Gearing up for their third season serving Rehoboth, Confucius owners Danielle and Shawn Xiong continue their dedication to bringing fine Chinese cuisine to diners as evidenced in their original dinner menu, and have added a new and welcomed twist: Sunday Brunch, served from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. After brunch, you can continue to order from the dinner menu until their 10 p.m. closing.

Sunday Brunch is certainly no novelty to Rehoboth but this brunch is different. Shawn and Danielle wanted this lunch to add a different aspect and variety to our community and started the new Sunday menu this spring. They are still in the process of exploring new dishes and the menu remains a work in progress. From my perspective what they have is already perfection but Shawn has a mission: he wants to change peoples’ opinions of what currently passes for Chinese cooking and renew the impressions of what Chinese cooking really should be and definitely is at Confucius.

From almost the beginning of Confucius, Shawn had the idea to introduce noodle days on the weekend. What was once an intention is now a reality. The Sunday menu is in two parts: Noodles and Dim Sum and Others. There are eighteen offerings, and you couldn’t go wrong with any of them. There’s a price enticement—order any one noodle dish and two other items for only $10.00. Yes, you read that right, ten dollars. Know anyplace else where you could have a great Sunday brunch for ten bucks?

Both Susan and I are big fans of Dim Sum and noodles rank right up there for me as the happiest of comfort foods. We decided to place ourselves in Shawn’s capable hands and asked him to select a menu for us to sample. This is something easy to do at Confucius. All you need to do is let them know what sort of food you like (or don’t like) and a feast is guaranteed. If you are a regular, as was the table of four next to us, they’ll remember what you like and present a variety of tastes for you to enjoy.

It should be mentioned that most of the dishes are made right on the premises and the freshness shows up in great and distinctive flavors. We started off with a pot of green tea, served as it should be in a cast iron pot, ensuring hot tea throughout our meal. The first dish to arrive was Hunan style Cold Noodles, a fusion of spiced noodles that added the right amount of heat to a cold dish. Following that came Beef Chow Ho Fun. Could you go wrong with a dish that has ‘fun’ in its name? Certainly not here. Flat rice noodles cooked with bean sprouts and green onions and loaded with tender beef chunks made for a memorable dish.

The Singapore Street Rice Noodles was a dish unfamiliar to Susan or me and what a wonderful treat. The threadlike glass noodles were brought to life by curry, shrimp, chicken, egg, green onions, and other goodies. This is a must try dish. The Shrimp Stuffed Eggplant that next arrived was melt in your mouth. Crispy puffs encase the eggplant which is stuffed with chopped shrimp, garlic and ginger. There’s a savory black bean sauce for dipping.

Dumplings, dumplings. How I love dumplings. We were treated to two varieties: Pork dumplings with Napa, big, fat ones, each one easily two delicious mouthfuls, followed by the more delicate but not less tasty Hargow, or shrimp dumplings. These jewels glisten in their glass noodle wrappers and are stuffed with plump shrimp.

Just when we thought we couldn’t hold another bite, out comes a wonderful portion of Peking Duck—a slab of tender breast meat and leg with fall-off-the-bone meat contained in the crispiest of skin. We spread the pancakes with plum sauce, topped it off with spring onions and managed to eat every single morsel. This treasure of a dish is also a Sunday special. Normally priced at an already reasonable $20 for a half-duck, you can get the same dish for $14.95. Also, Susan and I have marked our calendars to return for the Monday Nights Fish Special when all fish dishes are half-priced.

Confucius offers a full bar menu and a very extensive wine list, each bottle hand picked and tasted by Shawn himself. He selects with input from other restaurant owners and matches the wines with the customer wants and the sort of food that it compliments.

You should know that there is a special Banquet Room that will comfortably seat twenty. What better way to spend a special occasion and things can be made easier by letting the staff work with you to customize a menu that will be memorable.

Susan and I love this restaurant and are always made to feel special by Shawn and Danielle. Go there and you will be too.

Confucius Chinese Cuisine, 57 Wilmington Avenue, is open daily. For reservations, call 302-227-3848.