Tampa’s Chinese Face-off: Yummy House vs. China Yuan

Six Tampa chowhounds, two restaurants, two and a half hours of stir fried bliss

Competition sure tastes good.  

Tampa is lucky to be home to two excellent Chinese restaurants, China Yuan and Yummy House, both near the intersection of Armenia and Waters. I already knew both restaurants served the best Chinese food in the city, and was curious to know more. So last Sunday, six of the area’s most enthusiastic eaters met at Yummy House with open minds and empty stomachs. Boy, were we in for a treat.

Five of us, including myself, were already China Yuan devotees, while the sixth preferred Yummy House. Having met through online food musings on Chowhound.com’s Florida message board, some of us had never seen one another in person, and our discussions about eating, cooking, and dining out were pleasant and lively. We never intended to play kingmaker, and after two excellent meals, we would have been hard pressed to name a winner.

Yummy House is not known for courteous service. Even our Yummy House fan acknowledged that. It didn’t help that we arrived when the place was packed, but once we found a table and enough drinks and plates, things went more smoothly.

We began with the vaunted fried tofu, which deserves the adulation it receives online. I was always skeptical, wondering how tofu could have the flavor to be so fantastic. Yummy House punches up the dish with minced jalapeno and toasted garlic that adds a lovely savory note to the tofu’s crispy fried pleasures. I immediately understood, and would have ordered another plate if we didn’t have a second lunch around the corner.

The Honey roast pork was moist, with a balanced honey glaze that didn’t overpower the subtlety of the pork. The West Lake beef soup was similarly balanced, showcasing the fresh greens and tender minced beef in an herb-flecked broth thickened with egg and corn starch. The soup managed to be refreshing and hearty at the same time, much like China Yuan’s minced beef and cilantro soup. If you love cilantro, you will love that soup. If you merely like cilantro, go for the West Lake.

For entrees, we enjoyed the grouper with XO sauce, and requested chive stems and asparagus to replace the snow peas for a change of pace. Cooked perfectly, the tender fish had the delicious seared flavor of a very hot wok. The XO sauce was subtle, complimenting the grouper and greens. At $8.95, this dish is a real bargain. We agreed that the fish wasn’t tilapia, and it could very well have been grouper. One never knows these days.

The beef with ginger and scallion, which is a China Yuan favorite of mine, was just as good at Yummy House, with a sauce that was sweeter and less deep and dark: Different, but just as good, with generous slices of onion and pungent ginger.

This lunch would feed four hungry diners well, for six it was perfect for our purposes, and cost only $52 before tip.

The drive to China Yuan is probably five hundred yards. After expansion and renovation a couple years ago, the décor is warmer, and the service has always been attentive. The owner, Peter Chen, is often on hand in the dining room.

China Yuan also offers dim sum. The pan fried dumplings are probably the best in town, crisp, tender, and large. The biggest challenge of the dumplings is to show some restraint when eating them, or you will burn your mouth. Be sure to spike yours with lots of chili oil.

The clam with watercress soup was such a light delight with the rich dumplings. Clams lend their briny flavors to a pristinely delicate broth with mushrooms and greens. Sautéed squid, soft with a pleasant chew, came in a creamy, luxurious curry sauce with chunks of potato and onion.

For entrees, salty black bean sauce is excellent with firm-textured chow fun (broad noodles), beef, and bean sprouts. It was one of the heartier dishes of the day, along with the surprisingly good pork intestine with mustard greens. If you imagine stewed chitterlings with soggy greens, you couldn’t be more wrong. When one of us suggested this dish, the rest agreed out of curiosity, trusting our new friend, and the knowledge that we’d be well-fed in any case. The intestine was sliced thin and flash fried, served with stir-fried onions, peppers, greens, and a nuanced sweet sauce. The texture and flavor of the intestine was excellent, with a fried crunch on the outside and a pleasant chewiness inside. I would definitely order it again, and intestines usually aren’t my bag.

Before the tip, our meal at China Yuan ran a little under $50 with hot tea, and was every bit as good as our meal at Yummy House.

Two among us were serious chili-heads, and each consumed an impressive volume of chili oil during the afternoon. At each restaurant, demand meant that we drew oil from two vessels instead of one. After copious tasting and lip-smacking, they could not declare an outright winner. Yummy House’s chili oil packs more heat, while China Yuan’s has more flavor.

We came to two conclusions. One: that it would be great to get together again. Perhaps we’ll try ABC Chinese in St. Pete next. Second: Yummy House and China Yuan are both great restaurants, collectively greater than we might have first imagined. I still prefer China Yuan for its service, décor, and dim sum, but both restaurants have great food.

My final conclusion: I want to have two Chinese lunches every Sunday. I could get used to this competition.