🍽️ Restaurant: Chengdu Gourmet 2
📍 Location: 4768 McKnight Road, Ross Township
⏱️ Hours: 11 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Mon-Thurs | 11 a.m.-10:30 p.m. Fri-Sat | noon-9:30 p.m. Sun
🌐 Links: chengdugourmet-2.com, Facebook
❤️ Best $15ish meal(s): Kung Pao chicken for $15.99; shrimp lo mein for $13.99; or bring a friend and split the $18.99 fish fillet in hot spicy broth.
Why go?
There aren’t many places where $15ish buys you dinner from a chef with repeated James Beard recognition. Wei Zhu, who grew up in Chengdu, built his Pittsburgh reputation on Sichuan cooking, and Chengdu Gourmet 2 is the sprawling McKnight Road sibling of his original restaurant in Squirrel Hill.
The enormous menu goes deep into Zhu’s native cuisine, with Chongqing chicken, mapo tofu, dan dan noodles and fish swimming in chile-red broths fragrant with Sichuan peppercorn. But there is plenty of range, from Chinese-American favorites and dim sum to roast meats, seafood, noodles and sushi. Come with a group and a bowl of fiery Sichuan fish can share the table with shrimp lo mein and dumplings.
What to order
My pick is the $15.99 Kung Pao chicken from the Chinese menu. Zhu’s version is savory and deeply aromatic, with tender chicken, dried chiles and Sichuan peppercorn bringing both heat and that characteristic citrusy, numbing tingle. It is also an approachable way into the Sichuan side of the menu.
The $13.99 shrimp lo mein is no consolation prize. Plump shrimp and vegetables are tossed through springy noodles with plenty of wok hei, the smoky, lightly charred character that comes from a very hot wok. It is filling enough for dinner on its own and a good option if you want something less fiery.
Better yet, bring a friend and split the $18.99 fish fillet in hot spicy broth. Tender pieces of fish come submerged in a chile-red broth loaded with aromatics and Sichuan peppercorn. It is a generous, family-style dish, so splitting it between two puts the fish at less than $10 each and leaves room for rice or an appetizer for the table.
Good to know before you go
Come with people if you can. Chengdu Gourmet 2 is at its best when several dishes hit the middle of the table and everyone gets a little of everything. The menu is enormous, and sharing lets you move between Zhu’s Sichuan specialties and more familiar noodle, rice and dumpling dishes without committing to just one.
And if you order enthusiastically from the Sichuan side, there are fruit slushies, milk teas and milkshakes for cooling things down.
Inside Chengdu Gourmet 2 (Photos by Aakanksha Agarwal)
Know a Pittsburgh-area restaurant with a great meal around $15? Email us at social@publicsource.org.
