4 Must Try SPICY Dishes at The BEST Hunan Chinese Restaurant in New York!

And oh my God, I dropped a spoon in the sauce. Hey guys, what's going on? It's Mike, and I have my friend Tian here with me. And we are going to introduce you to one of the best Hunan restaurants in New York City. And Tian, thank you for coming with me today. No, thank you for having me. You're here because I need backup, guys. I admit when I cannot eat so much food. I'm here to eat. Because this is a restaurant where you got to come in, and don't come here by yourself. Come here with a bunch of friends, order a bunch of dishes, and share. That's the Asian way. And if you have someone in your group that's like, I'm just gonna get this for myself, and you know, I'm gonna only eat it. Nah, you can't. You can't be friends with those people, right? No, you can't be selfish. This is the restaurant that I'm talking about, and I did a video here a while ago about their awesome pork ribs. But today, we're not gonna eat that. We're gonna go ahead and introduce you to some other ridiculously good food they have here. Hunan food, in case you guys don't know, is very similar to Sichuan food, which Tian, you have not had either. My first time. Those of you who love Sichuan food, you guys know like a lot of spicy dishes, spicy and numbing flavors of Sichuan. Hunan cuisine is kind of similar, but it's also really different. It's different because it doesn't really have the numbing elements of Sichuan, but it's really straight-up spicy. And Tian, you can take the spice, right? Yes, I'm done with the challenge. That's why, if you guys want to come eat with me, you gotta be able to handle your spice, you gotta be able to eat the food, you gotta be able to put it away. Hunan cuisine is also called Xiang Cai, because it's right by the Xiang River region, and its characteristics are, like I said, spicy, and it's really kind of, not really, but it's a little oily. So, it's a very savory kind of food, so it's right up my alley. I don't know, you're not a salad-like lover, are you? Okay, so, good, we got that out of the way, because we're gonna be eating a lot of meaty, savory, oily, full of flavor dishes. I'm down for it. All right, cool. And before we start to eat, because the food is a little oily, we gotta drink some hot tea. What you guys don't know about eating spicy food is that, supposedly, you're supposed to drink something hot while eating spicy food. You're definitely supposed to drink something hot while eating really oily food, you know why? Otherwise, if you drink something cold, the oil hits your stomach, and then the cold water hits your stomach, it's gonna congeal, it's gonna, like, you know, not be good for your stomach. So, hot tea. Learn something new. All right, guys, a couple of our dishes has arrived, and I can't wait, because I am starving. I hope you're starving, San, because we've got a lot of food coming. I am. This is one of the specialties, must-have Hunan dishes. One characteristic that I didn't mention before is that Hunan dishes has a lot of cured meats, and this one in particular is called Lawei Hechou, so it has cured beef and pork. Sorry, I had to stop because my mouth started watering as I'm smelling this. And green pepper, red pepper. This thing also is cooked with black fermented beans, which, I bet you never had that ingredient before. One of my favorite things, goes so well with anything peppery, anything meaty. Smell this one. Waiting for that. That's awesome. Someone needs to bottle up the scent, because that's just amazing. And another dish you guys gotta try when you come here. One of my all-time favorites, but I never had it so good until I came here. I never had it so good until I came here. I ate this dish all around the country, even in Taiwan. I never had it as well as here. This is little pepper, Xiao Jiao You Rou Si. It's a popular dish, it's called little pepper with beef. And this is, a lot of places offer this. All it is, sliced jalapeno spicy peppers with beef, but the way they make it here. Can you guys see the spice going on over there? It looks very spicy. Yeah, right? I mean, it's covered. One of the spiciest things about peppers is the seeds, right? And this is covered in seeds. This, oh my god. The love I have for this dish is undeniable. I love you so much. I hope you love it. I'll try, can't wait to try it. I hope you'll love it as much as I love it. Okay, so let's try the Xiao Jiao You Rou Si first. Oh, so excited. First meal of the day. This is why I love this channel. I love showing you guys this authentic cuisine. First of all, I get to eat. And then, you know like, you go to some place and you're like, this is so good, I gotta tell people about