And the winner is......
The "Golden Horse Award" is the Chinese version of the Academy Award, a representation of the best achievements of the year, according to those who are in the know. A pointless bit of trivia really, until we visited the Golden Horse restaurant in Weiser a couple of days ago, and I was somehow able to make a connection. Or a dis-connect, rather.

The Golden Horse offers both Chinese and American food. The Chinese section of the menu comprises two full pages, with a large variety of combination menus, and vegetable, chicken and seafood dishes. The American backpage offers eggs, omelettes, sandwiches, seafood and steak and chops, and also has a senior and a children's option.

We were seated promptly upon entrance, in pink skai booths, and barely having taking in our surroundings we are presented with a large carafe with water and two glasses: "Here, have some water", quips the waitress with a smile before she dashes off, only to return ten seconds later with the menu cards. As it is later in the evening and we're hungry, we quickly scan over the Chinese combo menus and go for number 9, priced at $8.60 a person. It promises us Golden Horse salad, pork and seeds, fried chicken drumlets, chicken and broccoli, fried shrimp, pork fried rice and sweet and sour pork.

Within minutes we receive hot tea, and the first course of our dinner. The Golden Horse salad is a tasteful, crisp combination of thinly sliced celery, lettuce, carrots, radishes and pork and tossed in a very light mayo-vinaigrette, topped with seasoning. We dig in, happy to comfort our hungry stomachs with such a pleasant, light dish. After we finish, we nibble on our pork and seeds, as our dishes are removed and space is made on the table for the rest of the dishes that all arrive at once. To our horror, three out of the five dishes are deep-battered and deep-fried. When I cut open one of the sweet and sour pork balls that are served with a home-made sauce, the ratio of batter to chicken was 3-1. Not fun. The deep fried shrimp suffered a similar, though slightly less battered, fate. The drumlets had not escaped the dough dance either: reminiscent of miniature caramel apples on a stick, sitting on the plate were six golden colored batter balls. Protruding from each is, almost obscenely, a large, dry, naked chicken bone.

Our stomachs do a double flip, so we decide to focus on the rest of the meal, and gladly so. The pork fried rice was excellent: a brown colored rice, seasoned with soy sauce and jeweled with various colors of ingredients. The chicken and broccoli dish is pleasantly refreshing, with succulent pieces of chicken, crisp broccoli and added mushrooms and onion, all in a light binding sauce.

Our final veridict for the evening was that the vegetable and rice dishes most definitely deserved an honorary recommendation for Award of the year, but to keep still about the deep fried faux pas.    [11 Mar 2006 20:00:04]

Food:    Service:    Ambiance:    Overall: 
Recommended Dishes: Golden Horse Salad, Chicken and Broccoli, Pork Fried Rice

     ­Paul B, Ontario, OR   restaurantreviewer at hotmail dot com