To kick off the new lunar year, we travel to the hidden path within the mountains of Xizhi, Taipei. Where gravity defying monks tend to visiting tourists in between meditations and wu-gung practice. This is not merely a restaurant review. This is retelling of the legend know as …Shi Yang Culture Restaurant.

(warning, an overly long prologue below. Scroll to middle-ish to skip to food)

Whuppa. No seriously, we had to drive up a mountain to get here, here being Taipei. It was one of the more illuminating meals I’ve had, a kind of a mountain-top cuisine in zen-like surroundings. Take a look at the outside:

Talk about restaurants with a view. Forget about those which oversee some of the worlds greatest city harbours, or the world’s greatest city parks, or even those which will overlook our beloved Ol’ Smoke. A birds eye view on human progress may be breathtaking but it is also a reminder of the way man has levelled and desecrated mother nature with our heretical obsession in forcing our electrical wizardry upon the world.

In Shi Yang, it couldn’t be further away from the modernity of life as we know it. Here you eat under the motherly gaze of nature’s original skyscrapers. Surrounded by these hulking mountains with puffs of clouds brushing by its summits as they whiff past – It is humbling.

The restaurant looks like it was built by hand, with steel beams holding up solid timber planks, all painted black. It’s inspired by real ancient China. Song Dynasty, 10th century China. So wonderfully organic, humanistic, much harmony. As if the 21st century had forgotten to touch this part of the world, or more accurately, as if this place had deliberately stayed away from the march of technology. Ironic considering Taiwan’s economic awakening was built on the silicon boom. The restaurant is essentially made up of conjoining private quarters, there is no communal area, and each table is located in its own private room. As we made our way into our allocated room, I peeked into the others, and saw that they were filled predominantly by large groups of tourists from the Mainland, armed with their cameras hovering over the food.

The cobbled narrow walkway lit by bamboo lamp shades and flickering candles on the ground was cinematic. We took our shoes before entering, and sat down at a low long table, made of cold steel allowed to age to a natural rust, and held up by solid wooden legs. Sturdy, permanent and long lasting – a feeling in total contrast to my hectic, vacuous and fast paced world. For background music, chinese mandolins sent every mitochondria in my cells into a resonant sway.

The Force I feel, is strong with this restaurant. I feel at peace with myself, I feel I could move the mountains I was communing with. I felt hugely replenished. A large pot of extinguished charcoal letting out residual heat kept us warm. Only the sight of a kettle attached to an electrical socket, prevented me from glimpsing into the parallel brane universe.

The Taiwanese think of this restaurant’s cuisine as ‘creative and traditional’. But maybe it’s much more than that, but perhaps also very much less. You could say it’s a minimalist kind of high mountain food, leaner and far removed from the rest of the world below. There is so much clarity, it’s analogous to a spiritual stripping away of the burden of materialistic life, a rebirth to a purer version of self.

Or you could say this cuisine is a direct reflection of Taiwan’s mixed heritage. The island nation of flaming mountains, valleys of terrible beauty and a people who identify with sweet potato. It is a sort of cultural melting pot where the best of the Chinese and Japanese is found. From its original influx of Chinese migrants from the Fujian province to its eventual legacy rule of law left over after centuries of association with its (former) Japanese imperial master. For the foreigner (that’s me) whose had the fortunate pleasure of learning about Taiwanese culture first hand through my better half, it really strikes me as one of the most uniquely distinct cuisines/cultures in the world. It is both Chinese and Japanese, but neither at the very same time.

The man behind Shi Yang is a rather elusive character, which I think translates loosely to ‘Nourishing Eating Culture retreat, on a Mountain’. The restaurant has moved from mountain to mountain in its roughly 16 year history, from its original Xindian City location, to Yang Ming Mountain and eventually to Xizhi. The owner is Lin Pin-Hui, a former architect; The story goes that he packed in his successful city career to move to the mountains to lead a more spiritual life and to indulge in his true life passion of building a space to appreciate Chinese Tea.

Occasionally, he would entertain his buddies by cooking this purified lifestyle food, eventually it became a kind of underground restaurant. On those foundations, it grew to become a sort of transcendent purveyor of modern Taiwanese cooking and a tea house, famous not so much in guide books, but more so by word of mouth. I suppose the story is paralleled by Stephen Harris and The Sportmans in Britain. Move closer to nature, cook what you find around you, live a more enriched lifestyle. Yeah I’d like to do that once I’m done writing for you folks.

