Hunan Taste - San Jose

This is the kitchen inside the small restaurant named Hunan Taste. This restaurant has been given accolades for its spicy Hunan style Chinese food for decades.

The family, from the Hunan region of China, came to San Francisco in the 60s to start a restaurant with the food they were familiar with in their homeland. By the early 70s they had two small restaurants in downtown San Francisco, known mostly for their food, not their size or interior design. A writer for the New York Times dined at one of their restaurants and immediately claimed it to be "one of the best restaurants in the world."

The family grew and several parts of the family left their original starting places in San Francisco. The elder eventually moved the 1st restaurant to another place in town and a brother and his wife started this restaurant in San Jose. It is by far the best Chinese food I have had and it has a very loyal following in San Jose. The restaurants in San Francisco have moved and one was sold to a distant relative, but they raised the bar for take out and small foot print Chinese restaurants in San Francisco. Not only did they raise the bar for quality, but they brought a very special part of the Hunan culture to America.

The food is spicy and not your normal sweet and sour pork or lemon chicken (although they did add their own version of lemon chicken to the menu a few years ago "for the children."). Items like smoked ham and green beans, or basil chicken have a taste and peppery flavor that is hard to describe. The menu is quite complete, but if you're going to try it, make sure you have a cold drink close by.

Simply tremendous food.

As I usually say, enjoy! If you get a chance, come to San Jose or San Francisco and look up Hunan Taste - you won't be disappointed.

Try large.