Golden Wok

Golden Wok
www.goldenwokmsu.com/
2755 E Grand River Ave, East Lansing, MI 48823
(517) 333-8322
Mon. – Thurs.: 11:00AM – 12:00AM; Fri. & Sat. : 11:00AM – 2:00AM; Sun.: 11:00AM – 11:00PM

Golden Wok is probably one of my favorite restaurants in Greater Lansing.  I discovered this place when Googling “dim sum in Greater Lansing”.  On weekends over the lunch hours, Golden Wok serves dim sum (Cantonese for basically “order until your heart’s content”) in the traditional way out of wheeled steam carts tableside.  They offer all kinds of great small plates served piping hot to your table.  My favorites: siu mai (pork and shrimp dumplings) and shrimp with tofu with black bean sauce.  A usual dim sum lunch on the weekends is about $20-$25 for a family and it’s quite fulfilling.  Dim sum is served every day but it’s not served from the carts Monday through Friday  –  but you order off of a menu and it’s not quite the same as the weekend service.

Their menu is very straightforward and is decently inexpensive.  One of my favorite menu items is their house special pan fried noodles  –  crispy egg noodles with “krab” (you know, imitation crabmeat which is basically pollock painted with red streaks), beef, pork and chicken in a rich brown sauce.  Golden Wok also just recently acquired a liquor license (which I’m starting to find out is a hard thing to come by in Michigan) which is rare for most of the Asian restaurants that I’ve visited in my year and a half of living here.  I rather enjoy a glass of chardonnay with my Chinese food every so often and I can finally do that here at Golden Wok!

Asia’s Finest

Asia’s Finest
6445 S Cedar St, Lansing, MI 48911
Phone: 517-393-1688

Asia’s Finest serves up the holy trinity of Asian food: Thai, Vietnamese, and Chinese. It’s an odd combination, but it works. The meals are basic but it’s a cut above your standard Asian cuisine. If you look to be home-grown (in America, that is) the server will assume that you want your dishes mildly spiced. As you visit more frequently, you can work your way up to asking for a bottle of red pepper sauce.

The restaurant itself is in a strip mall in the convoluted mess where Cedar Street meets I-96. It is your standard strip mall ethnic dining establishment, complete with a faded overhead menu sign displaying pictures of their most popular dishes.

In the Vietnamese category, you will find a plethora of pho and beef and noodle dishes. For the Thai lovers they feature a variety of dishes that include Pad Thai and coconut curries. The Chinese is standard Chinese.