There is a more romantic report of his origins, his kitchen ethics (Culinary ‘partners’ as opposed to sous chefs) here.

No menus, the food is completely seasonal, and think of it as a vegetarian based (think monks’ food again) with the odd injection of the freshest seafood delivered from Keelung harbour, and some pork and chicken thrown in. Yeah that’s right, local provenance, no imported truffle or foie gras here. Tick, tick, tick.

The menu-less menu costs NTD1100 per person. NT what? That works out to be £26 each. That’s INCLUSIVE of service. And that’s for 9 to 10 courses, irrespective of lunch or dins. Yeah I hear you, £26 is actually cheap(ish) in Taipei terms too, but really it’s amazing how affordable it really is. I went with the family, 6 adults and two 3 year olds. Everybody eats the same thing, that’s to say, every item was times 6 (kids picked off their parents).

Ok, ok no more hot air, food below.

Course 1 : Vegetable soup with flying fish roe

Almost veloute like in texture, a root vegetable with rich umami flavours, perhaps akin to celeriac. I was completely sold on the first sip. The fish roe adding extra textural layers. We also drank this with a herbal tea, you know, I forgot to write it down, but it was medicinal, like a sort of strong ginger tea.. or something. Detoxing, different, cleansing.

Course 2: (L-R) Mochi with flying fish roe ; Pomegranate with wood ear ; Peanut tofu with olive tapenade.

This trio was like a kind of appetizer, uniquely and quite strangely cleansing.

There was a sequence in which I had to eat this in, but I forget the order.

My notes indicate that I started from the middle with the cold pomegranate juice with wood ear. A jolt to the soul. Then I moved on to the crisply fried and gooey mochi with a centre filled with a flying fish roe paste. I remember the crunch of the mochi, and thought how peaceful the cooking was. Did they use some kind of clean vegetable oil as opposed to lard?

Finally, I moved on to the peanut tofu. Great wobbly pannacotta textures, also served cold, it was fabulously dense and silken, as good as the best and freshest tofu I’d ever had in Asia, but with the surprise of peanut as opposed to that of pure water. Paired with perfectly boiled rectagular blocks of squid, an olive tapenade for flavour and some sort of mucus-like seeds – this was immensely brilliant cooking. I could honestly say I’d never had anything like this before. Seriously, this would change your mind about what tofu could taste like.

Course 3: Chawanmushi or “Chawan Steam” with scallop.

Or steamed egg in a tea cup. I was amazed at how the entire table (of my extended Taiwanese family) gestured “Chawanmushi!” as this arrived. To me, this wasn’t Chinese food, this was completely Japanese. But to them, it was completely Taiwanese. It occurred to me how different their culture was to my own ‘Nanyang’ ideology of Chinese culture. This was the Japanese part of their Taiwanese upbringing.

Anyway, look at that savoury egg custard. Look at the texture.

That’s zen cooking right there. Beautiful unbroken blobs of cooked protein. Seeping in the gorgeous flavour of intense dried scallop with some kind of pickled mountain vegetable. I get it now, chawanmushi is suppose to nourish the soul, this nourished my nuts alright. Energising stuff.

Course 4: The seafood and vegetable platter.

Or the sashimi platter, whichever way you want to look at it. My parents are still averse to raw food, it’s just so unthinkable to have raw food (generally speaking obviously) in Chinese cooking. But in Taiwan, again, it’s that Japanese side of their culture – raw fish was part of a healthy diet.

Flamed scallops, dried beadcurd, aubergines, sea urchin (these were gorgeously creamy), sea bass (maybe?) or mackerel, local mushrooms, lotus leaves, baby abalone, smoked salmon maki with fish roe.

Here’s my little selection I picked out for myself. It was the most beautiful sashimi platter I’d ever seen assembled. It was the very crux of Taiwanese culture, a perfect fusion of China and Japan. (Mindful of history, I mean no disrespect with that last statement.)

Course 5: Lavander, Guava juice with Passionfruit.

A mid-meal palate cleanser of guava juice. At this point I thought to myself, that I never realised detoxing could ever be so delicious. And entertaining.

