After living in the US for more than 10 years now, I feel that I am also looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. I am not religious, but I like the joyful, harmnious, and just plainly nice spirit these holidays bring. The Chinese equivalent version would be the lunar New Year holiday.

On Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve/Day, there is usually a feast for the whole family and people eat a lot. Therefore I thought it is a good time for me to share my favorite Chinese restaurants in Chicago with you.

As you can see from my first post, I grown up in a small rural village in Northern China. Nobody had refrigerators at the time, even for city folks. So to preserve food longer, we pickle vegetables and stir-fry meat, usually pork, with a lot of salt. Having pork in a meal was heaven on earth to me at the time. So I like salty, hot, and spicy food. I actually eat and enjoy the red, dried chili pepper that people use to cook a good Kong Pao chicken. However, the places I recommend all have many choices of different dishes. So don’t worry if you have mild taste. All places below offer authentic Chinese food, in my view.

1. Ed’s Potsticker House
3139 S Halsted
Chicago
312-326-6898
This place is located outside the center of Chinatown on Halsted. It serves a lot of North and Northeast Chinese dishes.

2. Mandarin Chef/Lao Sze Chuan
2172 S Archer Ave
Chicago
312 326 5040
Located in Chinatown, across the street from Walgreens, this place specialize in SiChuan cooking. It can be pretty hot and spicy. It also has one in Downers Grove.

3. Spring World
2109 A.S. China Place, Chicago, IL 60616
312.326.9966
http://www.springworldrestaurant.com/
Again, located in Chinatown, not too far from the square where they have statues of the 12 Chinese zodiac animals, this place specializes in Southwest China cooking, YunNan and SiChuan style.

4. Dragon King
Dragon King Restaurant
2138 S. Archer Ave.
312-881-0168
Again, located in Chinatown, not too far from the square where they have statues of the 12 Chinese zodiac animals, this place specializes in North and Northeast Chinese dishes. One particular thing I like is called Lao Hu Tsai. Consider it as a vegetarian salad with a punch.