China Kitchen

China Kitchen is located in the Cheat Lake area in a plaza with a gym, a pizza place, and a few other odds and ends. If you didn't live in that area or were specifically seeking it out, you might not know it ever existed.

It seems as though they cater to the takeout crowd, as there are only a couple tables inside. It could use a nice scrubbing inside.

They have the typical menu board with photos of select items - General Tso's, Sweet and Sour chicken, Chicken and Broccoli, the usuals. We happened to be here around lunch time, so flipped a paper menu over to see their options. $5 for their general tso's, with white rice. Also ordered a side of cheese wontons, $4, and a pop. I ended up paying around $10.

Our cheese wontons came out on paper plates, steaming hot. After a few minutes, the guy working brought out some sauce. A few minutes later he brought out my friend's entree. Then a few minutes later, he brought out mine. It was a little awkward and disjointed with the timing here.

The cheese wontons, while having lots of wrapper, also have lots of filling. I broke off much of the top part and ate the pocket full of cream cheese. Tasty, too. The sweet and sour sauce was a little odd in that it hardened, or congealed, quite quickly. After a minute or so, I actually had to break the topping through to get to the liquid part - eh, no thanks. Turn off.

The general tso's sauce was good, but it had that low-quality, stringy meat that I can't stand. If it's steaming hot, it's pretty good. You can focus on the taste of the slightly spicy, but sweet sauce. As it gets cooler, it 's hard to ignore the texture of the chicken - instead of white, striated meat, it is processed, stringy, darker pieces. Not my cup of tea. Also, I wish there was some more broccoli.

It was also pretty smokey in here, so when we left, we smelled of hot oil and grease. If it's the only place in town, I can understand this being your go-to. But I'd prefer other places over this.

Grade: C