Course 6: Grilled prawn with pumpkin and inari sushi

A sweet beancurd skin wrapped rice ball with anchovy and a giant grilled prawn. Alright, nothing too much to write about, aside from the fact that it was a juicy prawn. Delish.

Course 7: Glutinous rice with Italian salami, wood ear and some kind of local mushroom.

Dressed up like a cooked salami nigiri, but really it’s a classic steamed glutinous rice which could have easily been made with Chinese salami too. But this was nice too. The mushroom and the woodear were of exceptional quality, needless to say the rice was redolent of homey memories.

Course 8: Boiled chicken soup with ‘blossoming’ lotus flower.

The pièce de résistance. The kids were mesmerised by the blossoming flower.

Hah. And so was I.

I forget what the boiled broth was cooked with, but it’s a mystical blend of Chinese herbs, lotus root and probably ginger. (There’s almost always ginger in Chinese boiled broths).

Like most of these Chinese boiled broths, I hazard a guess that it’s been slow cooking for at least half a day. Yup, soothing chicken soup for the soul indeed. For me, double boiled Chinese soup is a family thing, it’s the love of a wife, mother and grandmother re-condensing in the pot, and ready to energise her family after hours on the hob. For me, I could only ever love my mum’s double boiled black chicken soup (I always used to choke on shark’s fin and fish maw anyway) , but this was cooked with spiritual zen (and a blossoming lotus flower!), I applauded its heartiness. This was the very essence of Chinese cooking.

Course 9: Yuni, oatmeal (or barley), longan, red date syrup.

Yuni, or mashed yam (taro) served piping hot with a thick caramel-like syrup was incredulously decadent stuff, a bona-fide pudding, but perhaps a rare one that could actually be good for your health.

We also ate sliced kiwifruit and bellfruit, the latter being quite symbolic of Taiwan.

I still can’t believe how ridiculously cheap the meal was. It was my turn to buy everybody lunch, so I paid NTD7260 or £159.59, for six adults and two kids.

Amazing. Just amazing. Beard stroking zen masters would eat here and grow to an old age, gain amazing human wisdom, and glide from tree to tree until David Carradine sends Uma Thurman to become an apprentice.

Shi Yang is an exceptionally unique culinary experience. But it can’t win a star (yet) because there is no Taipei version of the red guide. (There is a green one).

It’s absolutely one of a kind, culturally aware, modern yet traditional, it’s on the side of a mountain. It’s a destination restaurant. The waiters meditate in between service.

What’s that I hear? Noma? How much do they charge for making you cook an egg on your table? Surely more than £26.

If the bib has a ‘social responsibility’ in its power to enhance the reputations of whole national cuisines, then they should cast wider nets. Let’s not even take the Top 50 guys into consideration – that is no more than a back patting exercise amongst the power brokers of the food industry.

But you, Mr Punter, if you are searching for a holistic culinary journey that isn’t inflated with ridiculously materialistic awards – This is the ticket.

Let’s revisit the Lung King Heen (world’s first 3 starred chinese restaurant) dilemma. The Michelinism of the repackaged cha chan teng. But really, be honest now, LKH is exactly that. Aside from that view on HK harbour, tell me, what exactly is so ground breaking about LKH’s food? The innovative use of truffle? How about the burning of my wallet with the double charged bottled water. It is no surprise that I came out of LKH feeling so drained.

Did I mention Shi Yang rolled in all the cost of tea/water for free?

Luxe chinese cooking CAN be special. I am not saying that the traditional hotel banquet Canton restaurant shouldn’t be celebrated, it should and rightly so it is already. But I also think that the culinary world needs to look closer at ‘outcasts’ of Chinese cooking like Shi Yang which is creating something truly different. It changed my ideas of what Chinese cooking could be.

Call me a hopeless romantic but I just love the idea of this place: A remote getaway location wrapped within nature, cooking that is not only nourishing, but healthy, seasonal and entirely local. You have to travel to experience it, Shi Yang cannot come to you on a plane to Harrods.

