HONG WHA?????

My mother’s birthday fell on Memorial Day this year and since the only place open was the very bogue Bastone, we decided to hold off on going out to celebrate. Last Thursday was the first night we all had open, and my mother chose Hong Hua of Farmington Hills. When this place opened, I remember them getting a ton of ink and being touted as The Most Exquisite Place Ever so I was intrigued and looking forward to our dinner.

The parking lot was pretty full for 6:30 p.m. “They must have a hella rad bar in there,” I commented to my stepfather as we crossed the parking lot.

“Very good,” he replied, as he does to 99.9% of my remarks.

My mom had made reservations for 7 p.m. and said as much to the host when we walked in. He nodded politely and led us into the front dining room (past a sign reading “Proper Attire Requested.”) “It says ‘requested,’ not ‘required,’” I whispered to my mom.

“Obviously they didn’t see it,” she sniffed, gesturing toward a couple sitting to our right. I glanced down at my own torn dress and said nothing.

The host led us to a booth under a window with its shade fully drawn. I slid in and my mother slid in next to me with her giant handbag between us. “Can we move your bag?” I asked, and she picked it up to hand across the table to my stepfather.

“Let’s sit someplace else,” I suggested, realizing that the booth was just way too small for three people, enormous purse or no enormous purse, plus the unavailable window was making me feel even more trapped. The waitress showed us to a four-top which was much better. We ordered drinks and looked over the menu.

I was expecting something really daring inside, dishes I’d never heard of perhaps. Instead, I was staring down a list of items straight from the door-tag carry-out menu from China Buffet on Wyoming and 7 Mile. The waitress reappeared and we ordered—I got Szechuan Chicken, extra spicy, and a fried tofu in “pepper salt” appetizer—and before she left the table, she placed all our napkins on our laps for us, a step I felt she needn’t have taken as I was not really properly attired, after all.

While we waited, my mother informed me that she and my stepfather had recently instituted some cost-cutting measures. Among them, slicing their $14K annual wine budget in half, and contributing less to their favorite political organizations. As I considered spending $14 thousand dollars on wine each year, I gazed around the restaurant, which did not turn out to have a kickin’ bar at all, it was simply very crowded. I noted that none of the booths had three people in them, and concluded that seating us in one originally had been a slight of some sort but I wasn’t sure what it meant. Something racist, I’m sure. I folded the napkin the waitress had carefully embedded between my thighs and to kill time, went to the ladies’ room.

Hong Hua is laid out like Mickey Mouse’s head. We were in the main room, Mickey’s face, and the bathroom was off one ear. As I passed, I glanced in and saw that everyone in that room was Asian. What, they keep the round-eyes out front? I thought. What’s this about? A waiter carrying a huge tray with circular custardy jello-ish desserts maneuvered around me with a scowl. “Pardon me,” I murmured, “you racist!”

The appetizers had arrived by the time I returned, and I was depressed to note that the “pepper salt” on the fried tofu was neither peppery not salty, nor even in attendance as far as I could detect. There was a bed of pre-minced garlic, the type that comes in a jar, beneath the tofu along with a few pieces of jalepeno, and, failing all else, a small silver pitcher of plum sauce. My stepfather really enjoyed this appetizer, telling us several times that "this sauce is really delicious!"

I don’t even want to talk much about the entrees. My mother ordered some kind of shrimp/chicken in a “bird’s nest,” which turned out not to be the Chinese bird’s nest one normally sees on menus, that is, a real bird’s nest, an exotic delicacy. Instead, it was egg noodles deep-fried into a taco-salad bowl shape. My extra-spicy Szechuan Chicken was passable but I had to ask for a side of chili sauce as the dish itself was about as spicy as half-and-half. My stepfather loved what he ordered, which was some kind of beef with large slices of ginger. And when I say “large,” I mean like the size of a Dorito. He agreed to accept my leftovers to take home in the cheery bag pictured above as I knew I would never finish them.

On the way home, we were assailed by at least 25 motorcyclists racing down 696 at terrifying speeds. Of thematic interest: All bikes were rice-burners.

The best part of the whole evening was this fortune. I love typos!

GROSS

What the hell is this--a rice sandwich?

CAFE HABANA

Saturday morning broke crisp and clear. Stavros and I slept late, of course, and finally got up to make coffee at about 9:30. “Hey, I thought you said ‘late,’” you say. “9:30’s not late.” I know, I’m just pretending that we get up really early on weekends and get a bunch of stuff done like normal people. We don’t.

