Best restaurant meals I ate around Sacramento in January | Food reporter’s notebook
Meat lovers, rejoice: A barbecue joint near Arden Arcade is serving up juicy chicken, smoky tri-tip and sizzling beef hot links.
Not your cup of tea? A new vegan burger bar from a longtime Sacramento restaurant family ditches animal products for mushrooms, faux meat and vegetables in midtown.
These were some of the best meals that I, The Sacramento Bee’s food and beverage reporter, ate around the Sacramento region in January, along with a groundbreaking Armenian concept in Carmichael and a historic Chinese restaurant in Folsom.
All reviews were first published in my free weekly food and drink newsletter, which hits inboxes at noon each Wednesday. Visit https://bit.ly/bee_food_drink_newsletter to sign up.
Buddha Belly Burger
Andy Nguyen’s Vegetarian Restaurant is a concept of the 2000s (and truthfully, the 20th century, though it served meat back then). Buddha Belly Burger is Nguyen’s restaurant for the 2020s.
The vegan burger bar feels more modern and seductive, a dimly-lit enclave for plant-based eaters that opened in May in midtown Sacramento. Gluten-free options abound as well, and there’s a bit of a weekend brunch program centered around different avocado toasts.
After tasting the maha mushrooms ($14.50, and also available at Andy Nguyen’s), I’m convinced that Mother has competition for the best fried ‘shrooms in town. Giant fronds of blue oyster mushrooms are tempura-battered, fried to an impeccable crackle and served with a creamy sriracha mayonnaise dipping sauce.
Several types of burgers come on squishy pretzel buns with crunchy iceberg lettuce, microgreens and a house sauce such as garlic confit mayo or “Thousand Buddha.” The lion’s mane burger ($18.75 with a side of fries, salad or charred broccoli for an additional $2) took on a nice flavor from the mushroom’s soy sauce marinade, but I preferred the bánh mì burger ($18) with its pickled carrots, sliced jalapeños and juicy Impossible Meats patty.
Buddha Belly is the only restaurant to carry a dish with Rhiza, a lab-grown, adaptable fungus from The Better Meat Co. in West Sacramento that can be artificially colored and flavored to imitate a wide range of meats.
It appears in the Rhiza carne asada bowl ($18.75) alongside sliced okra, quinoa, roasted sweet potatoes and a garlicky chipotle dressing. That’s the right place, as the mock meat’s smoky taste shines and other deficiencies (a lighter color and chewier texture than typical asada) are disguised. Buddha Belly began carrying a Rhiza steak shortly after my review, The Better Meat Co. said in an email, and I’ll be eager to taste it.
Address: 1901 S St., Suite 100, Sacramento.
Hours: 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Sunday.
Phone: (916) 594-7646.
Website: https://www.instagram.com/buddhabellyburger
Drinks: No alcohol, but fresh-squeezed juices and lemonade and housemade sodas are worth a try.
Vegetarian options: All options are vegan.
Noise level: Quiet.
Our Family BBQ & Pies
You smell Our Family BBQ & Pies before you see it. The storefront is tucked away in the corner of a shopping center between Sierra Oaks and Arden Arcade. Scents from Steven Wright’s smoker waft through the parking lot, inviting customers in for down-home barbecue.
Ribs, tri-tip, chicken and hot links ($16-$31 with two sides and a drink, depending on the number of meats selected). That’s the extent of the mains, all smothered in a St. Louis-inspired barbecue sauce and served in a Styrofoam box with plastic baggies of white bread.
I have nice things to say about all of it — the moist and tender chicken, the tri-tip’s pink smoke rings, the slow burn of the beef sausage, the juicy rib tips hiding at the bottom of the pile — but would have preferred to add my own sauce to better taste each individual meat.
Tangy collard greens are a star side (potato salad, baked beans and macaroni and cheese are the other options), dressed up with bits of pork and hot wing sauce. A lemony icebox pie ($4 per slice) with a crumbly graham cracker crust was a nice deviation after such a rich meal.
Address: 2326 Fair Oaks Blvd., Suite J, Sacramento.
Hours: 12-9 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday, closed Monday and Tuesday.
