Create Your Own Stir Fry
Jun. 26th, 2008
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By Dana McMahan
FoodConnect Louisville
dana@foodconnect.com
Many of us have tried the “Mongolian grill” at our local Chinese buffet restaurants. You choose from a few ingredients, plate them and hand them to one of the guys at the grill. A few sizzling minutes later you get a fresh plate of piping hot cooked food. It’ll do to fill your belly, but I’ve never had a meal there I was excited about.
Then one day driving down a strip-mall lined highway in Flint, Michigan with my husband, we caught sight of a restaurant sign we didn’t recognize. It was lunch time and bd’s Mongolian Grill looked more fun than the generic restaurants nearby.
As it turns out, bd’s is a chain too, but it’s a chain I will happily eat at. They recently opened a restaurant in Louisville and we scoped it out with friends their first weekend.
The concept is the same as at your Chinese restaurant, but executed with a bit more finesse. Two constantly-replenished food stations offer a wide selection of both meat and seafood and fresh vegetables. And they get bonus points in my book for offering the veggie diner a lower price.
It’s easy and fun. Load your shallow bowl with as much of the uncooked food as you like (my husband can make quite a tower of his). On my last trip I went for shrimp, bay scallops, “crab,” edamame, water chestnuts, broccoli, squash, green onions, carrots, tofu and bok choy. I guess I’m getting good at the tower too.
Then you get to exercise your creativity at the sauce station. I recommend 2 scoops peanut sauce, 1 scoop ginger sauce and half a scoop chili garlic sauce. Join the crowd around the 7-foot grill where “grill masters” will rapidly stir fry your dinner on the 600° grill. Back at the table your waiter will bring brown or white rice (and tortillas, which I haven't figured out yet -- maybe if you really love carbs!)
It’s not fine dining, and the raucous sound effects – cheering and gongs from the grill crew, loud pop music – can be a bit much. But it makes for a fun evening and is one of the few options I know of to load up on so many fresh, whole foods at a restaurant. Go Mongo!
It’s easy and fun. Load your shallow bowl with as much of the uncooked food as you like (my husband can make quite a tower of his). On my last trip I went for shrimp, bay scallops, “crab,” edamame, water chestnuts, broccoli, squash, green onions, carrots, tofu and bok choy. I guess I’m getting good at the tower too.
Then you get to exercise your creativity at the sauce station. I recommend 2 scoops peanut sauce, 1 scoop ginger sauce and half a scoop chili garlic sauce. Join the crowd around the 7-foot grill where “grill masters” will rapidly stir fry your dinner on the 600° grill. Back at the table your waiter will bring brown or white rice (and tortillas, which I haven't figured out yet -- maybe if you really love carbs!)
It’s not fine dining, and the raucous sound effects – cheering and gongs from the grill crew, loud pop music – can be a bit much. But it makes for a fun evening and is one of the few options I know of to load up on so many fresh, whole foods at a restaurant. Go Mongo!
Dana has eaten her way from Inverness to Istanbul, and from Monaco to Morocco. A food and travel writer, she lives to explores the world and tell stories of foods discovered and meals devoured in far-flung lands. She once hand-carried a tagine across three continents in order to recreate a Moroccan feast, her backpack smells of spices, and she has been known to smuggle butter home from Paris. Her most recent adventure was learning all about the duck at Camp Confitt in Gascony, France. When at home in Louisville she dishes on restaurant news for her column in the Courier Journal.
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