Northern City

A few weeks back Nick and I decided to go out for one of our periodic Good Food Club (GFC) meetings. We were originally thinking about checking out Fat Rice in Logan Square but settled on the convenience of Chinatown/Bridgeport.  There are a number of Northern Chinese places opening up near the intersection of 31^st and Halsted in Bridgeport. We settled on Northern City.

Regional Chinese is hands down my favorite cuisine. For years now, most of the good regional Chinese in Chicago has been associated with Tony Hu and his Lao chain of restaurants. If you wanted Szechuan, you went to Lao Szechuan, if you wanted Hunan, you went to Lao Hunan. All of his restaurants are great (with the possible exception of Lao Yunnan which I found rather unremarkable).  When I heard about a new cluster of northern Chinese restaurants opening up in Bridgeport, I got very excited. I was thrilled to discover good regional Chinese in Chicago outside the Chef Tony vortex.

Northern City focuses on the cuisine of China’s Northeastern provinces, also known as Dongbei or Manchuria. The food heavily focuses on noodles and dumplings; rice is not prevalent in the cold northern climate. Proximity to far-eastern Russia gives certain dishes eastern European touches. Pickling is common and cabbage is prevalent. Nick travelled to northeastern China with his family a few years back so he was a good reference as to what was authentic and what was not.

When we sat down, our server brought out a nice little plate of spicy mung beans with chilies and picked ginger. This little dish did a good job preparing my palate for the flavor roller coaster I was about to embark on.

We ordered five dishes. It must have been opposite day because the entrees came out before the appetizers. First came the cumin lamb. This dish was fantastic. It consisted of spicy paper thin slices of tasty lamb. Lamb is relatively common in Dongbei cuisine. Our other main course came out next, Northern style braised eggplant. This dish struck a good balance between sweet and spicy. The dish included wood ear mushrooms which have an interesting texture and pleasant flavor.

Cumin Lamb

Next came out our apps. We ordered northern dumplings, pork pancake, and Korean cold noodles. The pork pancake was unreal, one of the best Chinese appetizers I’ve ever had, and I’ve had a few. This dish came with two excellent condiments, one was a salty soy based sauce and the other was basically chili oil with chili flakes. The northern style steamed dumplings came out next. They were good, I can’t remember offhand what the filling consisted of.  I mainly remember the dumplings as being a good vehicle for the chili and soy based condiments. The cold Korean noodles were another hit. This was a cold noodle soup with a hardboiled egg, fermented cabbage, and pressed meat. The dish was more sweet than spicy. This dish got me even more excited for an eventual trip to Korea.

Korean Cold Noodles

Overall, I was very satisfied with my Northern City experience. I always appreciate an authentic feast for a reasonable price. I’m really happy to see a great place like this opening up outside Chinatown proper. And as much as I respect him and his concepts, it’s nice to see an exciting regional Chinese restaurant in Chicago not owned by Tony Hu. Service was a little off but that comes with the territory when you are the only white people in the restaurant. Most importantly, it was great to know that authentic Dongbei cuisine is represented in Chicago.