Over the Rainbow

T & S Seafood Restaurant
10014 N. Lamar, 339-8434
Mon-Fri, 11am-2:30pm; 5-10:30pm;
Sat & Sun, 11am-11pm

photograph by John Anderson

T& S Seafood Restaurant is the reincarnation of the old Rainbow Inn Chinese Restaurant (which used to be in the shopping center at the end of Westgate Drive). Despite the number of years since the Rainbow Inn's demise, people still talk about it because of the superlative chow that was turned out there. Even now, people still ask about it on the Web, wanting to know if the rumors they've heard about its rebirth are true. The Phoenix has risen. Rainbow is alive and well, and operating under the guise of T & S, and the food is just as good, if not better.

T & S is about two blocks north of Rutland, on the west side of Lamar in a free-standing building with a bright yellow sign. You walk in the door, and the first thing you see are tanks filled with seafood on the hoof, just waiting to be transformed into some form of Cantonese delicacy. I'm a fisherman, so the sight of those plaintive little fish eyes bothers me not. If it gets to you, my only suggestion would be to gaze upon the rather extensive menu offerings instead and try not to think about what your dish looked like a few minutes earlier. My favorite tank is the one where the lobsters scurry about on top of a bed of their little pals, the clams.

My first meal there was on a Saturday night, late-ish in the evening. It took awhile to peruse the menu due to its size and its moderate rate of discombobulation -- there aren't clearly defined zones for meats, poultry, seafood, etc. They are loosely arranged in groups, within categories, but it forces you to actually read the menu, and pay attention as you read. I settled on a starter of Seafood Soup With Fish Maw for two ($5.25). To the uninitiated, fish maws are basically the throats of the fish, and they're quickly becoming my favorite part. The soup had a rich, clear chicken broth, in which swam the aforementioned maws (those gelatinous, velvety tidbits), accompanied by egg thread, straw mushrooms, and shredded bits of scallop, fish fillet, and shrimp. It spoke of the freshness of the sea. Next up was an order of Pan Fried Dumplings ($3.25), thin-skinned and stuffed with a coarsely ground pork. They came on a bed of fried rice vermicelli, with a sauce that had a hint of molasses and a slightly tart finish, and they melted in the mouth.

Cantonese cuisine prides itself on its delicacy and its attention to the detail of texture, and my next dish was a perfect example. Eggplant and Chicken in Garlic Sauce Pot ($6.95) was a hot pot of just-cooked chicken and vegetables, bathed in a rich, garlic-laden, silken sauce. The bright purple Oriental eggplant were a color and taste explosion, not cooked to mush like you often find elsewhere. The House Special Vegetarian Bean Curd ($7.50) was a huge portion, with all manner of crunchy vegetables resting atop cloud-like pillows of soft tofu, with a light but crunchy breading -- it was the ultimate dichotomy of texture. The brown sauce had a lot of depth, with a finish of ginger.

Lunch at T & S is a step above the old Rainbow in that it has dim sum daily (11am- 2:30pm). I chose from an extensive selection, marked my choices from the dim sum menu, and let the feast begin. I misread the menu, and because the prices were so low, assumed that the portions would be smaller than they were. Not to worry, I have a big-boy appetite, and it came in handy. Steamed Shrimp and Cilantro Dumplings ($1.50) were packed full of shrimp, with a tasty blast of cilantro on the finish. The Pork and Shrimp Turnovers ($1.50) were two football-shaped croquettes, four inches long, and delightfully crunchy and golden on the outside, with moist, sweet shrimp and barbecued pork on the inside.

I had two types of barbecue buns ($1.50 each) to check out the difference, steamed and baked. The baked buns reminded me of those perfect yeast rolls you used to get at the school cafeterias back in the late Fifties -- the kind that were light and perfectly yeasty and would literally dissolve on your tongue. Imagine one of those stuffed full with sweet but tangy pork barbecue, and you'd be pretty darn close. The steamed buns weren't the prettiest I've ever seen, but they came three to the order and weren't all dough like you find elsewhere around town -- they were filled to the brim and yummy to match. The Fresh Shrimp Cheung-Fun ($2.10) are the Canton equivalent to Vietnamese Bahn Cuon -- delicate, shrimp-filled packages of soft, steamed rice paper. They taste like the lightest ravioli you ever ate, plump with shrimp and accompanied by a soy dipping sauce.

I couldn't pass up the Seafood Combination Pan Fried Noodle for $4.95 (a steal at the price). A bed of thin, crispy noodles was covered with a blend of shrimp, fish fillet, crunchy veggies, and without question, the best squid in the city of Austin, all swathed in a light brown sauce redolent of garlic and ginger. The squid was as fresh as can be and toothsomely tender, very unlike the warm rubber bands most associate with squid.

Chef Sunny Huynh knows his stuff. He puts out light, flavorful Cantonese cuisine at some of the best prices in Austin. The seafood is just-off-the-boat fresh, the portions are large, and the service is attentive and first-rate. T & S delivers to "a limited area," but unfortunately it doesn't include Wimberley, where I live. So when I'm in the hinterlands of North Lamar, I will definitely return to the shores of T & S for some more of Sunny's seafood magic.