Off the Beaten Path: Five Stars, Hazleton PA

I've been meaning to write this blog post for awhile now. Rarely do I get a chance to have Chinese food while on the road. Even more rarely do I have a chance to get Thai or Sushi. In this case, I was able to have both! (or all 3 if I so desired).

My company has a terminal nearby and I found myself with time to kill and nothing to do or nowhere to go so I thought "Hey let's go exploring!" I knew there was a Walmart and K-Mart nearby but that's it and I was told there are more food options other than the Sheetz up the road, so I hopped in my bobtail truck and decided to go exploring. Well I found the Walmart but there weren't many food choices so I kept going and then I found the K-Mart, so I decided to turn in because something in particular caught my eye. As it turns out this K-Mart is attached to..A MALL! Oh girl, you know I loves me some shopping and retail therapy, let's go exploring!

The mall itself, The Laurel Mall (www.thelaurelmall.com) has a JC Penney's, K-Mart, restaurants, other stores, a cigar store, a computer parts store with an arrogant store owner (no comment about that) oh and a GameStop where none of the little gamer nerd boys even acknowledged or talked to me. Hello, pretty girl consumer gamer in the store and everyone's like "oooo, I'm scared to talk to her!" but I'm so not talking about that here, we're talking food.

I left the mall (with an overpriced external hard drive case..still not going to talk about that one) and decided to keep looking for this Chinese restaurant I heard about but haven't found yet. So I circled the mall and came upon a mall annex with a McDonald's, a few stores and...the Chinese restaurant. Bingo!

I parked further way to make leaving easier and I walked inside. It didn't look like a typical Chinese restaurant, it looked, dare I say, classier. It had a bar! And not just any bar but a really nice solid wood counter bar! The bartender gave me a menu when I told him I wanted to place a to go order and he gave me this enormous 11x14 piece of paper. Well okay maybe it's 8 1/2 x 14. It's big! So I'm looking through the menu and trying to decide what to get when I think "I wonder what's on the back of this?" So I flip it over and there in all it's glory is the Thai and Sushi menu. I practically orgasm'd. Why get Chinese when I could get Sushi instead?! But here is the other big dilemma..once again..8 1/2 x 14 piece of paper..what on earth do I get?! There are so many choices!

After talking it over with the bartender I came to a few choices:
Miso soup.
Pad Ki Mao (drunken noodle) with shrimp.
Spicy shrimp roll
New York roll
Red snapper sashimi
Squid sushi (or sashimi? I dunno which applies here)

First, the drool-worthy overall picture of everything.

And now we'll go item by item. First the miso soup.

It was as good as I remember from the last time I had it. Simple. Easy. Tasty. Yummy.

Next the Pad Ki Mao (drunken noodle).

The man told me this was kind of similar to pad thai but with a wider noodle. It was quite delicious and I did not hesitate to scarf it down. The description reads "Papardelle rice noodles with onion, basil and chili paste" plus the shrimp. It was delicious. I would order it again but with so much to choose from on the menu, I'd be more inclined to discover something else instead of going back to a favorite.

And now my other favorite part, the sushi/sashmi:

Doesn't it look so beautiful? Sushi chefs are artists, hands down. 

Okay! So the squid sashimi are the two white pieces next to the cup of soy sauce. I've had squid before so that's why I ordered it again. The red snapper are the other two at the bottom and those were quite tasty! I've never had red snapper before and the main reason I decided to try it was, and you're going to totally roll your eyes at this one: the movie "UHF". I just remember there was a cheesy game show in the movie and this Asian game show host saying "Oh! Red snapper, very tasty!" So I thought, well, let's try the red snapper and see if it is, in fact, very tasty. Don't give me that look, I'm totally serious! lol.

The spicy shrimp roll was, in fact, spicy. In fact, I loved the zing of spice it had and thoroughly enjoyed scarfing that roll down. I didn't even bother with the wasabi because it would have been too spicy. In fact, I tried the New York roll with wasabi for one piece and decided it's better without it. The hidden surprise was the New York roll and the reason I ordered it was because it was so intriguing. Check this out: apple, salmon and mango. While I totally get the apple part, I wasn't so sure about the mango part because that doesn't scream New York to me, but the flavors of them all together were excellent. It was so good! 

Once again I'd hesitate to order them again, not because they were bad, but because there is sooo much on the menu to choose from I'd rather try something new instead..but the allure of both of these rolls is really tempting. While I would love to have them both again, I'd love to try some of the other rolls first.

So there you have it. A surprise gem I found while searching for food in the Hazleton area. I would come back here in a heartbeat! Bobtail preferably here, as there is little room to maneuver with a trailer. There is enough room to park so as not to be in the way. Oh and there was also a Ground Round here, too. I haven't seen that place since we left Wisconsin in '89! Not sure if it's still open though. I may have to check that out next time I'm in the area.

Five Stars is located on Route 93 & Airport Road in beautiful Hazleton PA. It's in the annex to the Laurel Mall, not in the mall itself but in a small area of shops and restaurants adjacent to the mall (that's why it's an annex, Liz!) They have a website: www.5starsgourmet.com and it's casual dress. You can get orders to go, which I saw a lot of, or you can eat in and their booths looked pretty decent. 

Just prepare to sit and stare and be dumbfounded at the huge menu and don't be surprised if you tell the wait staff, "Just a few more minutes please, I can't decide what I'd like to order."