L.A.'s great Chinese food is located in the San Gabriel valley, a suburban area about 20 minutes east of downtown which is home to more than 300,000 Chinese immigrants.

Chang's Garden. For professionalism, staying power, and consistently excellent food in every place he has either owned or cooked for, few can touch Henry Chang. First the chef of San Gabriel's esteemed Islamic restaurant Dong Lai Shun, later the chef/owner of the much lauded Juon Yuan, he now runs Chang's Garden, which focuses on the subtle and literature-based cuisine of Hangzhou. In fact, while the English name of the place is Chang's Garden, nobody calls it that in Chinese. In Chinese it's Lou Wai Lou, the name of one of the most famous and venerable of Hangzhou restaurants. Great dishes: turnip and tilapia soup, yellow fish soup, sliced gluten, pork spare ribs in lotus leaf, fish dumplings (shui yu shui jiao), ice fish with soy bean sauce, snow cabbage with bean sheets, fried fish in seaweed batter (tai tiao huang yu), and eight treasure rice pudding (ba bao fan). Chang's Garden, 627 W Duarte Rd., Arcadia, CA 91007, 626-445-0707. English menu; little English spoken. Mealtimes are jammed. Arrive after 8:00 for dinner or wait.

Alert: Green Village has closed in the below location. Hopefully this will be temporary. If/when they re-open the new address will be posted.

Green Village. Lovers of Shangainese cooking, rejoice. Wang Haibo has re-opened Green Village in San Gabriel, at a new location just around the corner from that giant temple of consumerism on the corner of Del Mar and West Valley Jonathan Gold used to call 'the mall of a thousand ideograms'.  Just west of the mall, on West Valley, on the second  floor of a little mini-mall, Green Village is back. A native of Shanghai who became obsessed with food as a result of childhood hunger, Wang Haibo is that rarity in the Chinese cuisine world - a self-taught chef. In the kitchen, he displays an erratic genius - not everything is great, but when he hits it, bells ring. Ask locals to name the three best restaurants in the San Gabriel Valley and this place often comes up, for good reason. The new menu includes the outstanding favorites for which he is known and, with 321 items, enough other choices to satisfy anyone. To start with the classics, don't miss his braised fish tail (actually the lower third of a carp), the chicken stewed with chestnuts (a great winter casserole), Wu-Xi special ribs (Wang's recipe for this dish made it into Gourmet's hardcover cookbook of the best recipes they had published), and sauteed yellow croaker with liver moss (that's river moss to you English speakers).  The single dish for which he perhaps best known is the pork knuckle in soy sauce, which is actually a fresh, uncured ham steamed, fried and braised for hours in soy, spices, and rock sugar. The menu is organized in such a way that the American diner can feel the powerful pull between cuisine and memory in the San Gabriel Valley's immigrant culture. Dishes are grouped in categories such as "Shanghai Specialty", "Shanghai Traditional Dishes" and "Jiang Nan Reminiscent Dishes". Jiang Nan   means 'south of the river" and refers to that region south of the Yangzi where the cities of Hangzhou and Suzhou have long been known for their beauty, their poetry (in the case of Hangzhou), their lovely women (in the case of Suzhou), and their elegant cuisines. Memories are stirred when dishes of these towns are brought to the table. Green Village, 250 W. Valley Blvd, #M, San Gabriel, CA 91776, 626-576-2228. English menu; little English spoken.

Chung King. Hands down, the best Sichuan food I've had in America. The NY Times recently sent a reporter out to L.A. to eat at this place and he declared that it put pretty much every other Sichuan restaurant he'd ever eaten in to shame. Executive chef Chen Qingping, who created the menu, was a young prodigy in his native Chongqing; he was declared a master with apprentices of his own at the unheard-of age of 21. He considers the section of shui zhu dishes (‘Boiled Dishes in Hot Sauce') to be his greatest creation, and they are wonderful, incendiary dishes. I also love the Eel with Chilli and Brown Peppercorns (spicy with whole garlic cloves) and my kids adore the Quick-Fried Beef with Chinese Green Onion, which is not hot at all.  My husband is nuts for Boiled Pig Intestines in Hot Sauce, and also the Stir-Fried Fish Slices with Pickled Pepper. The cold dishes are fantastic, including the spiced peanuts with tiny, crispy dried fish; the camphorwood smoked chicken;  and the fu qi fei pian (literally "Mom and Pop sliced lungs", but the name is anachronistic; the dish is made entirely of tender-sliced beef shank in a marvelously complex dressing). The cold dishes make terrific take-home choices, but are guaranteed to vanish from your refrigerator within hours. Chung King has moved! There is still a restaurant named Chung King at 206 S. Garfield Ave. in Monterey Park, but that is run by a new owner and new cooks. Linda Huang has moved her operation, featuring the menu by Chen Qingping, to a new location in the city of San Gabriel. 1000 S. San Gabriel Blvd, San Gabriel, CA 91776. Tel. 626-286-0298. English menu. Little English spoken.