Anyway, before your rude interruption, I believe I was describing waking up and making coffee. As I lay in bed staring at Stavros, I considered breakfast options. I had visions of vegetables, salsa, spiciness. We’ve got to hit the Farmer’s Market, I thought. We should eat in Royal Oak. I remembered my dear friend Janis Beaglehole telling me that Café Habana had a decent brunch. That would fill my spicy hole, I thought, gazing thoughtfully at Stavros’s sleeping form.

Never one to argue, Stavros agreed to my Royal Oak plan. By some miracle, we were able to find a parking place right behind the restaurant as well as the additional blessing of hearing the oddest song in history while parking. It was some country-fried fellow talking about Buddy Holly, and the REAL story of what happened to him. I think. I can’t remember enough of the lyrics to properly Google it. However, it was very strange and anyone who knows what this magnificent number is should please leave the artist and song title in the comments, thank you.

We walked into a half-full room. Or half-empty, depending on your attitude. If you’re a dour son of a bitch, you would have thought the place looked near-empty. I, however, noted simply that all the tables I wanted to occupy were taken and thus the capacity registered at 50% full and 100% assholes for taking all the good tables. So we had to take one on a bit of a riser near the kitchen. This turned out to be okay because at least we had a window and got to watch the swarm of cops who began circling the area about a half hour later. But I digress.

Our waiter, one of two serving the room, was a blandish youth with a vacant expression. He brought us coffee and water and returned a few minutes later to take our order. I’d decided to get one of everything from the “sides” menu, which together would be the equivalent of a basic breakfast at any other restaurant. Eggs, potato, toast, bacon. I asked the waiter what, exactly, was “Cuban toast.” He stuttered, “It’s…it’s toast, just toast, white bread.…” Okay, I told him, put me down for one. I also added a side of black beans and some chili sauce the waiter claimed was “spicy.” Stavros ordered something consisting of eggs, peas, and possibly black beans. He’s far more daring than I.

While we waited for the food to arrive, I browsed idly through a copy of the free Latino newspaper. “Oh, look, Stavros: ‘Elephant Family to Dine on Abandoned Children,’” I translated. Eventually we grew tired of reading foreign news stories and Stavros attempted to hack into the restaurant’s sound system using a nifty iPhone app he downloaded last weekend. After several fruitless attempts, I suggested we resort to the TV-B-Gone, a little universal remote that hooks onto your keyring and turn off any TV within 15 feet or so. “Is that a TV?” I asked, craning my neck to peer around a corner.

Finally the waiter arrived with our brunch. I have to say it looked a lot better than it tasted. The potato component was essentially mashed potatoes with minced onions and shaped into a disc and deep fried. Sounds good, doesn’t it? But it really wasn’t. The inside was too gluey and the outside tasted exactly like onion chips from White Castle. The bacon was slightly undercooked but not as horrifically so as served by those rat-bastards at Café Muse, so I won’t complain too much about it. The “Cuban toast”? It was half a small baguette sliced lengthwise and toasted to point of light crispness, then left unbuttered or in any way adorned. There was no butter on the table so presumably this is the way the Cubans like their toast: dry and tubular. The “spicy” sauce was so bland I was worried that I had blown out my tastebuds on wine the night previous. “Try this,” I said to Stavros, who was having much better luck that I. “It’s good,” he said. “This is all really subtle; I like it.”

Hrrrmph. I tried the black beans. They were good once I added a lot of salt. Oh, I must mention this: At Café Habana, they use those terrible salt grinders. I hate those. That’s too much for tabletop use, in my opinion. I ate what I could, chewing dutifully on the flavorless bread and admiring Stavros’s ruggedly handsome visage. Around this time was when the cops began their siege. One after the other, they passed our window. “I’m going to go see if they need any assistance,” I told Stavros, and got up from the booth, hiked up my jeans, and stepped outside. A lone cruiser crept around the lot we’d parked in, and a couple more rolled slowly past me on 5th Street headed toward Main. I scanned the terrain for guys in ski masks hunched behind dumpsters but failing to see anything except a gaggle of middle-aged women in “Race for the Cure” t-shirts lumbering into a minivan, I went back into the restaurant.

Stavros was in the final round of his eggs-and-peas mess, so I looked around for our waiter. He was over by the restrooms, carrying a broom and dustpan with an odd look of bliss and tranquility on his face. I started to raise a hand but he was obstinately refusing to notice me, even peripherally. I turned around and saw the other waiter sitting in the booth behind us, folding napkins around silverware. “Excuse me, can we get our check, please?” I asked.

