Woon - Filipinotown — Restaurant in Los Angeles

Woon is a modern Chinese place that serves high quality food at a pretty high price, but definitely worth it. You order at the counter in front and can take a seat or grab it to go. Woon feels very different from any other Chinese restaurant that you will find in America, and that made me worried that it wouldn’t be authentic, but their food was more true to the cuisine than the usual orange chicken, beef and broccoli. We started with the scallion pancakes that came out fast. Theirs were thick and balloony while I prefer mine thin but they were still soft and flaky. It came with a vinegar, soy sauce mix. Then came the beef noodles, which had a good bounce to them. The shiitake mushrooms had a very strong flavor and the beef was high quality. My only issue is that while the beef was high quality, it was still a poor choice in cut, so it had a good amount of marbling but it was still a bit tough. We also ordered a larger helping of their five spice wings. These wings were perfect. True to more traditional Chinese wings, they’re only lightly battered yet still amazingly crispy. They were also perfectly cooked, somehow being juicy and tender with no pink! If you come here you have to get a serving of the wings. Lastly was the pork bao, which came after a while, probably because they had to steam the buns. Inside the buns were braised pork and pickled vegetables. I’m not too sure about the pickled vegetables; they had a sour taste that distracted from the meat. I was worried about dealing with such a big piece of meat sticking out of the bun, but it was no problem because it...

So fortunate to have the opportunity to try @thebaodega sichuan super club from NYC during its popup in LA! It’s so popular with a long line for the whole night, but fortunately Charlene and her team were quite efficient so the line moved pretty fast. The saucy wings were surprisingly good with a unique sourness from the pickled chili and numbness from Sichuan peppercorn - a very innovative creation to highlight Sichuan cooking! Mapo tofu is as expected with more numbness than spicy as i like it, best served over white rice. The vermicelli under the butterfly shrimp was so yummy with all the flavor it absorbed from the shrimp during the steaming process. Love the eggplant, poblanos, and century egg topping in the woon and the baodega noodle although the flavor could be stronger and the noodle was a little burned. Water spinach was gone before I had a chance to snap a photo. All the dishes were done with the right amount of oil and flavor but not too heavy. The cheese cake from NYC - nicely decorated with flower pedals and pomelo marmelade, is a great closure of the night, served and explained by Charlene personally to each table, giving the pop up the feel of a personal super club. I gave four stars as the presentation could be more polished. Hope to have an opportunity to try...

super fast service, friendly waiters. you walk up and place an order, they give you a number and bring the food to you.

they had specials: chili oil noodles, pork and veggie dumplings, and a black rice dessert.

everything is small portion and they give you plates for sharing. i’d recommend about 2-3 dishes per person. the pork dumplings and chicken wings were by far the best dishes. the chicken was seasoned and cooked perfectly, and the breading had a good crunch.

the chili oil noodles were good, but not enough going on (wish there was veggies or something else mixed in; it’s a lot of noodles by themselves). noodles were cooked perfectly al dente, good chew to them.

the tofu bao was too big in my opinion, and too much tofu ratio. i kinda wish the fried chicken was inside the bao 👀 that would be my dream dish!

ambience is casual and very cute, great for dinner with a friend or date place. some of the table height were pretty short; kinda hard to sit at if you’re taller. some of the furniture was more form over function (looks very cute but not that comfortable).

the merchandise at the front was super cute. whoever is designing the tshirts and packaging is knocking it out...