Mandarin in Bountiful: Farm-Fresh Flavors

The Mandarin in Bountiful, to me, is best in the summer.  The cuisine may come from China, but the veggies come from just up the road at Bangerter Farms. Every summer, the restaurant goes through about thousands of pounds of green beans, sugar snap peas, sweet corn, tomatoes, eggplant, zucchini, squash, bell peppers and chiles. (I found this out a couple of years ago when I interviewed one of the owners, Angel Skedros Manfredini. Her father, Gregory Skedros, founded Mandarin in 1977 with his wife, Jeni. Greg, a pharmacist, also owns  Mountain View Pharmacy in Bountiful. Now at 90, he still comes in to greet customers at the restaurant.)

My husband recently helped out a neighbor, and declined any payment.  So the neighbor brought over a gift card to Mandarin, probably realizing that we wouldn’t turn that down. He was right. That’s how we ended up there last Monday night.

My confession…I’m not always a fan of Chinese restaurants. It comes from a summer of waiting tables at a Salt Lake restaurant one that had serious sanitation issues. In fact, one night the owners were tipped off that the Board of Health was going to make a surprise inspection the next day, and they forced the whole staff to stay there til 2 a.m. scouring the place, tossing bad food, etc.  (Later on, one of their other restaurants DID get shut down by the Board of Health for a period of time.)  I saw some things that were pretty gross, and even though it was back in my college days, the experience stayed with me for a long time.

But,  Mandarin is one Chinese restaurant where I don’t feel that old anxiety. Back when I was a food ed at the Deseret News, we shot some photos in Mandarin’s kitchens for a Chinese New Year story. Everything looked clean and organized. I also happen to know that once a year they close the place down for a few weeks to give everything a thorough cleaning. I wish we could do that with our home kitchens!

Kim ordered Mongolian Beef, with sugar snap peas, onions and bamboo shoots in a savory dark oyster sauce with lots of garlic and soy. It was served over crispy rice noodles.

I had Cashew Chicken, loaded with fresh mushrooms, red bell peppers, sugar snap peas, green beans, and carrots in a flavorful soy-hoisin sauce.  Since the dishes come a la carte, we also ordered a dish of steamed brown rice to share. And, of course, we shared some of each others’ dishes. I especially loved the crisp-tender crunch of the fresh snap peas and green beans in my Cashew Chicken.

It’s interesting that for over 30 years — long before local farm-to-table food was trendy — the Mandarin has kept a relationship with Bangerter Farms. (Yes, these are the same farmers that successfully fought off an attempt to turn part of its Farmington acreage into soccer fields…keeping the farm in Farmington, so to speak.)

For the restaurant desserts, Angel told me buys apples and peaches from another Bountiful family, the Duncan Family Orchard; berries from Week’s Berry Farm in Paradise, and cherries from Woodyat Cherry Farm in Willard.

Over the years the Mandarin has amassed a lot of local and national awards. Some of my friends are loyal fans; others say it doesn’t taste “authentic” to them. I still remember the harsh criticism in 2006 by Mary Malouf, a Utah newcomer doing restaurant reviews for the Salt Lake Tribune. Many dishes tasted too sweet to her. But at the time, she wasn’t clued in to Utah’s sweet tooth. Now the editor of Salt Lake Magazine, over the years Mary gained a different perspective on the Mandarin. Last January,  she interviewed Greg Skedros during the Mandarin’s 40th anniversary. He told Mary how the restaurant ended up adapting some Chinese classics to suit customers’  tastes. For instance, when bowls of the hot-and-sour soup always came back to the kitchen with the fungus and lily buds uneaten, the recipe was adjusted.

I guess as restaurateurs, you have to decide if you want to be a stickler for being absolutely authentic, or if you’d rather have your 200-seat restaurant full of happy customers who don’t mind waiting for a table, because they love your food THAT much.

Besides, if restaurants were going to be truly authentic Chinese, they would have to do away with the ubiquitous fortune cookie, which are not a tradition in China.