The Wife is now in charge of cooking dinners during the week. I am very grateful for her work in this area and she has been doing an excellent job picking new and interesting dishes we haven’t tried before while rolling in our tried and true favorites. By the time we walk in the door after she comes to get me from work, most everything is ready. Unfortunately on Monday when she was getting ready to prepare the Chicken Enchilada Casserole she found the chicken was not defrosted and there wasn’t enough time to get it done before cooking. I suggested she take the night off and we go out to eat. I offered up a few different options to her including some new places, one of which she ended up choosing…
Nha Sang in Burnsville is a pan-Asian restaurant located in the strip mall which houses Taqueria Hidalgo and sits across from the Burnsville Performing Arts Center. While I have passed Nha Sang numerous times, I was never particularly interested in the place, passing it off as another typical Chinese restaurant with a cheap lunch buffet. It wasn’t until a few months ago when I read a long forgotten article about Nha Sang which spoke of its Tibetan cuisine that my interest was again piqued. I added it to the “Must Do” list and begged MSPD a few times to join me–he never could clear his oh so busy schedule–figuring The Wife would never be up for the food. Well, after she looked over the menu and saw some traditional Americanized Chinese dishes she declared Nha Sang the winner and off we went.
When we arrived at around 7:15 on Monday we were the only people in the restaurant. It’s a cute little space painted a dark red with a good number of tables and some booths available as well. The lunch buffet equipment dominates the middle of the restaurant but it was tucked out of the way as best it could be for the evening. We were seated at a booth along the windows and the sole person in the front of the house provided us with menus and some time to look them over while he went to fetch our drinks.
The menu (it is a little outdated on their site as there were a few new items listed in the print version) is fairly small for an Asian restaurant of this type and offers dishes ranging from Thai to Vietnamese to Tibetan. The Wife wasn’t looking for anything adventurous that evening and stuck to the Americanized Chinese options while I decided to go with a Tibetan dish. With these ideas in mind we placed our orders for Cheese Wontons (6) for $3.37, Steamed Pork Potstickers (6) for $4.27, an order of Sesame Chicken with rice ($8.97), and an order of Tibetan style Shapta ($9.97).
The wontons and potstickers were out fairly quickly and were presented nicely. The wontons were light and crispy but had plenty of flavorful cream cheese oozing from the inside. While cream cheese wontons do little to excite me, especially when they’re served with the typical syrupy, mass-produced sweet and sour we were provided on Monday, I have to admit that for the price these were some of the best I’ve had in the area. The Rooster and The Wife were both big fans and they were polished off quickly.
The Steamed (also available fried) Pork Potstickers were served with a light and refreshing ginger vinegar soy sauce which rounded out the fairly flavorless appetizer. While I didn’t find anything terribly wrong with these particular potstickers, none of us were clamoring for more and there were definitely no fights over anything except to try more of the dipping sauce. The Wife noted that she’d be inclined to try them fried next time even if it meant having two fried appetizers at the table at the same time.
The Wife’s Sesame Chicken was a surprisingly large portion for the price. While I found the flavor to be lacking overall, The Wife was quite impressed and said she would definitely order it again in the future. She boxed up half and brought it home with her and while the leftovers held up very well, it still didn’t tickle my fancy. However, The Wife noted that while she’s tried Americanized Chinese options at both Classic Saigon in Eagan and at Saigon Palace nearby in Burnsville, neither of those places came close to this offering.
The Tibetan Style Shapta is described as, “sliced beef with onion, green scallions, jalapeño with a Tibetan style bread.” While I didn’t order it with rice, the server said he was going to bring me some as soon as he put it down on the table. While it comes rated as 3 of 4 peppers on their menu, I asked for it to come as hot as they could make it. The meal came out loaded with chiles and beef. The meat was tender and flavorful and the heat was enough to get my nose going. Honestly I went into the meal thinking it was going to be yet another mediocre Asian restaurant but I walked away pleasantly surprised with the quality of the food I was served and certainly the heat. This will definitely become a more regular stop for us based on my meal alone. Yum.
Overall I was really impressed with my meal at Nha Sang. My dish was flavorful and spicy and while the rest of the meal wasn’t as incredible, this single dish really showed promise and made me look forward to trying some of the other less common items on the menu. In addition to the food the service was phenomenal and the restaurant itself was beautiful and clean. This is definitely a place I will recommend to anyone and everyone and I hope you all give it a chance and soon.
