Family-run Box Hill eatery Shaanxi-Style Restaurant is an argument for not judging a book by its cover. Behind an unassuming facade almost stereotypical of a suburban Australian Chinese joint, the authentic northwestern Chinese food draws in so many customers the family had to expand the original dining room into the space next door.

As the name suggests, the food here all originates in the Shaanxi province in northwest China, where strong flavours of garlic, salt and onion are common. Try regional specialties like roujiamo (flatbread meat sandwiches), biang biang noodles and paomo, which is a lamb soup popular in the province's capital, Xi'an. If you walk away from Shaanxi-Style Restaurant with a bill of more than $40, we'll be very surprised, as dishes range from $3 for green bean soup, to $19.90 for the fried pork intestine with chilli; most of the dishes sit at around the $12 mark.