Best Chinese Restaurant

Dallas doesn't have a Chinatown. It has a Koreatown. And there's a Cowtown to the left. But no Chinatown, no parades with dragons and firecrackers. Perhaps that's why most Chinese cuisine in Dallas is forgettable: heavy, dry, greasy and sticky--with dumb fortunes. Chef Hsu busts that mold with a fat bronze Buddha (they have a nice collection on the bar). Chef Hsu features lithe treatments of the old standard retreads: kung pao chicken, Mongolian beef, sweet and sour pork. Then it goes on a rampage of Chinese exotica with braised sea cucumbers with pork belly, various versions of stewed and braised shark's fin and shredded jellyfish salad among others, all impeccably prepared with an eye on clarity and a palate sensitive to intrinsic flavors. Plus they have a large live lobster and crab tank for the kids, and buffet tables the size of container freighters for the value-minded. Dumb fortunes, too.