Way back before Pepe and Jonathan Magallanes went grocery shopping every day for Germantown Parkway fave Las Tortugas, back before anyone uttered the phrase “farm to table,” long before most of us thought in terms of chef/owner, there was Mr. Joe.

I don’t know if Joe was his first name or his last, just that “Mister” preceded it and he could cook. He owned Wah Nam, a Chinese restaurant in Raleigh that started out in a small strip center on Austin Peay and later moved to its own building on Stage Road, sort of catty-cornered from the skating rink.

$10 Deal: Try Sweet Pea’s in Bartlett for good fried livers

Back in the day, Mr. Joe began each day shopping at Fred Montesi in Raleigh, picking up his produce and staples for the day. It was an unusual enough practice at the time that the grocery manager would talk about it now and again.

I ate there as a child with my parents, as a teenager on dates, even into the 1990s, married and with kids. I’m not sure when the restaurant closed, though I know it was after 2000, and don’t know if Mr. Joe still owned it when it did.

I remember three specific dishes and can’t say they’d be as good to me now as they were then, but guess what? That doesn’t matter. The way I remember them, they were great and as you’ll see, one sort of lives on and that one I like as much as ever. I typically ate walnut chicken or Szechuan shrimp but always, always ate Wah Nam fried rice.

A few years ago I ate at Golden City in Cordova and sampled all manner of authentic dishes at dinner, giving the chef carte blanche to send what was best that day. I returned later to order from the lunch special menu — I was reviewing the restaurant — and my cousin was with me.

We ordered Young Chow rice and looked at each other after the first bite, then he pointed to it and said, “Wah Nam’s. Exactly like Wah Nam’s.”

He was right, and I’ve been back several times, sometimes just to pick up an order of the rice, sometimes for dinner, where you can find plenty of dishes priced lower than $10. Golden City’s large menu is the jackpot of $10 Deals.

Young Chow rice ($8.50) contains several proteins. It’s full of small shrimp, bits of pork, Chinese sausage, fried egg and vegetables such as cabbage and green onion. It’s quickly cooked, but just lightly, so it has a fresher flavor than some fried rice dishes that cook longer or are heavily flavored with soy sauce.

Young Chow, by the way, comes from the word Yangzhou, which is also the dish’s city of origin.

Golden City is my second-favorite Chinese restaurant in town, even if both are actually in the suburbs. New Asia in Germantown takes top place, but I’d happily eat at Golden City any day, and it’s likely worth a trip to Cordova for you, too. Get the rice, eat dinner, or go for the weekday lunch special.

Golden City, 815 Exocet Drive, is open Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday 11 a.m.-9:30 p.m. and Friday and Saturday 11 a.m.-1 a.m. Call 901-590-0063 for more information.