Sinbala Restaurant in Arcadia

After my mom’s surgery she was craving some shaved ice from Sinbala so we went there instead of You and I sushi, I remember saying to myself that this place was subpar last time I went with my ex-girlfriend and hoped it was better this time around. I don’t know how this place has 4 stars on Yelp… it seriously was not that great but if you do want your fix of Taiwanese food here’s a good place to satisfy that craving. It is hyped up by many and is disappointing, just like Pink’s Hotdogs (but relatively Ok, Pink’s is NASTY).

This was SURPRISINGLY spicy and crisp.

Marinated Enoki Mushroom Salad

First off the cold appetizers came which consisted of spicy pickled cabbage and marinated enoki mushrooms. The spicy pickled cabbage was REALLY spicy compared to all the other versions I had and lacked the pickling bite I was so accustomed to. The marinated enoki mushrooms were soaked in a vinaigrette that was heavy with sesame oil but all in all it was pretty refreshing and good.

The sauce was packed with corn starch... but overall the egg was fluffy and the oysters weren't fishy.

Shortly after the cold dishes came the oyster omelet. Usually I don’t like this because most Chinese restaurants skimp out on the quality of the oysters thus resulting in a very fishy and ammonia-like oyster, but the oysters in this omelet were very mellow. It also had some unidentifiable pieces of gluten inside and the sauce was very corn starchy. Overall it was OK but this is not my favorite but my parents LOVE it since they grew up with it.

Super hot, crispy, and fresh!

After waiting for a bit finally one of my favorite snacks came, the fried chicken roll. It’s basically just a compilation of chicken and seasonings with a wrapping of tofu skin. The whole thing is deep fried and served with a sweet and sour sauce. The chicken roll had very little flavor but the thing about it that stood out was that it was really fresh and HOT, thus making something bland tasting seem somewhat more appealing. It was fried perfectly and was very crisp and not greasy.

Flavorless and the pork was very dry. This needed a LOT of help...

At least the noodles were cooked prefectly.

Next came my minced meat with noodles (gan ban mian) and it came with a lot of baby bok choy, a soy sauce hard-boiled egg, and a few slices of pork(which was super dry to say the least). The noodles needed a lot of seasoning since there was barely any flavor so I doused the noodles in some soy sauce… it was a very bland noodle dish, it had almost zero flavor whatsoever.

Very mellow with a hint of sweetness. I think the basil killed it though, it added a weird herbal note to the sausage.

A side of Sinbala sausage arrived. It was literally just a plain Taiwanese sausage covered in some gravy and a chiffonade of basil for $1.75, not too shabby, but I wouldn’t pay nearly 2 dollars for it. The sausage itself was not overly sweet and was very mellow in flavour. The basil added a weird herbal note to the sausage and was better off being left off of the sausage. There was nothing special about the sausage.

The Sinbala sausage plate.

My sister happened to order a whole plate of the sausages complete with minced meat rice, scrambled eggs, broccoli, and corn. I thought the best thing on the plate was ironically the scrambled eggs and not the sausage, the scrambled eggs had a very smooth gravy over it and it was very tender.

So sweet... but pretty good for a hot summer day!

For dessert my mom got some shaved ice. This stuff was SOAKED with condensed milk and brown sugar water, it was VERY sweet. Underneath all the sweetness was red bean, mango pudding, various jellies, and tapioca (boba).

Overall Sinbala was alright, nothing amazing or spectacular, but someplace where you can get your fill on some traditional Taiwanese eats. One reason why I thought (and my father) the food was mediocre was that we both grew up on authentic Taiwanese food, so we probably have a very high expectation and very hard to please palate for Taiwanese food.

Sinbala Restaurant

651 W Duarte Rd
Ste F
Arcadia, CA 91007

(626) 446-0886

~ by klyftonite on July 5, 2009.