Recently I tried a "new" restaurant, P.F. Chang's. I quote new because the restaurant itself is hardly new. It's a chain that's been around for 30 years and has 300 stores worldwide. Likely there's one near you. And the one near me isn't exactly new to the neighborhood; it's been there for 24 years. Plus, I've been there before. Though my last visit, to it or any of its 299 sister stores, was about 23 years ago. Returning to try it out again fits my sort-of New Year's resolution a few years ago to try new restaurants— where "new" specifically includes places I haven't been to in a long time.

Why have I not been to P.F. Chang's in 23 years? It's not because I hated the food. I mean, I did dismiss it as overly Americanized, yuppie-fied Chinese fare. I live in an area where there is so much more authentic Chinese food available that going to a "Chinese" restaurant that's the same in Wichita, Kansas as Silicon Valley, California was laughable. It's the same reason as why sit-down chain restaurants are sparse in Silicon Valley and up the peninsula to San Francisco. See also, Try finding an Olive Garden here. But keeping in mind, "I'm not eating Chinese food so much as Chinese-ish food that's yuppie-safe and is the same in Wichita," I decided the local P.F. Chang's was worth another try.

So, how was it? In a word, Chinese-ish. 😂 I went with my spouse and two mutual friends. We ordered a variety of appetizers, sides, and mains to share. Everything was well prepared and attractive looking as it landed on the table. The flavors were a little bland, made suitable for Middle American palates, if a bit too salty (also suitable for Middle America). Basically it was exactly what I expected it would be: an Americanized facsimile of Chinese food, served in upscale fashion and with upscale prices. And I figure that's exactly why/how the chain succeeds. It gives people a safe, not too foreign, and slightly upscale experience with ethnic food. Plus, it's a date-night or nice-dinner-with-friends spot that's two steps classier than Chili's.

Would I eat there again? Sure. Not next week... but probably sooner than in another 23 years.


Edited to add: Funny story about how authentic— or not— P.F. Chang's is. When I was traveling to China frequently for my job in the late 00s/early 10s I showed my Chinese national counterparts online pictures and menus of some of the Chinese restaurants near me. It was a revelation to them as schools in China taught that nobody in the US speaks a Chinese language or knows anything about Chinese culture. I was curious for their opinion as they looked at menus and pictures from the restaurants, which looked the most Chinese to them? They all picked P.F. Chang's. Why? I asked. It turns out it's because the restaurant's website prominently displayed the words "Chinese Food", in Chinese, written traditionally in vertical orientation. Native Chinese thought that made it the most authentic. 😂

Northwest Return Travelog #7
Moscow, ID - Fri, 30 Jul 2021. 5:30pm.

This afternoon we took a slight detour on the way back from hiking Elk Creek. Instead of retracting our route directly back to Clarkston we angled due west for a while to the town of Moscow, Idaho. There was a gem shop Hawk wanted to visit there, and it seemed like a good place to find dinner sooner than getting back to Lewiston/Clarkston.

Moscow has a still-active old time-y downtown. It's a college town, so a constant stream of fresh energy— and especially, fresh money— has kept the town from rusting out the way most of Small Town America has.

Moscow reminds me of Chapel Hill, NC, where I was a graduate student. The town is part old time-y holdout, part arty bohemian cheap-chic, and part yuppie. Though last time I visited Chapel Hill (a few years ago) the yuppie stuff had overgrown the main street like kudzu in North Carolina's pine forests.

For dinner we picked a Mexican restaurant with sidewalk dining. That was important to us as Idahoans have largely stopped wearing masks. "It's optional," everyone says, pointing to the CDC guidance that says masks should be worn by everyone not fully vaccinated. The Idaho Panhandle is an area with less than a 40% full vaccination rate, yet the region's no-mask rate is over 90%. As one comedian recently quipped, "Somebody up in that bitch lyin'!"

Food at the restaurant was good, especially for being a) so far from the Mexican border and b) in a small town. Though that's kind of what we expected from a college small town, as opposed to a dying small town.

This past weekend Hawk and I visited a Whole Foods store. One's opened up recently in our downtown, a little over a mile from home. We were walking in the area and figured, "Why not?"

Why not is Because it's too expensive, normally. Whole Foods earned the nickname "Whole Paycheck" years ago for good reason. So many of their groceries are 1.5x to 2x the price at other grocery stores. As a result I'd only shopped WF maybe 4-5 times in the past 10 years; most of those times were to buy dinner at their food court when it was the best option in the area. Curiously their food court is not overpriced 1.5x to 2x.

I wasn't looking for food court food Sunday (I'd eaten lunch before our walk) but I figured I'd give the new store a walk-through anyway. First up inside was the produce department. Wow, that was a story of prices all over the map. Avocados were on sale and actually cheaper than other stores' regular prices. Meanwhile bell peppers were priced almost 3x what I buy them for at Trader Joe's. To be fair, WF's peppers looked better than TJ's, just not 3x better (not even close).

Next up was the cheese department. Yuppie cheese were similar in price to what I see at Safeway. ...Well, at the one Safeway in our area that has a yuppie cheese department. I grabbed a dish of spreadable cheese at full price because it was a variety I don't see carried at Yuppie Safeway.

Then there was the meat department. The butchered meats looked oh-so tasty... and they cost at least 50% more than the best prices I've seen elsewhere. One of those elsewheres, though, is Costco. Costco has some great quality meat, but a) the selection is narrow, just a few cuts at a time; and b) you've got to buy it in huge quantities. That Is The Way at Costco. For harder-to-find choices and just-the-two-of-us sized portions I might be willing to spend 1.5x on occasion.