so densely populated with restaurants.

Food 9
Drinks 6
Atmosphere 7
Service 7
Value 8

South Legend Sichuan

Location: Milpitas, CA
Cuisine type: Szechwan (Chinese)
Atmosphere: austere, family style seating
Meal: dinner
Overall score: 3.5

Nina

Ben got home very excited that he found a great online deal for this restaurant with rave reviews. To make things even better, it was a Szechwan restaurant, and given how much he likes spicy food, that in itself was a compelling reason to try it out.
The prices were very low, which wasn’t entirely surprising given the level of competition among Chinese restaurants in this part of Milpitas. Feeling at ease, we ordered an appetizer and two entrees to fully enjoy the offerings - we got a rabbit cashew appetizer to share, and I ordered a chicken mushroom entree (mild spiciness, I didn’t want to risk it too much). Of course, like with every other traditional Chinese restaurant, hot green tea was a given - however, we were not offered water and looking around the restaurant no one else had a single water glass on their table either.
The raised expectations and high level of anticipation for this food made the disappointment that much more bitter once we were served the food. The appetizer was flavorful, though not as spicy as advertised, but it was very hard to eat since it consisted of little more than cashews, scallions and rabbit bones - it almost looked like they put a whole animal through a wood chipper and fried it that way. My entree came before I even had a chance to get a good taste of the appetizer, so our table quickly got a little crammed. My chicken pieces were lost in a sea of long celery pieces, and again not even close to the level of spiciness I was hoping for.
But I’m not done! I could have probably overlooked some of these issues - I’m used to having way too many crunchy vegetables in my Chinese dinners (so I usually just eat a part of those and all the meat to find the right balance for me), and I might even be ok with chewing through bones to get to small pieces of rabbit meat. The main problem which could not be overlooked was the insane, no, *inhumane* level of salt in these dishes. If it were only the appetizer, or only my entree, I would have dismissed it as a slip or a blotched batch of sauce. But all three plates on our table were impossibly salty. It quickly saturated our taste buds and drowned all other flavors of the food. We asked the waiter if they usually make their food extremely salty, and he said no, they never do. At this point we were too disappointed to even try anymore, we let them take away most of the food and didn’t ask for to-go boxes either. I guess the sane thing to do would have been to order a new set of dishes to replace the unedible ones, but at that point, having all three in that state, we were unsure asking for a new plate would fix anything and too hungry to wait for another round - instead we just headed home and snacked on things we already had in our fridge (cheese and crackers has never tasted so good).
We will likely go back to this place (not before our year of unique restaurant visits is over, of course) to see if this was an isolated incident or common practice.

Food 1
Drinks 4
Atmosphere 5
Service 5
Value 1


Ben

We stopped in with a groupon to check out. In a predominantly Chinese plaza in Milpitas, it has a very pleasant and inviting feel and the area is interesting to walk around. The service was a little scarce, but prompt upon ordering.  We started with an appetizer  order, rabbit cashew. I found the appetizer to be pretty unpleasant (basically a rabbit chopped up whole with the bones, making there a lot of irregular shards and difficult to pick through, and served cold with celery andn uts) to being something I just wasn't used to. For the entree, I asked for a suggestion and ordered a spicy beef, which was served on a hot platter above a candle to stay warm. The presentation was appealing, and was served with a warm and flavorful green tea. The beef was fried and stewed in a sauce which looked appetizing and spicy, a good-looking platter of Chinese food - not too breaded and not overly greasy.  Upon tasting it, it was the most bizarre experience I can remember at a restaurant. The food was the single saltiest thing I have ever been served in my life. This is not just my dish, but also Nina's and the appetizer as well. I couldn't shake the thought that the dishes were meticulously prepared, and then a full cup of salt was poured over and shaken through each dish (and I am not one averse to fried, salty foods). I tried to taste through it to see the flavor, but it was difficult to see past. The only explanation I could think of was that this was simply a mistake (the chef used soy sauce instead of vinegar? A cup measure instead of a teaspoon?). The whole experience was simply bizarre. We weren't able to work through more than 10% of any of the dishes (each bite tasted like gelified seawater), and just discarded the food and walked out extremely disappointed as I had high expectations from some decent reviews. I am curious to try it again just out of sheer disbelief from the food I was served. 

Food 0

Drinks 7

Atmosphere 6

Service 5

Value 7

Pho Nguyen

Location: Milpitas, CA

Cuisine type: Vietnamese, Pho

Atmosphere:  small, austere

Meal: dinner

Price range: $8 (entrees)

Overall grade: 7.7

Ben


In an area with Pho on every corner, we are still very much noobs, as this was only our second pho experience. It is a bit difficult to differentiate and evaluate these restaurants as many seem to have a very standard menu and style. The service was polite, the atmosphere pretty austere. We tried both the in house made fresh noodles and the standard thin noodles for the Pho. I found the meat servings (I had tripe, brisket and rare steak) to be pretty generous. I enjoyed the soup and the standard basil, lime, jalapeno, and bean sprouts were served. The price was $6-8 depending on the meats and the size. Overall it's a pretty standard place that does a good job on presenting quality Pho at good prices.

Food             8

Drinks           6

Atmosphere   6

Service          7 

Value            8

Nina

After another full day of unpacking boxes, we decided to take a break and head out on the town. As usual, we didn't have a precise destination in mind, but we were looking to find a Goodwill store to give away a large box of random things which should have never been packed with our belongings. In the Goodwill plaza we found a large assortment of Asian restaurants, several of which were Vietnamese, and as such specializing in Pho. We walked into one of them at random and sat down eager for the warm broth and delicious noodles to provide us much needed energy to carry on with the unpacking.

I ordered the rare steak, tripe and tendon pho with fresh homemade rice noodles. It came with sweet basil, lime and jalapenos for seasoning and bean sprouts for an extra crunch. The broth was very flavorful, especially after added a mixture of all the different sauces we found on the table - sriracha, hoisin and chili. The fresh noodles were definitely much richer than the standard ramen-like noodles that typically come with the pho.

Best of all, I got a frozen coconut bubble tea (with tapioca pearls, of course). It was sweet, but not overwhelmingly so, and had a fresh taste of real, blended coconut - which is quite a treat considering how many of the bubble tea places use simply canned or powder flavors. As usual, the small version of the bubble tea was too large for me to ever hope to finish, but I can never complain of having too much dessert :)

Food             9

Drinks           8

Atmosphere   6

Service          7 

Value            10