Hot & Sour Soup in the San Jose area?

[tshuma]

I've got the mother of all classic nasty colds, starting with the traditional sore throat with implications of more to come, followed by congestion, sinus headaches, coughing, etc. I desperately want a good hot & sour soup in the Chinese Restaurant sense, and I've never yet found a restaurant that could scratch that itch since I've moved to the Bay Area. (I don't go to many Chinese restaurants, and when I do, I've always been varyingly disappointed by the hot and sour soups.)

I WANTS it, I does. Thus, I appeal to friend internets. Where in the San Jose area (including Campbell and even Santa Clara....Sunnyvale if that's the only one you know) can I get a good hot and sour soup? One with a decent pinch of white pepper and a decent glug of vinegar?

I must summon hot and sour soup. I must.

Comments

[miss-emelia.livejournal.com]

Why is it that Chinese in the bay area is so much more disappointing that Chinese food in Sac? That's just weird to me. But in Sac, I know several good places to go, and here it's always just kinda meh.

Oh, you might try Mandarin Gourmet. There's one in Cupertino off DeAnza and there's one in San Jose down near Oakridge Mall.

[tshuma]

Thanks, I might be up for a field trip tonight. I can't believe I've lived here this long and still haven't found this basic need.

[tsgeisel.livejournal.com]

The Chinese migration never really seemed to get a foothold in San Jose, at least not to the degree it did in SF or Sac. Mostly the Chinese immigrants were brought in to do manual labor jobs, and the associated areas, including restaurants, grew up out of a need to support them. San Jose was an agricultural community for a very long time, and depended more on a migratory exploitable class than on a permanent one. So while there's not really a lack of Chinese people in the area, most of them are recent transplants, without the same underlying infrastructure you find in SF.

That said, if you want Vietnamese food, you're in the right city... :-)

(And, I've never had their hot and sour soup, but I like Wonton House, in Santa Clara, on El Camino (just past Lafayette, before City Hall). The best part about them is that they're open until midnight, and they have menus in Chinese on the walls - always a good sign.)