Lei Garden, Washington, D.C.

Gung-Hay-Fat-Choy. That means "happy new year" in Chinese. The Chinese New Year started last night, and continues for a week. This is the first time I've lived in a city with a Chinatown and been here for the new year, so I went with a friend to Chinatown last night for dinner at Lei Garden. My friend is from Hong Kong, so I didn't have to do any of the ordering. There was this rapid exchange of conversation with the waiters in rather animated Chinese, and soon dishes began to appear.

Of course, I have no idea what some of the things were we ate, but they were all good. I particularly remember a scallop dish with snow peas and water chestnuts and a beef dish with hot peppers and bits of garlic and scallion mince with virtually no sauce. Another thing was a skewerful of salted, savory shrimp that was pretty tasty. The nice thing about ordering in Chinese, though, is our food was much more authentic, the sauces weren't sweet, and there wasn't much sauce either.