Have you ever eaten at Nha Sang in Burnsville? If so, what did you think? What did you order and have you tried their lunch buffet ($6.50)? Would you stick to the more mundane options or would you try some of the others such as the Tibetan options? Whatever you have to say about Nha Sang go ahead and comment on as I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Address:
Nha Sang
12621 Nicollet Ave
Burnsville MN 55337-2862
Phone:
952-895-0011
See all the pictures from Nha Sang in Burnsville on Flickr here.
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April 4th, 2012 at 7:13 am
Na Sing is Eric’s favorite place to eat south of the river. We’ve been there are few times for lunch, it’s decent. Probably the best around Burnsville/Apple Valley for Asian food.
April 4th, 2012 at 8:16 am
I was there once over a year ago and remembered liking it. I have wanted to try the lunch buffet but since I am nowhere near there during the work day, I haven’t had the chance.
April 4th, 2012 at 10:08 am
I have never been able to go and sit down for the buffet however I do get the buffet to go fairly often for lunch. they give you the typical to go box, you fill it to your liking and charge you by weight. Typically 5-7 dollars for a good lunch.
April 4th, 2012 at 10:15 am
I love this place. It’s not far from where I work and I got there for lunch quite often. One of the items in the lunch buffet is the Tibetan chicken curry (not sure exactly what they call it) – it is fantastic. This is the only Asian restaurant where I don’t have to add any hot oil to my plate of food.
April 4th, 2012 at 10:18 am
I have been for lunch a couple time, and ordered takeout from here. The food has always been good. The service is always great, and, as noted, the place is very clean.
The only issue I have ever had is that the food is spicy. I know thats not an issue for Bill, but many of the items, even on the buffet, were spicy enough I had watery eyes and a runny nose, and my wife and 4 year old really struggled.
Thats a bit nit picky though, as I would much rather the food was a little overspiced than bland.
Glad you tried it Bill, and really glad you liked it. They seem like nice people and I wish them well.
April 4th, 2012 at 12:17 pm
Phenomenal service? I’ll put this place on my list. Good service is always worth supporting.
April 4th, 2012 at 3:07 pm
Crap. Now I want Chinese for dinner. Maybe I’ll have to stop here tonight, because it definitely sounds promising. If not, it’ll be on my list for a night soon.
April 4th, 2012 at 3:17 pm
I love joints like this! …added to my long list of LL places to check out.
April 4th, 2012 at 7:01 pm
Chapter&Verse–I agree! It is on my must try list for sure! Thanks Bill for the review :)
April 5th, 2012 at 9:13 am
I have eaten there 2 times in the past 3 years. Also ordered out 2 times.
Both times we ate there were at night, midweek and Saturday. Both times like your experience, almost no one else in the restaurant. However I do think they get a good take out business. The lack of actual customers in the restaurant usually makes me a bit wary, especially on a Monday evening…
but it sounds like your experience was fine.
the best things to get are the Tibetan foods, and the cranberry curry chicken is actually very good. When you stray into the standard chinese restaurant items i find they go down a notch. we seemed to find the food didnt improve with every time we went or took out, and actually seemed to get a bit less good, so we stopped going. The people that own it are very nice and pleasant.
I recently for some reason looked over the yelp and urbanspoon user reviews on it, i did see some astroturfing… (3 reviews bunched on one date all saying about the same thing in 1 or 2 sentences , with the usual exclamation marks).
We have friends who take out there alot and enjoy it. i think they must survive on takeout, like alot of other places like this in Burnsville (Chinese Gourmet) because the table traffic is minimal in the evening. There are alot apartments around there… which makes sense.
Glad you tried it. We will have to give it another shot.
April 9th, 2012 at 8:19 am
I went for the Buffet on Friday.. I would do it again if I have a chance. They have a couple of “regular” items, Sesame Chicken, Beef & Broccoli, egg rolls, etc.. those were good but nothing special.
They had a spicy chicken dish (Himalayan?) and a red curry dish that were very spicy but good. I loved the red Curry dish. If you want to order off the regular menu you can do that as well.
The owners work the restaurant and seemed to be taking good care of everyone that was eating there..
April 14th, 2012 at 7:16 pm
Bill, I have eaten here several times. The cranberry chicken curry is amazing! I had never had anything like it before and was glad I took a risk and tried it. It is a really great balance of flavors (unfortunately , I can’t rate anything else there… after ordering it that first time, it is now all I order from there). I suggest you try it (it often isn’t on the lunch buffet, but both times it wasn’t I inquired about it and they made some up for me and included it as buffet. Pretty nice service).
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