He looked around, saw our waiter. “Sure,” he said, getting up and looking irritated and amused at the same time. “He’s…uh, he’s a little under the weather. I think he ate something bad,” he added unnecessarily. Well, that’s just terrif, I thought. Our waiter’s got the shits. Then I recalled the beatific expression on his face, and decided that he was stoned. I felt better, but not a lot, and Stavros paid and we left. Normally I would conclude our story here but one funny thing happened at the Farmer’s Market that I must report.

First of all, I was disappointed to find that the majority of their produce was lettuce. About a million kinds of lettuce. Everything else was only available in embryonic or infantile versions. Of course, moron, you’re thinking. It’s May. The Farmer’s Market isn’t the grocery store. Fine, okay, I forgot. Sue me. Lucky thing, I love lettuce. So we’re wandering around with our lettuce when we bump into some guy he knows.

“Hey, Stavros,” the guy said. I turned around. The guy was with a woman; we smile weakly at each other without speaking.

“We see each other all the time!” the guy continued. I look at Stavros.

“Yeah, we…see each other…from time to time,” Stavros agreed. Well! This is certainly an exhilarating reunion! I take Stavros by the hand and we move toward the Praying Mantids display (“Guaranteed to Fix Your Insect Problem—200 Live Praying Mantids, Should Hatch By July!”).

“That guy never introduces me to his wife,” he grumbled, totally unaware of the strangeness of their conversation. “Don’t get those,” he added, nodding toward the Mantids. I took his hand and we left.

I’m going to go back next weekend for the Mantids.

STAVROS'S HOTDOG MASTERPIECE

Stavros made these two beauties for dinner last night. The buns were brushed lightly with olive oil, then sprinkled with garlic powder leftover from a "Chex Mix at home" experiment. Then both sides of the inner buns were brushed with Gulden's spicy mustard and ketchup, atop which the Ball Park beef frank was placed along with one pickled green bean, sliced Roma tomato, and a squiggle of yellow mustard. Stavros is a genius.

THINGS GET HOT AT HOME WITH EUNICE AND STAVROS

Stavros and I had a truly incendiary evening yesterday. It was a beautiful afternoon, and since Stavros’s plans were unexpectedly canceled, we decided to grill. Earlier in the day, I had been to the very expensive Plum Market where I purchased a pound of hot Italian chicken sausage and some corn on the cob, and Stavros loves hot dogs, so I figured I’d make a side of pasta and we’d have a genuine smorgasbord. (“Smorgasbord” is French for “full stomach.”)

We had a preprandial cocktail on the patio and tossed out a box of Carr’s Water Crackers to the squirrels, who had to then run around and dig up chunks of buried brie—a chore but worth it—and chatted about our respective days at work. Stavros is a busy manager for a highly-regarded showbiz firm, and I provide online content for some of America’s leading retailers of GDP-type items. Stavros, all in black, did not even glisten in the early-evening sun as he described his day. I remarked that we would likely soon run out of propane, and with that gripping observation, I turned on the grill and we went into the house to prepare the meat and corn.

I unwrapped the sausage while Stavros took his hot dogs from the freezer and lay them on a plate. I had high hopes for these sausages. Not only did I expect them to be good, I demanded it. My trip to Plum Market had put me in a rotten mood because it wound up being horrifically expensive and so far, not worth it. I originally meant to get lunch—I woke up wanting salad from a salad bar. Perhaps unwise in the season of Swine Flu, but that’s what I wanted and I had had a vague memory of Plum Market having a superior salad bar. So at lunch I drove down to ritzytown and was seduced into buying a few additional things by the subliminal messages in the muzak, among them, these grossly overpriced sausages. The salad bar turned out to be about one thin hair (I was going to say “pussy” instead of thin) better than the one in my cafeteria at work, and the potato chips were revolting—I think they had sugar on them—and cost $1.79, I realized once back at work. So I felt consummately gypped by the entire experience and pinned my salvation on these hot Italian chicken sausages. If they were good, the trip and expense would have been worth it. Capice?

I put the corn and the sausage on the grill and came back inside to make the pasta. Stavros assisted by way of attempting to make out with me constantly. As I filled the coffee pot and set the timer for this morning, I glanced out the kitchen window at the grill, from which huge, poisonous-looking clouds of black smoke were suddenly billowing.

“STAVROS!” I cried, placing the coffee pot on the sideboard. “Look at the grill!”

We raced outside and I yelled, “What do I do?”

“Put the fire out!” yelled back Stavros.