So if you ask me about luxury Chinese food, and who to pat on the back, then I would very much like to put my paws on Mr Lin. This is a clean slate, purer beginnings, and it is not the tired old design of those dripping in the indulgence of excesses where haute cuisine is a place to broker the next depression. Of course, high cooking is inexorably linked to money, after all no matter how puritanical we all aspire to be, in the end, money makes the world go around. Especially in the restaurant business which depends on it. It’s business after all. Not to say money moves all intentions, but really we need to be realistic, and where lots of money is generated, great restaurants follow closely behind. Having said that, there are the outliers, and those are ones which really intrigue. (Also discounting the obvious exceptions to every stereotype)

All things considered, Shi Yang is a gem, it’s just fantastic. This is a gastronomic experience like none other, it is nearly spiritual, and – to borrow an oft abused word to describe destination restaurants – a genuine pilgrimage. Most importantly I would go back, partly because I can afford to. This is the reason why people like us collect restaurant experiences. This is what I aspire to write about. This is why restaurant blogs really exist. Now book a flight to Taiwan.

The Gist of It

Shi Yang Culture Restaurant
Taiwanese, £30pp
No. 7, Ln.350, Sec.3, XiWan Rd
XiZhi City, Taipei County, Taiwan
Tel : +886-2-2646-2266

There are others : Andre in Taiwan ; My Several Worlds ; Taipei Times ; Pace J Miller ;

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The smell of mushrooms, sizzling hot noodles and steamy soup. The knocking klikity klak of randomised synchronisation of high heels and colliding porcelain to the tune of a muzak of an epic eighties love ballad by Jacky Cheung, but above all of that a near enough constant stream of murmuring chatter in the background. Invariably this includes big round tables of women, babies, the next generation eyeing the next generation of the neighbouring big round table with the processions led by the belly laughter of silvering Chinese men. That unmistakable harmonious bustle is the very signature of a Chinese restaurant and as far as my experiences have taken me, it is an ambiance that is near enough the same the world over.

My Taiwanese other half grew up referring to this particular type of Chinese cuisine as ‘yum cha’ , where you do drink tea, but really, the slang has more in common with Sunday lunch than afternoon tea. For me however, yum cha is dim sum (where she will say refers to pudding when I say tianping… on the same subject, when I say run – jo – she thinks I’m saying walk – pau) , and it is more of a tradition than a meal, a treat for soothing the heart and the only time of the week for the family and the closest friends to sit together on the same table to share a civil meal and speak of the changing world.

It was no coincidence that dim sum involved pressed shirts and blouses, and that it followed right after the morning Sunday mass. Of course, we’d like to think of ourselves as god-loving baptised atheists, but dressing up for Sunday lunch was something me and my brother always looked forward to, psychologically, it was when the the week felt like it finally arrived. And since we’d usually skip breakfast for Dim Sum, the empty stomach only made the anticipation more tempting.

“Guk-fa, ga tong.” That’s how we usually began our Sundays, that’s chysentemum with rock sugar. Looking out to the restaurant, which is big enough for banquet style weddings, you can raise your arm and wave in just about any direction, and have a familiar hand return the gesture. Being that we were naughty little critters, we’d rather cool off with a couple of tall glasses of ‘teh si ping’ – iced milk tea – than indulge in tongue burning tea. This was usually followed by two steamers each of shui mai, har gaw and two plates of char siu cheung fun.

I have such fond memories of growing up around large round tables in Chinese restaurants, it is a tradition I find myself fortunate enough to be continuing in London. I won’t disagree that Alan Yau’s legacy restaurants do the cuisine proud and it’s a wonderful thing there is so much choice for dim sum in this city that we can opine about the ones we prefer, but for me, dim sum is as much about seeing the joy of large tables of mulit-generational Chinese people related to one another as it is about the fluffy sweetness of a char siu bun.

On the topic of the fluffy buns, the dim sum at Princess Gardens was much more than adequate. All the traditional stuff was great as far as I could tell, the har gaw was full of shrimpy bounce, the rice flour used in the cheung fun was chewy and sticky just a tad thick but fresh tastin’ and as good as you could get in London. Personally, I thought the shiu mai was constellations above the London competition, managing to tamp sheerly decadent rims of pork fat with copious amonts of mushroom and crab. The ball of dumpling was so bouncy, it could double as a tennis ball – bounce in this type of dumpling is the best kind of attribute. The ‘thousand layer’ sponge cake, which is sometimes referred to as Malaysian sponge cake felt like I was laying my tongue over a thousand layers of fine Persian carpets – that’s simple pleasures at its finest matey.

