Wallowa County’s only Chinese restaurant came under new management when its name changed from Ming Li to Happy Garden Restaurant this fall.

“My dad wants to take this name. It says to the customer, ‘Come in, eat and be happy,'” explained Lisa Zhen, who serves as the eatery’s spokesperson.

She moved to Enterprise from Salem this fall to operate the restaurant with her husband, Ken Zhen, and brother and sister-in-law, Jian Zhen and Lingli Wang. For the most part, Lisa Zhen said, the men are kept busy preparing the food in the kitchen while the women wait on the customers.

The new managers have taken over the business from a member of their extended family, Richard Zhen, who ran Ming Li for five years, but is now running a restaurant in Elgin.

The primary owner is Lisa’s father, Hung Zhen, who continues to live in Salem.

Between them, the two couples have four children – three school-age daughters, Jude, Amy and Michelle, ages 6, 7 and 8, who attend Enterprise Elementary School, and Andrew, 5, who is a frequent visitor to Happy Garden.

The Zhen family originally discovered Enterprise through a chain of real estate agents who felt that the little Northeast Oregon community could use a Chinese restaurant.

Lisa said that, while the restaurant’s menu hasn’t changed radically, it does include some tasty additions, including Moo Shu Pork with vegetables. One local favorite is a spicy dish known as General Tso’s Chicken.

The large menu also includes combination plates of such favorites as egg rolls, fried shrimp, sweet and sour chicken and chow mein, and multi-entrée family dinners for two or more. Also available are a wide variety of appetizers, such as egg rolls and crab puffs.

Set on the west edge of Enterprise across Golf Course Road from Safeway, Happy Garden is open from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily. Menus are available for the asking, and to-go orders may be placed by calling 426-3688.

Lisa Zhen said the families are settling into their homes in Enterprise, and enjoy the small town friendliness they encounter. She finds it amusing that, since there are no Burger Kings or McDonalds in Wallowa County, some Happy Garden customers order hamburgers from the restaurant’s American menu.

The Zhens had a much longer journey than from the west side of Oregon when they moved to Wallowa County. Lisa’s father grew up as one of 10 children in a small village in the Chinese state of Canton, where almost everyone shared the last name of Zhen.

She said that her father was a “very poor” farm hand when he decided to try to better his family’s life by immigrating to the United States a dozen years ago. At that time, his mother and three brothers were already living in Oregon, operating a restaurant.

Lisa was in her late teens when she arrived, enrolled in a Salem high school and started a “different whole new life.” Most of her family members work in the restaurant business in Salem, Eugene and other parts of Oregon. Lisa herself owned and managed a restaurant in Grants Pass for several years before returning to Salem.

One aspect of Wallowa County life Lisa’s family is gradually warming up to is the winter weather.

“We’re not used to cold; we’re from Salem,” she said.