“With the hose?” I asked, in keeping with my new habit of asking the dumbest possible questions.

Without waiting for an answer, I sprang like one of Charlie’s Angels and grabbed the hose, conveniently located apprx. six inches from the smoldering grill, and squatted in front of it, aiming the water into the drip pan, which was fully ablaze from a year’s worth of collected olive oil and assorted lard. I held down the trigger of the spray nozzle and crouched in front of the grill like Jacklyn Smith taking down a rogue pimp and finally the fire died down. I dropped the hose and reached under the grill to turn off the flow of propane from the tank while Stavros extended a delicate hand to turn off the ignition knob.

“Holy shit,” said I.

Stavros opened the grill. The hot Italian chicken sausages had been reduced to anthracite. The corn was still vaguely cornlike, but with a greasy, gray sheen and speckles of soot. Smoke rose in foul breaths and blackened the cobwebs and soffit vents under my eave.

I gotta say, I took this pretty hard. I almost never ruin dinner. Especially by way of a giant fire. Stavros was kind enough to remove the drip pan, which had finally been extinguished, and I dropped the charred remains of the sausage and corn into the garbage. Luckily, Stavros had grilled and removed his hot dogs prior to the fire, so all was not totally lost. Plus we still had the pasta. So I had some pasta, and Stavros had his hot dogs and pasta, and we decided to go for a walk and get an ice cream to make up for the tragic loss of 800 calories.

We live very near each other, Stavros and I, and thus we patronize the same party store. (For those of you not in the Detroit area, “party store” means “liquor store.” Not “balloons and streamers”; booze, etc.) I should also point out that I have lived in the neighborhood for about three times as long as Stavros, which is why what happened next was amusing.

We walked into the party store. I noticed that this evening’s clerks were the two older men, not the twenty-something sons of the proprietor. I approached the ice cream vault and heard, “Hi, Stavros.” I turned around in time to see Stavros raise his hand in a wave and reply, “Hey, Pete.”

Hey, Stavros? Hey, Pete? What’s going on here? Are these two pals on Facebook now or something? Stavros looked quite proud of himself as we wrapped up our purchase, and the minute we were outside I demanded, “How does he know your name!”

“I go there every day,” he said. “He sees my credit card. He started saying, ‘Thanks, Stavros,’ so I asked him his name.”

I didn’t quite buy this and I watched him with suspicion as I ate my Good Humor strawberry shortcake bar.

By the time we got home, there was no lingering smell of grease fire and the evening had somewhat redeemed itself by virtue of the ice cream and the discovery of a 1992 Ford High School yearbook lying the road.

I will not, however, be returning to Plum Market.

DAVIN WHIPPLETHORPE ON CHINA"RUBELLA" RUBY

Being a huge fan of Amazing Chicken and a frequent take away customer, my friend Ruby and I decided it would be nice to get out and enjoy our dinner at the restaurant. It is usually half occupied when I get my take-aways, but tonight it was fairly packed. Ruby and I get a table directly in front of the Media Awards wall where you can read how many times they’ve won The Metro Times best Chinese restaurant award. Most of the awards are extremely yellowed meaning they must have gotten awards for quite some time.

Our waitress, who was charming in a non-English kind of way, quickly brought us our waters. Ruby ordered the Curry Chicken, yum, with a bowl of egg drop soup, equally yum. I ordered the…guess…the Amazing Chicken and a bowl of hot and sour soup.

Our soup arrives promptly. When at a Chinese restaurant, I immediately grab for the soy sauce as if it’s a bag of money, despite my high blood pressure, which is being controlled with Micardis HCL, anywho, I reach across the table to grab the soy sauce and lo and behold 4 rather small but equally offensive cockroaches run out from behind the soy sauce and run directly across my hand then onto the floor. After 10 seconds of shock expire, I jump up and scream not unlike a girl would do. Everyone in the restaurant drops what they’re doing and it’s all eyes on me. Not a fan of attention, I flipped my wig even more. When the kind Oriental owner came over she had a look on her face as if she’s seen this thousands of times over…and if you’ve been there, you would agree. Not even a sorry, or your meal is on us, crockroash no etra charg.
Too upset to eat I demand to my friend Ruby, who is quite fond of food and overeating in general, to leave immediately. Ruby then asks me if we want to get our food as a take away. I publicly chastised her and asked her how can have the gall to take food home that shared the same surface as a family of cockroaches? I walked out and yelled “FILTHY!”
To this day I still order Amazing Chicken take-away. And chit chat with the owner. I can’t help it.


~ Davin Whipplethorpe