Being Chinese, one can only appreciate the shellfish overkill for breakfast, and the scallop gai lan dumpling was the icing over a largely fine start to the weeping Sunday. As we near Fall, warm Sunday dim sum is a welcoming addition to my life’s dowdy schedule, as the days get shorter and as I count down the days till I have to turn the wick up on the heating.

We paid £38.40 for the first meal here for two, drinking guk-po (that’s po-li leaves and chrysanthemum). I left a more gregarious fella than when I entered the restaurant, and I liked the meal enough to return the following Sunday with a similar resultant mood. About the only thing I thought was below par were the egg tarts – too dry, unsweet and overcooked, aka, just abit shit really. Otherwise, the quality of the dim sum was exemplary. I was pleased to find sizzling wok-hei in their noodles too.

I’ve had some truly terrible dim sum – not this one obviously – in my lifetime, but I’ve almost always consumed it with a smile, I think of my dear mother, my cranky father, my pathfinder of a brother and I thank them for gifting me the ability to appreciate one of humanity’s greatest inventions : Hospitality.

So if you are at Princess Gardens next Sunday, and you spot a curious Chinese fella with a Leica around his neck, come say hello to me. Princess Gardens is currently serving my favourite dim sum in London, besting Pearl Liang. It carries the right kind of atmosphere and the quality of food is redolent of many fond things.

The Deets.

Princess Gardens
Dim Sum £25pp.
8-10 North Audley Street W1K 6ZD
Tel : 020 7493 3223
Tube : Bond Street

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… and for the photo lovers…

Shredded Mooli cakes, £2.90

Scallop Dumplings, £2.90

Monk’s beadcurd roll, £2.90

Crystal dumplings (I think) , £2.90

‘Thousand Layer’ sponge cake, £2.60

Shiu Mai (Pork & Crab), £2.90.

Ah, Chinatown. One can only love it and loathe it, at the very same time. I despise Chinatown like the way I despise the way Justin Bieber’s bobcut falls over his forehead. I may well be the last person in London who will write nice things about the state of Chinese food in London but at the same time, I love it for the very same reasons. Firstly, for the rude service, what was once a spectacle at Wong Kei, has now become a culture spreading rapidly across restaurants in Soho, perhaps even an act worthy of its own Westend matinee; Secondly and more pressingly for the transient standard of cooking – It could be great on Monday nights, but total piss by Friday noon.

On the otherhand, whenever I exit Leicester Square station, the smell of roast duck, bbq pork (and piss) takes away any and all anxieties, hope is immediately restored in this culinary wasteland.

The Sichuan fad was something I never fully understood, and am still scratching my head over. To me, it’s oil, sichuan pepper, luncheon meat, more oil, more bud numbing pepper and yet more oil. But you lot love this stuff, no doubt with a helping article or two from the revered queen of Sichuanese writing – Fuchsia Dunlop. Which leads me to the Empress of Lisle Street, the Queen of Sichuan food in London, as far as the blogs will have you believe. I don’t think I’ve seen so many positive reviews about a Chinese restaurant before. Opened last year, the kitchen is helmed by Kang Dong, his track record includes stints at a presumably upmarket Hotel in the Sichuan Province in China. His profile graces the opening page of the menu describing how his style had conquered many palates in the Far East before he was whisked away to London.

Curiosity had the better of me, and for the smell of siu lap, as well as the positive scribblings of Mr Coren and Ms Maschler plastered outside, it was inevitable that I give this crowd favourite a sample.

Marinated Chicken in Spicy Sauce, £7.

Or Saliva Chicken as it is, in Mandarin.

I took Mark, Carin and the better half, who is much better versed in Chinese cooking than I am. The chicken was cold, wet, oily and spicy – as saliva chicken should be. A regular feature of Sichuan restaurants.

Hot and sour Rice Noodle, £6.

The glass noodles, made from potato starch, were bouncy and chewy and generally tasty. The hot and sour soup was merely adequate. I’m not quite the fan of this contrast, but it is adored by the Taiwanese. The perfect balance of being on the verge of just spicy enough and tethering on the edge of being just sour enough is a highly sought after equilibrium. It is, I am told by the fiercest lovers of this soup, a condition that is hardly satisfied. This version was much too toned down.

