Zoe's: Fresh Chinese in Somerville

China native Jun Yang and his wife, Li Su, opened Zoe's five years ago on the Somerville-Cambridge line, not far from Inman and Porter squares. The little place is filled with Chinese students and, on weekends, with Chinese families. And with good reason: If you think you've had great Chinese food that arrives at your table seconds from the wok, then you'll be surprised when you discover what freshly made really tastes like.

One example is a platter of stir-fried baby bok choy ($7.75) -- the dish isn't on the menu, but the waitress offered it to us one night. This heaping display of large chunks of bright green leaves -- almost too hot to bite into -- is crisp and mildly garlicky, and is still piping-hot 10 minutes later. Scallion pancake ($3.50), triangles of golden dough studded with spring onions, is gloriously crisp and flavorful. Deliciously crunchy pan-fried noodles ($7) are studded with stir-fried broccoli, carrots, and generous squares of beef. It's no surprise that Zoe's has become the favorite spot of many of its neighbors.The owners happened into the restaurant business via an unusual route. Su is a researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health; as she explains it, her husband was a journalist in China and helped the Beijing Hotel publish a book of recipes. "They cater for national visitors," explains Su, and the hotel's food includes "many different styles." First Yang assisted the hotel in writing the book; then he translated the recipes into English. Along the way, he became interested in food. So Zoe's, named for the couple's daughter, is the varied Beijing Hotel menu adapted for a Boston audience.There are dishes that are probably similar to what is served at home: fish head cooked in clay pot ($8.50), for instance, or tripe with cilantro ($8.95). Among the North-South specialties are lamb with cumin ($11.95), and the Sichuan menu offers several whole fish (though their $15.95-$16.95 price tags made these out of bounds for our $15-per-item Cheap Eats limit).Luckily, most of the items on the menu are less than $10, and portions are so generous that you can have leftovers for lunch the next day. Plump curls of spicy Sichuan-style shrimp ($9.75) come with an intense red sauce loaded with onions -- we needed lots of rice with that dish. Very thin slices of white-meat chicken and pea pods ($7.75) offer a mild contrast to the hot items. General Gau's chicken ($8.75) consists of walnut-sized nuggets of meat, battered and fried, then tossed in a pleasingly spicy red sauce.

One of the stars here is tea-smoked duck ($11.50). Mahogany-colored, it is intense with smoky tea and spices, and the skin is quite crisp. Cut into small pieces, the moist duck is served with all its bones intact. In order to enjoy it, you have to consider this bone-in system delightful (as we did). We scooped big chunks of a neon-purple and garlicky eggplant ($7.25) along with broccoli ($7.25), whose florets seemed to shimmer in their garlic sauce.

One Sunday night, as my mother carefully made her way down the little flight of stairs to the entrance, she noticed many members of a Chinese family dining at a big round table. They seemed to be enjoying their meal and one another, and since we had as well, we were pleased to match our generations to theirs.