Szechuan Beef Noodle Soup

Another boot camp class in the books, that's five days in a row working out.  Not going to be able to make it out tonight though due to dinner plans with family.  Hopefully the ground dries up by tomorrow morning so I can hit the ole' dusty trail, mountain bike trial that is.  Definitely looking forward to getting back on the bike, it has been too long.

Hila has finally come home to me from Paris, I picked her up last night.  After boot camp while I was waiting for her I stopped to get some dinner at Hunan Chinese Gourmet in Fair Oaks Mall (anyone who knows me knows I go a bit bonkers for Asian food).  I ordered the beef noodle soup...first of all, I am getting ahead of myself, let me back up and give a little back story.

When we were in China a few years back I had this soup there, no clue what it was called, I mean the menu was in Chinese but they had a picture of it and it looked amazing.  I ended up having this soup every day except once, and that day I had it twice!  The restaurant is called Mr. Lee's (China's version of fast food but incredibly better than McDonald's).  I googled the name when I got back in the states and found a picture (below) in the hopes that one day someone with knowledge of China could tell me what this soup was called and if it was available here in the states.

So one night several months after our trip we are out to dinner with a friend Dominique and her family, they are of Malaysian descent, and I happen to bring up the soup.  I show her mom the picture and she says, "Oh that's Szechuan Beef Noodle Soup."  After months of searching for this soup she knows what it was just by looking at the picture, I am Jack's utter surprise.  She also says there is a restaurant in Fair Oaks Mall that has it, if we were not already at dinner I would have driven there that night.  So me being the patient man that I am we wait until dinner the next night to try it out, and my oh my what a treat.  The soup was not exactly the same but close enough that I felt like I was eating the same soup, I loved it.  Absolutely amazing.  So last night since I had some time before Hila's flight landed, and Fair Oaks Mall is just a quick hop and skip away from boot camp I thought what better time to indulge.  It had been awhile since the last time I had this soup and even as of this morning, I want to go back for lunch today.  You know what my birthday is on Monday, I think I just figured out what we will be doing for lunch!