Modern China

As you can tell from my last name, I do have some Chinese blood running through my veins but this doesn’t mean I love eating Chinese food! In fact, I hate it! They all taste the same! Almost all chinese restaurants serve the same food, same name, and same old crappy yucky crap they thought all of us Filipinos love!

But then comes “Modern China”… A restaurant owned by one of the most enthusiastic foodie I’ve met in my lifetime, Mr. George Pua. His love for food is nothing compared to other restaurateurs out there. He knows his stuff probably as good as he knows his wife and kids. His excitement for food led him to opening his restaurant in 2005. With great knowledge about Chinese cuisine because of his extensive travels abroad, he and his experienced native Chinese chefs were able to come up with flavors nothing like other Chinese restaurants out there have! The taste, the aroma, the texture, the spices… ummmm! You’ll be begging for more even just by browsing through the pictures in their menu!

Oh, and one more thing, if what you want is not in the menu and its something their chefs can do, you can request for it! How’s that for customer satisfaction?! You really get what you want! I did!

MODERN CHINA

G/F Glorietta 4, Ayala Avenue, Makati City

 

by Sam Lim

CHINESE-FILIPINO restaurateur George Nocom Pua can talk for hours about Chinese food? how it should be done, where to source unique ingredients, how to distinguish the authentic from the trendy.

Listening to him makes you crave for something braised or deep-fried with a soy-sesame-chili dip. Then he serves his food and, after a few bites, you understand where such passion is coming from.

Pua manages Modern China Restaurant on the ground floor of Glorietta 4?a fine-dining concept established in 2005. The Economics and Business Administration graduate from De La Salle University has no culinary background, but calls himself ?very matakaw? and finds joy in creating Chinese food.

Modern presentation

?Modern China is all about genuine Cantonese cuisine. We don?t temper it for the Filipino palate because Pinoys like it as is. The ?modern? part comes in the presentation,? he says during our recent interview.

He takes care of everything?the menu, interiors, pricing. He comes in on weekends to oversee operations and give suggestions to diners.

On a budget? He suggests the Family Value Meal menu, a full-course meal that starts at over P3,000 for six persons.

?The place could be intimidating?that?s the first thing diners should overcome,? he says.

Modern China looks like a HK restaurant?predominantly black, red and white with oriental accents; with round, lazy Susan-topped tables for a family feast. On a wall is a catchy blown-up image of the Beijing National Stadium or ?Bird?s Nest,? where the 2008 Olympics was held.

Specialties

For those looking for a place to celebrate Chinese New Year in, check out Modern China?s specialties. A separate dim sum/appetizer menu has spinach shrimp dumpling, shrimp pork siomai, hakaw, spareribs tausi, chicken feet. It also includes noodle dishes like beef brisket and roast duck noodles; seafood shrimp congee; curry beef tripe, healthy wheat bun; buchi.

Pua says the secret to coming up with ?real? Chinese dishes is to get a ?real? chef.

?I travel to China and HK for my other business, so I take the opportunity to try out the restaurants, from the hawker to the big ones. When I chance upon a really good cook, I take him here. It?s tricky, but it?s the only way to have the best.?

He has three chefs for the restaurant.

Pua suggests the following meal: Start off with the Golden Mountain Beancurd Seafood and Salted Egg, a thick, yellow, chunky soup, and a Dim Sum Platter.

Next, the tender Beef Short Ribs?a recipe from his mother, which is his favorite, and perfect with Yang Chow fried rice (also a hit with the kids).

There?s also the Lobster with Cheese and Egg Noodles, which might remind you of carbonara; Sesame Fried Chicken, whole sesame-coated deep-fried chicken (it takes a whole day for the seeds to stick); Chili Shrimps on a stick served on a bed of toasted peppers, fried so crispy you could eat the shell as well as the peppers.

Non-spicy dishes

All items in the menu have no MSG, and most of the spices and ingredients are from Hong Kong and China, such as the fragrant white, red and green peppers reminiscent of our local labuyo but with a milder hotness.

There are non-spicy dishes, but most are rich and flavorful so diners on a diet should come here on their ?cheat day.?

Make room for pork items like the Suckling Pig, Pork BBQ Platter, Crispy Pork (a take on the lechon kawali), Crispy Pork Intestines, Oven-Baked Pork Ribs.

Other items on the colorful menu with photos are Stewed Chicken with Wine Sauce, Braised Goose Feet in Abalone Sauce, Peking Duck (can be ordered in half), White Chicken, Red Hot Fried Chicken, Pan-Fried Snowflake Beef Steak, Short Rib Beef Steak.

Non-meat items include Stir-Fry Prawns in Sweet Sauce, Grilled Cuttlefish, Wasabi Cod Fish, Vermicelli Hotpot Crab, Steamed Lapu-Lapu with Soy Sauce, Fish Head Casserole; Mixed Vegetables, Jelly Fish, Black Mushroom, Soyed Tofu and Abalone dishes.

Ice cream can be had for dessert, as well as sweet items on the dim-sum menu like Savory Mango Puff, mango jelly in flaky pastry?best eaten while still hot; Green Tea Cake; and Coconut Bean Pudding.

