Nangokutei

Rating: OK
Meal:  Dinner for 2
Price:  2600 yen
Payment:  Cash only
Dishes: Miso pork with cabbage teishoku, gyoza, fried rice, sesame balls
English Menu: Partial

Smoking: Probably

This one has no English, the other one did.

Thursday night again, so my son and I went out for Chinese.  Our first choice (the closest one) was closed, so we walked a little further to Nangokutei (South Country Restaurant, possibly a reference to south china regional cooking).  I've already ranted about "Japanese" Chinese food in a previous post, so I won't do that again.  Suffice it to say that I have yet to find anything resembling real Chinese food in Yokosuka.  That holds true across the board, but there are a few places that are slightly better than others.  This is one of them, or at least it has been in the past.

 
It's right off "blue street" (common parlance for the road that leads down from the Yokosuka Chuo train station towards the base), very close to the train station.  It's right around the corner from the famous standing yakitori eatery.  With a very distinctive sign, it's hard to miss.

It looks very tight inside, but there is lots of room upstairs, which is where we headed for the first time.  If you can ignore the grime (pretty much standard for smaller Chinese restaurants) it's got a nice feel to the place, a little better than the usual.

Their menu is quite extensive, and most of what I have tried in the past is quite good.  It's made very quickly, and if you sit downstairs at the bar you'll hear Chinese (Cantonese or Mandarin...I can't tell) spoken by everyone who works there (always a plus).  My son had the usual pork fried rice, and he begged for a plate of sesame balls for dessert.  I quite like the sesame balls there as they are filled with a darker black sesame paste.  I went for a teishoku (note:  this is a Japanese thing, not Chinese) for economy's sake.  A dish I generally like and is a good gauge of general quality is miso fried cabbage and pork.  Basically a stir fry.  It came with white rice, soup and a plate of gyoza, quite a bit of food for the price.  Usually I quite like the food here, but for some reason last night it didn't sit well.  Serves me right for playing it safe, I should have ordered something crazy for the review.  Oh well.

At one time I would have ranked this as a (relatively) Very Good, but since I found it I have also found some other places that have evened things out a bit.  As such I've downgraded it to an OK for now.