But while the food at the Chinese Restaurant proved to be predominantly Chinese American -- eight kinds of chop suey, five egg foo youngs (and no softly scrambled fu yung), egg rolls (and no Chinese spring rolls), and so on -- choosing carefully from menu and blackboard specials, the latter including close to a dozen Chinese-Peruvian chifa dishes, produced a pretty authentically Chinese, and very tasty, meal.
If starred ("highly recommended") Singapore rice noodle ($7.95) is typical, stick with the stars; it was terrific. Cantonese in cooking style but incorporating influences from India, Indonesia, and Malaysia, the dish featured a mountain of very thin rice noodles sautéed with everything but the kitchen sink: red peppers, green peppers, baby corn, celery, Chinese cabbage, onion, chicken, tiny shrimp, roast pork, and a few bits of what tasted like better pork roast (juicier, tenderer, and more flavorfully fatty). The noodles had a strong curry flavor and considerable heat, which worked well, the spiciness mouth-tingling but not mouth-numbing.
Also marked "hot," Szechuan chicken had barely a hint of fire, and compared with typical versions of this dish had a huge proportion of chicken to crunchy veggies. The chicken came in a $9 combination plate with good won ton soup (plenty of crisp greens and julienned pork, delicate won tons that were amply stuffed); an egg roll with an anise-heavy as well as otherwise off-flavored filling of minced meat; what was supposed to be one sparerib but was actually two huge, meaty, wonderful ribs; and pork fried rice that was strangely spartan, containing only a few small bits of rather dried-out meat and egg.
Why "strangely" is that the pork fried rice that came with a house special of almond duck ($8.50) was packed with juicy pork, light egg curds, diced onion, and bean sprouts -- excellent. The deep-fried duck itself was heavily breaded and rather tough (it's much easier to keep duck tender when long-cooked than when stir-fried, which is why it's most commonly roasted, braised, steamed, or smoked in China), but nicely flavored and topped with a generous amount of rich, nutty gravy.
Hot and sour soup to go was quite good, a budget-priced $2 half order so packed with pork and veggies that despite much less cornstarch thickening than usual, it made a substantial meal-in-a-bowl lunch the next day.