a face full of chinese

Face Cafe
301 E Valley Blvd
Alhambra, CA 91801
(626) 282-8899

price: $
verdict: it's aight

because i know english is your second language, i will not make fun of your name. in fact, i won't make fun of you much. you've pleasantly surprised me even in the face of your low yelpie reviews.

some family members and i came here for lunch today. the real draw is their super cheap breakfast of rice porridge and crueller for under $5. since i had the day off, waking up early enough for the breakfast deal was no lure...who cares about saving a few bucks! i look like a raccoon with my dark eye circles peoples! i need some sleep! if you have a big family, it will make your dollar stretch though during these hard economic times and still give you the freedom of eating out. no wonder there was a wait for tables.

anyways, we still managed to stretch our coins a bit for lunch. we started off with the innards of a cow, tripe and some other cow part with the "beef intestine" dish. it was chewy, soy saucey, but well executed. did it make me want to rip up a cow and eat more? no. did it taste good? yep. order it if you don't get squeamish about eating offal.

we also ordered the gailan (chinese broccoli) with dried salty fish. the dish was mainly gailan stems which is a rarity because that's the more "prized" part of the veggie. most places like to load you up with the leaves. the salty fish bits also gave it good flavor and a nice crunch. yum.

the third dish was beef chow fun. not oily, lots of beef strips and a good way to eat the meal without rice. but my most favorite dish were the one inch cubes of fried tofu mixed in spicy salt. i love the fact that i get a good fried crust with every bite. they weren't too oily either so it actually felt healthy...kind of.

i took pics...after eating half of each dish and THEN remembering that i should snap a photo. ahh, this raccoon was hongry today. not a bad place for lunch and with 3 milk teas, the total damage came out to be $33, tip included. i can't vouch for the other dishes, but the ones i ate were good. service ain't that great, but seriously, who goes to alhambra for service anyways? try face and save a few dollars while you're at it.