When QQ Noodle first opened last April in Fremont, many bay area residents were excited to hear about a place that actually “hand-pulls” noodle (手拉面) from scratch. Since then, I’ve written about a few other places which offers fresh hand-pulled noodles, which are the domain of Shandong style restaurants. These included Four Seasons in West San Jose and Palace Chef in nearby Fremont. There are also many other Shandong restaurants that make the noodles by hand (though ultimately machine-press them during the last step, instead of pulling it).
QQ Noodle was unique in that they serve mainly noodle dishes and that’s it. They serve some of the common noodle items such as Da Lu Mian (打滷面; House Special Noodle Soup on the menu), Zha Jiang Mian (炸醬面; San Hao Soy Bean Paste Noodle) and Niu Rou Mian (牛肉面; Beef Stew Noodle Soup). But they also serve several other varieties of noodle items such as Tomato & Egg Sauce noodle, Sour and Spicy Pork noodle, etc.
This time I tried the Da Lu Mian and the Pork Chao Mian (肉絲炒面; Shredded Pork Chow Mein). Knowing that during our last visit, due to the texture of their hand-pulled noodles, it is better fitted for stir-fried items.
The Da Lu Mian was served with the “Lu”, the main ingredients, served atop the noodle. It was the right consistency, which can be best described as gooey and gloppy.
After mixing, it had a good flavor and was on the light side. The more common version uses a soy sauce based sauce. The ingredients included the standard pork and veggie strips, and the obligatory egg flower. The only minus was that the sauce could have been more plentiful, as it was not enough to cover/mix the whole bowl of noodles. (Grade: B+ )
The pork chao mian was just as I remembered from last time. It had a very good flavor and because of the stir-frying action, the flavor was able to get into the noodles. (Grade: A- )
Overall, it is a solid noodle house. I’m not too fond of their noodle soup items because the broth was not rich enough to penetrate the dense noodle. But it is commendable that they able to thrive on noodle items alone for this long in the SF bay area. And for the folks living around Thornton in Fremont, they have at least two nice hand-pulled noodle houses to choose from.
QQ Noodle (三好拉面)
3625 Thornton AveFremont, CA 94536
(510) 713-0228
I always love to see them adding vegetables to the big pot of boiling soup base behind the counter. I remember one time, I saw the server accidentally dropped a piece of chicken karage on the floor. He picked it up, put it back on the plate and served it to the customer! @_@ ever since then, I always take the table seating. Haha… (attempt#21)