East One Chinese Restaurant

For many of you, I'm sure you have seen East One in that viral Facebook post.  You know, the one claiming that they were serving up plastic rice?  Personally, I thought that was a crock of sh*t.  I've eaten then a few times and no, I did not eat any plastic rice.  In fact, this viral video was proven a hoax and indeed, there was no plastic rice served at East One.  This particular visit occurred just before "plastic-gate" where we went for a family meal including the grandparents.

We went for their build-your-own-meal for 5 which included soup, a bonus dish, rice and dessert for $75.88.  The first item to arrive was the "free" Half Chicken served with the usual ginger & green onion condiment.  Nicely gelatinized, the chicken skin exhibited an attractive hue (with the help of food colouring).  Underneath, the meat was succulent and tender while mildly seasoned.  That wasn't an issue as the condiment was pretty salty in itself.  Contrasting the chicken, the Scrambled Eggs & Shrimp was pretty pale and lifeless-looking.  No matter, as the eggs were fluffy with the right doneness.  The shrimp were large and buttery with a clean snap.  We found the dish mildly-seasoned.

Up next was my son's favourite dish being the Brisket & Daikon Hot Pot.  This came out sizzling and featured brisket which was actually tender and succulent.  Normally, brisket can turn out pretty dry and chewy, but this was on point.  Furthermore, the amount of sauce wasn't excessive while being nicely balanced.  I thought the daikon was just soft enough in texture, but was incredibly bland.  The brisket and daikon was probably cooked separately.  Although the Peking Pork Chops were also not particularly aesthetically-pleasing due to its pale hue (I guess I love food colouring), it ate better than it appeared.  The pork chops were tender and juicy while decently flavourful from the tangy and sweet sauce.  I would've liked to see a bit more crispiness from the exterior of the pork chops though.

I personally am not a fan of anything sauced in sweet mayo (maybe except ebi mayo), so I was already biased towards the Fried Fish with sweet mayo sauce.  However, it wasn't as revolting as I had envisioned.  First of all, there was a restrained amount of glaze, yet it was pretty sweet though.  Secondly, the fish was fried up beautifully being crispy while still flaky inside.  In fact, the crispiness held up to the sauce.  Our last dish was the Gai Lan with Beef.  Despite appearing vibrant, the gai lan was soft and lacked any crunch.  This was probably due to being blanched too long in baking soda water.  Other than that, the dish was nicely seasoned the beef was tender.  Overall, we enjoyed the meal at East One and it didn't break the bank.  No plastic rice too...

The Good:
- Decent eats
- Service has improved since Venice Garden
- No plastic rice

The Bad:
- Some dishes were a bit small
- Tables are squished together