it. Well, I get to tell you guys about it. That's his passion. It's very soft. Oh, spicy. Is it hitting you? Whoa, Chen, I don't know. What's your tolerance on the spice meter? No, but I can take it. It's very spicy, it kicks in. But it's nothing crazy. It's so good. Like you said, beef is super tender. Oh, that spice is hitting me. It's the seeds. It hits you, like you bite it, you don't think, you chew a couple times. It hits you. Oh. It's not only that it's spicy, it's really flavorful. And that's what I really like about this dish. A lot of times I get this dish somewhere else, I can't really even eat it with rice, because it's not that flavorful. This, need some rice. It's good. Are you a rice lover? I love rice. I can eat anything with rice. Without rice, I don't know. Thank you. You gonna try a pepper? Oh my god, two? I'm living dangerously here. I see some seeds there too. This is crazy. And all we got is hot tea. It's not too bad. Oh my god. This is like my, every single meal I have is like spice level 12. One of my favorite dishes here. One of the best ways I ever had this dish cooked. If you love spicy food, this is it. So this dish, beautiful, different types of cured meats, it's very bright with the red pepper, it's got red green, the smell of the fermented black beans. I, you know, you never had that. I never eat with someone who never had fermented black beans before, so I'm excited to see your take on this. Why does it feel like, for some weird reason, I feel like I don't like it. It's not gonna taste better. Fermented black beans, it's got a very unique flavor, and it brings out the essence of the meats and the pepper. I just made all that up. No, no, no, I'm serious. Fermented beans with beef. It's actually really good. Oh my god, it's good. I love Chinese cured meat. It's like a jerky, but it's not like crazy tough. But it's got a lot of chewy texture to it. I'm gonna try the cured pork. Tian doesn't eat pork, I'm gonna try this for us. I'm missing out? Am I missing out? Your life is not complete, Tian. Best piece of bacon you'll ever have. The fatty part, it's not gonna melt in your mouth, because it's cured, so it's a little chewy. But as you chew, the juice oozes out from the fat. It's like this little porky sauna in your mouth, My tongue is now relaxing. It's full of flavor. I'm having the best day ever. Tian, let me ask you, because you're Tibetan, what is Tibetan food like to you? I would say it's very similar to the food, because Tibetan food mostly got influence from India and Nepal, so the spice and, you know, the meat. So it's pretty spicy? It's pretty savory, a lot of meat? Yes. What kind of meat do you guys eat the most? If I was living in Tibet, I would be eating yak meat. Yak meat? Oh man! You mean those cute little creatures that run really quick? I can't eat cute things, that's why I stick with pork and meat. They're not cute. I'm asking because, Tian, you're gonna take me to Tibetan food, coming up, so we're gonna do a Tibetan food video. I've always wanted to do it, because I've been to Tibetan restaurants, and I literally have no idea what to get. But you're gonna actually take me and show me some awesome dishes, so I cannot wait for that. But we have another dish here, guys. This is the highlight of our table right now. And a must-get when you come here. When you come to this restaurant, you tell them, you say, I want a whole roasted fish in a bin. And this is what they're gonna give you. And you can see here, there's potatoes, there are peanuts, there's sweet potatoes, there's onions, and you can even request more veggies in here, like mushrooms, and underneath all the goodness, let me show you guys, is the fish. There it is, whole fish under here. Tian, because I understand that you haven't had a lot of Chinese food, authentic Chinese food, is this the first time you had a whole fish sitting in front of you? Yes. I was expecting actual fillet. Nah, that's not how we do it. Authentic Chinese food, we need the whole fish, because sometimes you're lucky with me, because I don't do this, like sometimes, some people just attack the hip, that's how they eat. Eyeballs, brain, like, Must get when you come here, one of their specialties, there's a special secret ingredient they tell me that they put in here, they won't tell me what it is, they put it on a steamy hot pot for you, so it doesn't get cold, and the vegetables are soaked with the spice, soaked with the fish flavor, try a little bit. It almost tastes like like those Mexican Chipotle. This is literally one of my favorite dishes they have here. This is not my first fish, but I normally don't eat fish, so we'll see how it just goes. Surprisingly, it doesn't have that really strong