Being in a mall has always been a challenge, adds Pua, who also manages Tomy Roma?s ribs and steak house, also in Glorietta 4. The 110-seater restaurant is open during holidays; P100 rice bowl meals are also available for takeout for a minimum of 25 orders.

Visit http://modernchina restaurant.yolasite.com. Call 7528728, 7528729 or 0922-8770091 for reservations.

Peking Duck

Peking duck, 2.8-3 k a piece

Iodized salt

Sugar

Chicken powder

Spices

Ginger powder

Turmeric powder

Ginger

Garlic

Onion

Star anise

Choco ball

Laurel leaves

Mei Kwei Lu

Sesame oil

Marinate duck in the spices. Blanch the duck. Pour some vinegar/glucose/wine and lemon. Hang duck and let it air-dry for at least two hours. Put duck into roasting oven for about 45 minutes or until golden brown and crispy.

In a separate casserole, boil oil, then pour on the Peking duck. Serve hot.

Steamed Lapu-Lapu Emperor

Lapu-lapu

Chinese ham

Bamboo shoot

Black mushroom (shiitake)

Egg white

Salt

Sugar

Chicken powder

White pepper powder

Sesame oil

Clean and fillet lapu-lapu. Sauté Chinese ham/bamboo shoot. Add the rest of the ingredients.

In a baking dish, mix egg white and pour in the sautéed mixture. Put lapu-lapu fillet on top of the mixture.

Steam for 30-45 minutes. Serve hot.

 

By Irene C. Perez
Philippine Daily Inquirer

George Pua is a funny and lovable restaurateur who is a BFF or Best Friend Forever of mine. Or should I say Best Friend in Food.

Naturally, I met him during a food event — the opening of his Tony Roma’s restaurant some 15 years ago. I am not a steak fanatic, but nonetheless we have become good friends. First of all, he never runs out of amusing stories. More importantly, he never runs out of delicious food.

Laughter and food are great stress busters, so I often drop by his Modern China restaurant in Glorietta 4 whenever I want to relax before a busy day. We had not seen each other for months, so when I visited George recently, he made up for lost time by treating me to a stress-busting food-tasting session.

George is a natural cook who will whip up a dish at the mere mention of ingredients that you like. “Cooking is something that you have to like,” he reminds me.” You either like it or not. It is a gift that is sharpened over the years, and in my case, it was honed through frequent traveling and eating everywhere, from holes-in-the-wall to grand restaurants.”

George learned to cook at the age of 10 by just observing his mother and his grandmother, who came from Xiamen. “I only have two passions — good food and rubber shoes, which I collect.”

Rubber shoes are what he wears all the time, especially when exploring eating places in China, Singapore, Thailand and Hong Kong. George has this habit of ordering as many dishes as he can when dining at an interesting restaurant, just so he can discover more new flavors, and then try cooking these at home.

At a recent food trip in China, he loved a certain dish so much he couldn’t resist going back the next day. Instead of trying to memorize the ingredients and flavor, however, George decided he should do the next best thing — hire the chef! That chef, along with three others, now form the powerful kitchen crew of his Modern China restaurant. And that certain dish George liked is the Chinese equivalent of our lechon kawali, one of his many bestsellers at present. Modern China is a favorite of Makati businessmen, foodies, local Chinese and our own Chinese Embassy diplomats.

With its walls carrying picturesque views of the Expo in Shanghai and the Olympics in Beijing, eating at Modern China reminds you of your excellent dining experiences in these cities.

My taste buds went on a nostalgic mode when George served a soup that warmed my heart and my tummy — spinach with mushroom soup with just the right addition of crab.

Then came deboned “emperor’s fish” he calls it — exquisitely served on a bed of steamed egg white. So exquisite, it melts in your mouth.

Then still another stress buster: skewered shrimps with just the right chili flavor. How do you manage to have your seafoods so fresh? I ask George. He points the answer to me — his aquarium of live fish, shrimps and crabs.

The crabs came so perfect, so deliciously fried with salted eggs! So delicious I had forgotten to try an assortment of siomai dim sum (priced from P60 up) that are also  Modern China bestsellers. My favorites are the spinach dumpling and the shrimp hakaw, although everyone else’s favorite is the xiao long bao, the soupy pork dumpling.

Popular choices of Modern China regulars are the suckling pig with seafood rolls and chicken bacon cheese rolls (only P780 per half order), the sesame fried chicken and the honey garlic spareribs (only P280). For all day-dining, George says congee and noodle dishes are tops.

A side dish, which George didn’t expect to be such a hit — because it was meant to be just a usual offering on the table — is Modern China’s peanuts, now selling hot at P100 per take-home order.

Vegetarian dishes occupy two full pages in Modern China’s menu, thank God. My super favorites are the beancurd spring roll and the fried beancurd. Both are crispy and utterly the best in town.

For dessert, the durian puff was so refreshing. And so was the watermelon sago (an innovation by George for those who may want something other than the usual mango sago).

For a change from my usual green tea, I chose the genmaicha, which is roasted brown rice tea. What a clean, invigorating taste.

I left Modern China feeling so energized, so happy, so less stressed. Now you know why George Pua is a BFF.

LIFE & STYLE By Millet M. Mananquil