Chinese Food in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget
When my husband Laurent and I go to Atlanta (Georgia), we love searching out neighborhood Chinese restaurants for plump, briny shrimp dishes.
One of the best meals we have eaten in Atlanta was at the The Peking Garden, which was built to look like a Chinese house with red doors in Smyrna, Georgia.
The Peking Garden is unassuming outside, but has some nice artwork inside - a bubbling and spotlessly clean aquarium by the entryway is a 5-foot porcelain vase, a wall-size bas relief sculpture painting of diners at a garden tea pavilion, paintings of feather-rich birds turning their heads sitting on top of bushes with flowers, and curling dragon sculptures rippling across the walls. I like Chinese art, so the effect of all the art on me was to make me serene and happy.
Many East Coast city people seek out high quality Chinese food. When we ate at Peking Garden, there were Latino families, Chinese families, African-American couples, policemen, and Laurent and me in the restaurant for a late Sunday lunch. I felt like a cross-section of Atlanta’s population was out for a delicious and pleasurable meal.
The Chinese are experts at cooking seafood and do wonders with Georgia’s incomparable plump shrimp. We chose a simple dish that really lets the shrimp shine – kung pao shrimp. Laurent chose the mild sauce for his order, and I ordered a spicy sauce for mine.
Kung pao shrimp’s main ingredients are shrimp, green peppers, onions, mushrooms, carrots, and peanuts. The sauce is what really makes this dish delicious. It is made with dark and light soy sauces, fresh ginger, Sichuan peppers (numbing yet delicious), vinegar, water, and a little sugar.
Kung pao shrimp fills you up when you eat it with an order of white rice for each person. It also clears your sinuses, so brink some tissue with you.
The kung pao shrimp was about $13 for each order. I think that price is very fair for the delicious and healthy meal we ate.
Peking Garden Restaurant
2526 S. Cobb Drive SE
Smyrna, Georgia
By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
