South Of The Clouds is a casual spot on West 8th Street in the Village specializing in mixian, rice noodles from the Yunnan province of China. The menu is small, service attentive.

We started with their signature Yunnan Crossing Bridge Rice Noodle Soup served with a platter with small bowls of crispy fried pork and uncooked fish, beef, pork, chicken and quail egg. With that, we received a tureen of boiling broth and a bowl of mixian, their tubelike version of rice noodles. Our server combined those noodles plus the raw ingredients with the boiling soup then left it for us to serve ourselves.

Skip the “Spicy Chicken (Bone in)” as it is not like any “bone-in” chicken you’ve ever eaten. Someone chopped, finely chopped chicken then cooked it like ground meat with peanuts and a spicy sesame sauce. I found it impossible to eat a bite without pulling out microscopic to small chunks of chopped bones in each bite. Seriously I gave up.

We also tried their sesame-oil tree-ear (also known as wood or cloud-ear) mushroom salad. Interesting. I kept them on hand in my home for making hot and sour soup. I should have considered making a salad with them!

An interesting spicy dish is their tofu pudding, a mixture of the mixian (rice noodles) with ground pork, pickled mustard greens and soft tofu ($15) presented at the table. To enjoy, we first had to combine ingredients. When we did so, the silky soft tofu made the ingredients resemble a pudding. Good, although it needed a lighter hand with the flavorful Sichuan peppercorn oil.


My dining companion ordered a side of pickled cabbage ($2). The kimchi-like spicy treat was the best dish of the evening.

 

South of the Clouds
Greenwich Village
16 W 8th Street
New York, NY 10011
(212) 888-9653