Spicy Way in Milpitas has Noodles in Chengdu Style, Chengdu Zhajiangmian, with a tablespoon or so of unseasoned minced pork, peas, peanuts, bok choy, chicken broth and chili oil. I didn’t pick up any numbing Szechuan peppercorns, and the flavor emphasis was more on the chicken broth, which was super savory and more pronounced than at Tofu Village, perhaps because of MSG, either way very good. I like the peas here much more than at Spicy Queen – – they were firm and creamy, but not starchy.
The Szechuan hot and sour yam noodles at Chili House in the inner Richmond were intense and tasty. The sourness was from pickle mustard (suan cai) and the spicy numbing liquid was topped with a thick coating of chili oil. Similar to “water boiled” beef, the bowl full of liquid acted as a sauce for the glass noodles, and isn’t intended for drinking like a soup. With each chopstickful of noodles, the force of gravity pulled the yam noodles down and clawed in a surprising amount of the sour chili broth.
Note that the hot and sour and yam noodles, with or without intestine, use yam noodles, and their pork intestine noodles use egg noodles.
