Your experience of Chiang’s depends on which menu you order from: the American one or the real menu, which has dishes like “Fried Pig’s Intastine” [sic]. If you settle for the weak American menu, you’ll get dishes that are either overly sweet, too greasy, or too salty—and, worse still, you’ll miss out on Chinese classics like “Bean Curd Sheets Roll” and “Fried Tofu of Strong Odor” (stinky tofu, which is not bad, though not as good as at Henry’s Taiwan). The “Shepherd’s Purse Bun,” in spite of the singular usage and obscenely low prices, comes with two delightful puffy steamed buns filled with finely diced greens. Hot pots are also a good choice. Skip dim sum, though, which is mediocre compared to what you’d find in the I.D.

Despite some cool framed woodcuts—one of which features a red-robed, bearded man-beast described as “Chinese Santa Claus with a sword”—there’s that typical banquet-hall feel of a restaurant that bustles when busy and feels stale when quiet. Luckily, the former is more common; the flip side is that there’s nearly always a wait for a table, in part because this is the best option on the northside (that is, north below Richmond).