The New Mập Kitchen Offers Three Cuisines in an Asian Food Hotspot

A small island of restaurants in a residential area of northeast Carrollton is the home to what seems like a rotating roster of Asian restaurants, many always worth checking out. The most recent addition is Mập Kitchen, which opened late last fall with the goal of serving up flavors from three countries: Vietnam, China, and Thailand. We stopped by for a quick lunch to check it out recently.
Driving up, we were greeted with a small dining space, as is the norm in this Carrollton oasis, that was functional and cozy. Three cuisines may be represented, but Vietnamese is clearly the focus here. Sure, you can order some tom yum soup, orange chicken, pad Thai or chicken chow fun, but Vietnamese dishes such as mì vịt tiềm (stewed duck noodle soup) and canh chua cá (sweet and sour catfish soup) are just some of the specialties that demand attention on this menu.

Reviewing the menu yielded several appetizers such as chân gà sốt thái (Thai Style chicken feet) or papaya salad with shrimp, pork and pig ear that sounded delish as well as intriguing, but having no time for preliminaries, we settled on two mains: Bánh canh cua and tôm ran thit ba roi.

In no time at all, the steaming dishes arrived at our table. The tôm ran thit ba roi was a healthy portion of braised shrimp with pork belly, garnished with peppers and cilantro. It was flavorful and rich, if not a bit messy to eat, since the shrimp were braised in their shells and thus the slightly sweet and a bit piquant sauce got everywhere, but it was worth the effort.

Almost immediately, we knew the bánh canh cua was something special, our culinary find of the month. This large bowl of crab tapioca noodle soup was overflowing with unique flavor combinations and ingredients: a slightly dense broth with thick round noodles reminiscent of udon, with chunks of crabmeat, shrimp, thinly sliced white chicken, crispy fried shallots, enoki mushrooms, quail eggs, chopped green onions and huyêt.

Nine ingredients magically come together in this dish that has a lot going on, in a good way. Even if some of the elements were not our cup of tea individually (the huyêt, for example, a pork blood cake), they all came together to complement each other in a wonderful savory mélange of flavor. The little chef’s kiss that completed it all was the quẩy, a Vietnamese fried bread that accompanied it alongside a heap of chili paste.

Next time we'll definitely have to try the stewed duck noodle soup, which looks and sounds fantastic, as well as the house special flat noodle with gravy sauce. Maybe even the chicken feet or pig ear salad. Perhaps the crispy pork chitterlings as well. We shall see.

Add this to your must-eat visits the next time you're in the area, or better yet, make it an afternoon destination... and don't sleep on the bánh canh cua.

2660 Kelly Blvd. #114, Carrollton; Monday - Thursday, 10 a.m. - 8:30 p.m.; Friday-Sunday, 10 a.m. - 9 p.m. Closed Wednesday