The Great Wall restaurant has been a fixture in the Meadowlane Shopping Center for years. In the past, it has been connected with other Great Walls in Lincoln and several owners, according to Taylor Cao, the Meadowlane establishment’s current owner/manager.

Cao purchased the business from a relative two years ago, and to avoid confusion about its identity, renamed the business Jin’s Great Wall Chinese Restaurant after her sister.

Cao was born in China and came to the U.S. for her education. Her parents, who live in Lincoln, are often in the restaurant’s kitchen preparing traditional Chinese dishes.

“We help each other out,” Cao says.

The restaurant is tiny, with a tiny dining area and a long carryout line – 90 percent of Jin’s business is carryout.

The thing to remember about Jin’s is that the long line from counter to sidewalk is usually populated by customers picking up their to-go orders. And generally, the time period from when a carryout order is phoned in to the time a customer picks up an order is 10 to 15 minutes.

Teachers, construction workers and neighborhood residents comprise most of Jin’s lunch trade, while the 5-7 p.m. dinner time is the busiest with lots of carryout orders.

Cao praises those she calls “the regulars” – customers who have frequented Great Wall restaurants for years and those who come specifically to Jin’s because of the continuity of the menu items. “They have been there for us.”

“Our recipes are the original recipes,” she adds. “They are the recipes that have worked for 20 years or more. Why change them?”

In two years, Cao has only added one new item to the menu – a chicken lettuce wrap that she had perfected.

The appetizers at Jin’s Great Wall number seven. They cost $3.25 to $6.75 and range from Egg Rolls to Pan Fried Dumplings and Crab Rangoon, while soup choices are Egg Drop, Hot and Sour, Wonton, Chicken Noodle, Chicken Rice or Vegetable, costing $2.50 small/$4.95 large. The House Special Soup is $5.95.

A pork entrée, including Sweet & Sour, Roast Pork with Broccoli, Roast Pork with Mixed Vegetable, Szechuan Pork or Mongolian Pork, is $10.25. At $10.95 beef choices include Beef with Broccoli, Pepper Steak with onions, Beef with mixed vegetables, Beef with snow peas, Hunan beef, Beef with garlic sauce, Mongolian beef, Szechuan beef or Mushroom beef with oyster sauce.

There are a dozen chicken entrees at $10.25 including Moo Goo Gai Pan, Kung Pao and Peanut Butter chicken. Ten seafood entrees at $11.25 include Sweet and Sour shrimp, Cashew shrimp, Shrimp with Lobster Sauce and Mongolian shrimp. Six Lo Mein orders cost between $9.50 and $10.95, while six Chow Meins range from $10.25 to $11.95. The restaurant also offers Egg Foo Young, Fried Rice, Mei Fun and Moo Shu.

Nineteen Chef’s Specials are available for diners to try, ranging from $10.95 to $13.50. Among the choices are General Tso’s Chicken, Sesame Chicken, Orange Beef, Kung Pao Triple Delight, and Salt and Pepper Shrimp. Jin’s also offers $6.95 Lunch Specials from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuedays through Saturdays, and 36 Anytime Dinner Specials from $9.50 to $10.25.

According to Cao, the most popular customer choices at Jin’s Great Wall are Beef with Broccoli, General Tso’s Chicken, Kung Pao Triple Delight and Sesame Chicken.

“I’ve learned a lot in two years,” Cao said. “Things were pretty hectic at the beginning, but now they are much better.”

Hard work and respecting traditions seem to have the necessary benefit.