Rant and Rave:
Food
by Martell

Rave—Kim Tar Restaurant, Monterey Park, CA—How hard is it to find a good cheap Chinese restaurant in LA?  It seems like you either have to choose between Chinois on Main or the equivalent of Panda Express.  But not anymore.  This past weekend, a friend took a group of us to one of his favorite Chinese/Vietnamese restaurants, and we loved it.

Everything we ate was good, but the best dishes were the various House Special items.  The House Special beef was extremely tender and flavorful, the House Special fish filets were little breaded bites of heaven, and the House Special squid was the best I've ever had.  I would also recommend the hot and sour soup with the fish in it and the fried tofu dish.

The only bad thing about the restaurant was some sub-par service.  In one case, our friend went up to the waitress to ask for more tea, and she was promptly told to sit back down. 

Two final selling points: 1) We had 17 people show up for lunch on a Sunday and they had no problem seating us, and 2) we ate a TON of food and still only paid $10 apiece out the door.  Good, good stuff.