What we ate in January. Fresno restaurant favorites from Bee journalists
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Bee journalists sampled Fresno restaurants and compiled standout January dishes.
- Reporters prioritized flavors and dish craftsmanship over formal restaurant reviews
- Featured items include beef ribs at Horn BBQ and Adrian’s chicken burrito.
One of the best parts of covering the food and restaurant scene in Fresno is sampling the food.
With Fresno’s growing number of restaurants, our reporters and visual journalists are getting behind-the-scenes looks at everything from the newest little family run Chinese spot to the latest restaurants by celebrity chefs.
And part of that job is sampling the food. The Bee does not publish traditional restaurant reviews; we’ll still leave the full reviews to you, the public. We’ll continue to focus on the news of new restaurants opening and others closing. But we do occasionally get gobsmacked with something so delicious we’re compelled to tell you about it.
So this month we decided to compile the best things we tasted in the course of our reporting and share it with you. We hope you’ll check out the stories behind these restaurants and sign up for our weekly Eat, Drink & Bee Entertained newsletter with all our foodie coverage, too.
The best foods we tried in January
Beef ribs from Horn BBQ
Reporter Joshua Tehee: Probably anything on the menu at the just-opened Horn BBQ in Fresno could be on this list.
The standout were the beef ribs, which I sampled as part of my reporting on the restaurant.
Fall-off-the-bone tender, just one rib is enough for a meal. Pairs great with Horn’s signature barbecue sauce.
Drawback: It’s available only Fridays and Saturdays.
You can read about chef Matt Horn’s Fresno roots and his “spiritual” approach to barbecue in my story about the new Horn BBQ, which is inside the former Yosemite Falls Cafe at the Granite Park complex.
Chow mein from Dragon Wok
Reporter Bryant-Jon Anteola: Not all chow mein is made the same. And at Dragon Wok, you can definitely taste the difference — how much tastier its chow mein is compared to other places.
It’s a masterpiece made of stir-fried thin noodles, loaded with beef, chicken, pork and shrimp, and with vegetables that are cut into long, thin, matchstick-like strips.
The shape of the vegetables is perhaps fitting, because as the kids say — this food is fire.
Not hot, in terms of spicy. But good. Really good.
It’s a popular dish that I got to try while reporting on Dragon Wok, which has been open since October and is located in the southeast corner of First Street and Herndon Avenue.
Dragon Wok owner Alan Wong is a second-generation restaurant owner who grew up helping his parents run their own restaurants in Selma, Reedley and Kingsburg.
A vegetarian appetizer from The Yellow Chilli
Reporter Bethany Clough: The dahi bhalla topped with crackling spinach and pomegranate seeds is an appetizer at the newly opened The Yellow Chilli restaurant in Fresno — and it was the best thing I tried during my visit.
It’s made with lentils and smothered in creamy sauces. It’s an odd thing to highlight, for sure, when there are lamb chops that are deliciously soft and tender on the menu. It’s not even their most popular starter (that’s the raj kachori). But sometimes the ingredients combine to equal more than the sum of their parts, jumping out and making you say “wow.”
You can read all about The Yellow Chilli and its menu here. The restaurant is at 799 W. Palmdon Dr.
The chicken burrito from Adrian’s Mexican Food
Senior editor Christopher Kirkpatrick: A chicken burrito from Adrian’s is a go-to lunch for me. Simple, fresh ingredients, massive flavor and locally famous red salsa that is addictive. The flour tortillas are handmade there, and you can tell.
I had one on Tuesday, and I’m still thinking about it. I first became aware of Adrian’s from a profile in The Bee. Located at 3060 E. Belmont Ave., Adrian’s is to-go only and operates inside a rundown building near a colorful towering sign that hangs over the road.