fish taste to it. It tastes like chicken. Fish tastes like, well, here it might, because they use so much seasoning, you're not gonna get the fishy flavor or anything like that. Well, I'm glad you're able to try new things today, because this is how we do it. Wanna try a fish eyeball? No, thank you. Wanna see me eat one? No, actually I can't eat one myself, I can't do that. People do that and freak me out. Come here tomorrow, wherever you are in the world, and get this fish. If you like fish, this is like the mecca of fish dishes right here, isn't it? God, it's so good. Every bite you take, every bite you take of this fish, you know, dip it in the hot oil, spicy, it's fragrant, there's a mix of flavor in here that's like a little sweet, a little salty, it's just perfect. It's like the perfect harmonization of flavor in each bite of this fish. You know what? I'm glad I don't eat fish, I can eat this all by myself. You try the potato? It's very soft. It's gonna be very soft. Hints of cumin flavor, absolutely phenomenal. If this is how veggies taste, bring me a salad just like that. Yes. I was just gonna say that, yes. Because usually like salad tastes like, you know, grass. It's very blunt. I mean, I like to see myself as above the food chain of a cow. We're down to our final dish, and this smells so good. This is a very simple dish, and they told me it's no MSG, no like crazy ingredients. It's really just braised natural flavor of the chicken in a special broth. Veggies are very simple. They look like potatoes, but they're actually turnips. It's not very spicy. This is gonna be very explicit. It doesn't look spicy at all. No. It's gonna be very focused on the natural flavor of the chicken. I never had this before, so I can't really tell you guys about this until I try it. And I love how they bring this stuff out to you. Yeah. Look how creative this is. And it's not even just like a simple setup. This is like a, like literally someone nailed this box together for this dish. They had a DIY for this. Yo, we need to do a YouTube how to build a hot pot box video. It's deep. It's not like that's it. It's like, it goes in. A lot of veggies on the bottom. A lot of chicken flavor in that radish thing. The antennae is burning up in her mouth. Have some of this. Are you crying? I mean, are you crying because the dish is so good? It was very hot. You gotta work on your I gotta blow it more. Yeah, you gotta burn it up more and let the skin recover. I have a lot of experience. I just shove these in my mouth. I'll shove a boiling soup dumpling in my mouth. My mouth is like destroyed. I can put whatever I want inside. Let's try the chicken. It looks bloodier than regular chicken. There's a lot of subtle flavors in this. And usually chicken like, you know, chicken tastes like whatever. But this, as you chew it I feel like the ingredients of the soup I feel like it really mixed it in there. These are some of the dishes that we definitely recommend trying when you come here. One more dish that we did not get to eat because I got it last time is the cumin sesame pork ribs that are absolutely amazing. I did a video just to focus on that. But definitely give this place a try guys. Yes. This is a must. I'm surprised that I'm missing out on some of these foods. Especially the spicy ones. Oh my god. It's amazing. You guys have to come and honestly try it out. And this is your first time eating authentic Chinese food ever. Yes. That's crazy. Thank you so much. That's why I wanted to take you here. Because, you know, people who've never had authentic Chinese food, you gotta try it because there's so many things to try all across China. This is definitely on my must try list. Come here. Get the spicy pork ribs. Get the fish. Get those two dishes we had. Little pepper beef. Get the mixed cured meats. I've been to basically every single authentic Chinese restaurant in New York City. This place is one of the most authentic places. One of the best tasting places I have ever had. And they also do DIYs. If you didn't tell. These guys are crafty. I would say my favorite one is the spicy beef. I don't know what it's called. The one with the pepper? Yes. The one that made you almost cry? Yes. But it was really good. So if you guys are spicy lovers, come here and get that dish. I have all the dishes listed for you guys Their address is below. Try this place out. Thank you all so much for watching. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me. And you'll see her again when we go east on Tibetan food. Yes. Are we going to eat yak? Who knows? We're going to go explore for yak meat. I might be a little hesitant about that. I'm not really sure. Alright guys, thank you so much for watching. See ya.