Phone number: (916) 333-3397.
Website: https://www.instagram.com/ourfamilybbq/
Drinks: A few beers on tap, soda, bottled water and the house specialty “cinnamon water,” a refreshing sweet-bitter drink made by soaking cinnamon sticks in ice water.
Vegetarian options: Only sides such as potato salad and macaroni and cheese.
Noise level: Quiet aside from ambient music.
Yerevan Bar & Restaurant
Yerevan Bar & Restaurant is illuminated by a glowing green light around the building, one that stands out as you drive Fair Oaks Boulevard in Carmichael. Green remains the theme inside the Sacramento region’s most expressly Armenian restaurant as well, the color of the chairs, curtains and faux foliage that give a cooling effect in a refined dining room.
Founded by Akob Darmoyan in March 2023 and named after Armenia’s capital, Yerevan has quickly become a cultural gathering spot for Sacramentans with roots in the Caucasus region. The menu is dotted with hard-to-find dishes with roots in Armenia and neighboring countries, and a banquet hall was holding a raucous party on our Friday night visit.
Lavash, bread and hummus are complementary, but you might want to order ajika ($10) as well. A Georgian red pepper dip, its smoky flavor stood out amid a current of medium heat.
Don’t miss khinkali ($16), four giant Georgian soup dumplings with plateaued flat tops that are essentially a West Asian version of xiaolongbao. To eat: Hold a dumpling by its thick stem, flip upside-down, bite a small hole and suck the broth out. Eat away at the dumpling, including the beef patty inside, before discarding the stem.
Armenian barbecue skewers called khorovats are a national dish, and while pork is a go-to, the chicken lula kebab ($29) made for an herb-forward, tasty collection of ground meat. Adventurous eaters would do well to try the nicely-cooked tjvjik ($29), beef liver and hearts stewed with peppers and onions in a tomato broth.
Address: 7600 Fair Oaks Blvd., Carmichael.
Hours: 4-10 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday, 4-11 p.m. Friday, 2-11 p.m. Saturday, noon-10 p.m. Sunday, closed Monday.
Phone: 916-620-9999
Website: yerevansac.com
Drinks: A fledgling bar program comprised of standard cocktails and a few choice liquors and wines.
Vegetarian options: Borscht, salads and few other options.
Noise level: Loud.
Hop Sing Palace
Hop Sing Palace is an appropriately-located step back in time in the heart of Folsom Historic District. Founded in 1957 by Ken Jeong, the grandfather of TV personality and journalist Lisa Ling, the pink-walled interior with faux stone arches calls to mind San Luis Obispo’s Madonna Inn if it were covered in old Tsingtao beer or 1999 car show posters.
Owned by Bill and Lana Lam since 1986, Hop Sing is Folsom’s oldest restaurant, a place where you’re liable to see two senior men celebrating a birthday lunch or a 4-year-old girl thrilled at the simple prospect of hot tea. Its long menu is rooted in Chinese American tradition, a collection of familiar Cantonese-inspired dishes that have stood the test of time.
Hop Sing beef ($15) is a house specialty worth trying. Thin beef fillets were coated in a sweet sauce similar to a Korean galbi marinade with hints of five-spice powder, slow-cooked until they’re tender enough to be cut with a spoon, then topped with sesame seeds and served with colorful shrimp crackers.
Sliced crimini in the mushroom chicken ($14) packed a surprising amount of flavor as well. A mixture of baby bok choy, water chestnuts and other vegetables along with the namesake ingredients came smothered in a rich gravy begging to be soaked up by white rice ($4).
Two disparate dishes, the onion ginger scallops ($18) and Sichuan eggplant with shrimp ($16), were similarly buttery under their deep-fried shells. The former was salty and served with refreshing ginger slices, while the latter could’ve used more of the implied heat.
Address: 805 Sutter St., Folsom.
Hours: 11 a.m.-9 p.m. seven days a week.
Phone number: (916) 985-7309.
Website: https://hopsingpalace.com/
Drinks: Beer, wine, tea and soda, none of which are more than $5 a glass.
Vegetarian options: Many.
Noise level: Relatively quiet.
