What the heck is a Lanzhao Beef Noodle?
Lanzhao beef noodles is a famous historic dish in northwestern China, becoming nationally popular there in the 90s as a fast food. It was developed as variation of beef noodle soup noodle which is compatible with the Muslim diet of the Hui people, making Lanzhao beef noodle stores a convenient fast option for Muslims here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lanzhou_beef_noodles
A few cities in Australia have chain stores for these noodles now. A friend asked if I'd been to one, I mentioned I'd been to one in another state a few years back and my friend asked me if it was 1915 Lanzhao Beef Noodles, 1919 Lanzhao Beef Noodle, or one of the few 1917 Lanzhao Beef Noodle stores.
I hadn't paid attention to the date, so I had no idea, but yes, there are two chains and a couple of other stores all with nearly the same name.
- https://www.1915lanzhou.com.au/ (NSW, VIC)
- https://www.1919masternoodle.com.au/ (ACT, NSW, QLD, SA, VIC)
- and a couple of NSW stores which may or may not still be called 1917 Lanzhao Beef Noodle
Looking in deeper, the video on 1919's homepage says 1919 Lanzhao was opened in 2018, merging with Master Lanzhao in Victoria (est. 2017) to form their current brand. Meanwhile, the birth of 1915, or at least under that name, is fuzzy. 1915 seems to be claiming (the language is ambiguous) in 1915 in China as "1915 Halal Lanzhou Beef Noodle" while also saying 1915 Catering Management Co., Ltd. was established on September 22, 2014, although another part of the site says "Yijiu Yiwu Catering Management Co., Ltd. was founded on September 2, 2014, Lanzhou beef Ramen was founded in 1915", which makes me suspect a typo is in play and it changed name at a later date. I haven't found anything conclusive to prove which was named first.
Anyone been to one of these stores? Anyone been to a 1915 and a 1919? What's different?