SEASIDE – Wanted: Chinese restaurant purveying authentic Chinese fare such as steamed fish, Peking duck, plum sauce, mung beans, shark’s fin soup, bean thread noodles and dim sum. Chinese restaurants serving “combo” plates, crab puffs, exotic cocktails with miniature flags, fortune cookies and other American culinary niceties need not apply.

In the Columbia-Pacific region, unfortunately, the search remains ongoing. Chinese restaurants here are pretty darn, well, American. Meaning a diner would be hard-pressed to locate one that offers much of anything mentioned in the first sentence.

Enter the Silver Dragon. We’ve eaten here three times and enjoyed, if not been wowed by the seafood soup, a chicken-asparagus special bathed in a black-bean sauce and a plate of Szechwan mixed vegetables, among other preparations. Really. Our oversized serving of moo shu vegetables was loaded with shredded this and that and flecked with fried egg. And the rice noodles drenched with mildly spicy sauce that formed the bed for our sliced Mongolian chicken breast were way better than passable.

Could it be that our palates have been deadened to honest-to-goodness Chinese fixings? Otherwise, why weren’t we savoring coriander, cilantro, ginger, hoisin sauce, a hodgepodge of chilis and other classic Chinese seasonings?

Blame it on American taste buds. Chinese chefs may believe their native country is the center of the universe. But evidently many of them refuse to acknowledge that provincial American diners will patronize anything but toned-down Chinese restaurants. The real deal is reserved for their countrymen who know how to order “off” the menu.

OK, the food at the 10-week-old Silver Dragon is advertised as Cantonese (as well as Hong Kong, Mandarin and American), a regional Chinese cuisine that’s usually simply flavored and characterized by minimal seasonings. But even garlic seems in short supply, with the exception of a handful of assertive dishes: string beans doused in garlic sauce, Szechwan veggies, the chicken-asparagus special and an exemplary Kung Pao beef. Laced with quartered serrano chili peppers and who knows what else, the latter almost made our eyes water.

Honey-walnut prawns, conversely, were marred by saccharine-sweet walnuts tossed with shrimp that had spent considerable time in the deep-fryer instead of a few seconds in a wok. And the Triple Crown shrimp, scallops and fowl arrived simmering in an unimpressive white wine sauce stir-fried with Chinese formula vegetables — water chestnuts, pea pods, baby corn cobs and the like.

Food generally arrives quickly, a good thing because there’s not much else here to capture the imagination. The Silver Dragon space – which has housed a furniture store, a clothing outlet and a dance club – is commodious and stark with mostly unadorned white walls. Numerous small potted plants add but a flash of color. The place almost makes one long for the tacky orange, red and black decor that used to differentiate many Chinese restaurants.

Friendly servers don’t offer much assistance. They claim everything on the menu, which lists upwards of 100 choices, is wonderful. True, the food is handsomely plated – every selection we ordered looked pretty. Your best bet will be to share three dishes between the two of you – if you opt for combination plates, you’ll likely not sample anything distinctive – although it’s doubtful you’ll finish the ample portions. For a jazzier meal, request more zip as we did with our chicken-asparagus special and hope the chef breaks out his private stash of chilis and Chinese spices.

Otherwise realize that Chinese restaurants in our region aren’t as authentic as their brethren in many West Coast Chinatowns. Sadly, those of us desperately seeking more daring Chinese fare can’t always get what we want.

I think I read that in a fortune cookie.

Contact the Mouth at The Daily Astorian, P.O. Box 210, Astoria, OR 97103 or phone (503) 325-3211 or e-mail mouth@dailyastorian.com

Silver Dragon1 N. Holladay St., Seaside; (503) 738-6688

Hours: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday; noon to 10 p.m. Fri, Sat; noon to 9 p.m. Sunday

Prices: Inexpensive to moderate. Only a few menu items top $10, and most cost $7 to $9. Two could eat well for less than $25, excluding beverages and tip.

Superior selections: Mongolian chicken, chicken-asparagus special, Szechwan mixed vegetables, sauteed string beans in garlic sauce, Kung Pao beef

Atmosphere: Stark white walls, numerous potted plants and a lost-in-space feel

Service: Friendly, but sometimes spotty

Kid-friendly: Absolutely, with more than 100 choices, including an eight-item American menu.

Vegetarian options: Many, such as vegetable egg foo young, Szechwan mixed vegetables, red braised tofu and moo shu Vegetables

Alcohol: Beer, wine and cocktails

Access: The entrance and restrooms are accessible to people in wheelchairs.

Credit cards: All major cards

Personal checks: Not accepted

Reservations: Not necessary

Smoking: Not permitted

Fortune cookie triviaNo, fortune cookies don’t date to the time of Confucius, and they’re not a Chinese specialty. Rather, these crispy, half moon-shaped wafer cookies originated in 1916 in – get ready – California. The invento, a man named David Jung, is said to have been a noodle maker by trade.