Lucky Strike

I’d had a boring day and my dinner buddy Michelle’d had a tiring day filled with bad conference food, so we were up for a)eating out, b)exceptional food, and b)something interesting. On all three counts, I could not have chosen better than Lucky Strike, a tiny outpost of Szechuan cuisine out at SE Powell and 122nd.

The bright shining stinging burning star of the two-page menu is the Hot Pepper Chicken Bath–small bits and pieces of chicken fried with plenty of garlic and chile and Sichuan pepper, tossed with bright green chopped scallions, and then covered in a “bath” of glistening blood-red dried imported chiles. It’s dangerously spicy and almost too good-looking to eat, kind of like George Clooney.

Lucky Strike’s approach to exterior aesthetics could probably be best characterized as “Curb appeal? We don’t need no stinkin’ curb appeal.” The restaurant is located in a slightly ramshackle, rather shady-looking building along busy SE Powell, and we watched bug-eyed as a belligerent fellow swaggered past the seedy cigarette store next door, pulled a 24-ounce can of Tecate out of his pocket, popped it open right there on the sidewalk, and downed it.

“We’re not in the Pearl anymore, Dorothy,” I told Michelle, who was staring at a huge black van inching towards us as it settled into a parking spot on the narrow asphalt strip between Lucky Strike and the street. “Stranger Danger!” she squeaked, and we hustled inside.

Warmth enveloped us as we stepped into the tiny well-scrubbed restaurant. It’s not fancy by any means–the furniture is cheap, there are soda coolers and televisions in the dining room, a lint brush sits upright on the bar next to the Keno cards, and the scuffed black and white linoleum reminds you of your first college apartment, the one that made your mom tear up the first time she visited–but the dining room is clean, tidy and carefully arranged, and there are cheery touches like the brightly colored plastic Ikea cups that come with the chilled wine bottles filled with water, and owner Rita You is so sweet and pretty and friendly, you instantly feel at home.

I could hear something sizzling mightily in the kitchen behind the small bar, and the air was heavy with the acrid smell of peppers, prompting a near-immediate sneezing fit. We settled into one of the five no-frills tables for four, which in addition to a larger table for 8 and a few bar seats, comprises the extent of Lucky Strike’s seating.  A large television hanging from the ceiling blared the evening news, and a teenager eating with his mother at the corner table played a loud drum solo with his chopsticks.

“I want something spicy,” I said, my nose still tingling. “I want a beer,” Michelle said mournfully, still watching the black van mistrustfully. We ordered “bottomless” cups of chrysanthemum tea and a TsingTao from the list of eight Asian beers and surveyed the menu of authentic Szechuan (aka Sichuan) fare, a cuisine that is characterized by its fiery garlicky spiciness, pungent flavors, and use of the mouth-numbing spice Sichuan pepper, enough of which can mimic the tingly insensate effects of a shot of novocaine, but without the nasty drooling. Hopefully.

For the less adventurous, the menu offers a few recognizeable dishes like Pineapple Fried Rice, Orange Chicken, and Kung Pao Chicken, which is labeled “traditional Sichuan dish reclaimed,” and weenies are mocked, er, accommodated with a section entitled “On the Safer Side.”

Then things get interesting. Enter the Crispy Pig Intestine, Pickle Fish Bowl, Spicy Pork Ears, “Thousand Year Old Egg” with garlic and the pickled peppers of Peter Piper fame, and the cold Spicy Jelly Fish Salad–a tangle of long, thin, ragged translucent ribbons of jelly flesh, tossed with crisp stalks and bold green leaves of Chinese celery, chopped fresh garlic, scallions, and a generous sprinkling of red chile pepper. Biting into them, there’s a distinct gelatinous crunch as your teeth penetrate the noodle-like strips, and as you chew them, this crispy crackling sensation does not diminish. It’s both fascinating and disconcerting. And hot.

Slightly less dramatic dishes include delicious tender Guinness pork ribs in a sweet soy glaze, Spicy Seafood Noodle Soup with a rich, creamy broth reminiscent of cioppino or bouillabaisse, and a mellow plate of gingery, gently flavorful sauteed baby bok choy that’s refreshingly unsearing to a shell-shocked palate. The twice-cooked pork has thick slices of tender, meaty pork belly tucked in with slick and shiny bright green Chinese chives that have a beautifully mild, almost spinach-like flavor, a punch of fresh chopped ginger, squishy salty little fermented black beans, and of course, pepper, and more pepper.

But the bright shining stinging burning star of the two-page menu is the Hot Pepper Chicken Bath–small bits and pieces of chicken fried with plenty of garlic and chile and Sichuan pepper, tossed with bright green chopped scallions, and then covered in a “bath” of glistening blood red dried imported chiles. It’s dangerously spicy and almost too good-looking to eat, kind of like George Clooney.

That night, the crowd was eclectic, a mixture of neighborhood folks and fans from afar. Once the aspiring drummer left, he was replaced by a lone man with a staring disorder, a couple with an appallingly loud kissing disorder, and a girl who smuggled in her little black shitzu in her laptop case. Between our fellow diners and the big television’s programming change from news to Inside Edition, we could have been entertained all evening, but alas it had been a long day, and it was time to ask for dessert (they don’t have dessert right now), play a quick game of video poker (through the swinging doors across from the bathroom), and start the long trek back home.

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