Hot and Fiery beef slices and tripe , £7.50.

Ah but it is so much more exciting in Mandarin, called ‘Husband and Wife Lung Slices’. The name is either meant to symbolise a kind of duality, in this case the combination of tripe and beef, or it’s suppose to indicate the mythology behind the genesis of this dish – that it was first served by husband & wife who operated a food cart in Chengdu in the 1930s, or point to the traditional myth that the recipe could use either lung, heart or tripe to accompany the beef slices. It was pretty salty.

Five spice dry beancurd, £5.

Seasoned with Five spice powder or ‘Wu Xiang Fen’. It comes as a premix which you can get in a jar at your local Sainsbury.

Steamed ‘Dong Po’ Pig’s joint, £13.80.

Su Dongpo was a famous 11th century Chinese poet, he wrote stuff like this:

Morning came, rain past.
What trace is left?
A pond full of broken duckweed.

Deep no?

Aside from playing his part in shaping Chinese literature, Mr Su is also credited for accidentally a pork dish, which by our best guesstimation, is what this dish is named after. As it is claimed (on Wiki) :

It is said that once during his free time, Su Dongpo decided to make stewed pork out of boredom. Then an old friend visited him in the middle of the cooking and challenged him to a game of Chinese chess. Su had totally forgotten of the stew during the game until a very fragrant smell came out from his kitchen and he was reminded of it. Thus Dongpo’s Pork (東坡肉), a famous dish in Chinese cuisine, was created by accident.

So goes the story.

I’ve never had steamed trotters before, or at least not trotters in a sort of braised stew fashion. I thought this was a great trotters recipe. The meat was so tender, it fell off the bone easily, very juicy and full of flavour. I enjoyed it immensely. Most of all, the sauce was very good. Rich, salty and also a little sweet. I liked it because it carried no hint of numbness, no spiciness, no pepper, who knew if it was or was not Sichuan, all we knew was that we loved it. Oh weeping duckweeds.

Zhong’s (secret) dumplings, £4.40.

We overheard on twitter about these secret house dumplings. They were ok. Homely, nothing special to shout about.

Crab with salted egg yolk, £17.50.

Salted duck eggs to be exact. Salted egg yolk sauce is Cantonese, as far as I know, but if you get a chance, either here or Pearl Liang, you must order something with salted egg yolks.

Anything with salted egg yolk is a winner. Deep fried prawns with salted egg yolk is win, fish fillet with salted egg yolk is a win and so is an entire fried crab crusted in a salted egg yolk armour.

I thought this was sensational, mostly because they used alot of egg yolk in this recipe. The more the merrier really. The eggs are cured either in brine or salted charcoal. The yolk usually comes out florescent orange. My mum used to make congee with salted eggs and dried scallops for Sunday breakfast, but personally I used to love mixing boiled salted eggs with steam rice, or even with fried rice. I could eat this stuff everyday.

Anyway I do digress, so the only problem with the chunky crab was that it became a little messy to take the monster apart. Otherwise, what an awesome dish.

We drank alot of Sunlik beer, and we paid £103.50 in total for four.

This was a reasonably good meal. I can understand the fanfare and I feel that it is largely justified. Good Chinese restaurants are getting harder to come by, so considering the slim pickings, Empress scores well above the average, in my opinion. In any case, a meal out at any Chinese restaurant won’t break the bank, so even if it didn’t live up to the hype, you won’t have to deal with any alarming financial ramifications.

So let’s see, that’s Pearl Liang, Wing Yip Cricklewood and Empress for the slightly posher (very slight) but still good valued Chinese dinner.

The Gist of It

Empress of Sichuan
Chinese, £35pp
6 Lisle Street WC2H 7BG
Tel : 0207 734 8128
Tube : Leicester Square

In other news… Giles Coren ; Guy Dimond ; London Chow ; Asian Food Adventures ; Catty ; ILTEAETL ; Pig Pig’s Corner ; Mr Noodles ; Chopstix to Steaknives

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What it must feel like to be Yotam Ottolenghi. Author of two likeable, innovative cook books; Owner of a string of likeable, innovative takeaway/café/restaurants, and the custodian of a weekly vegetarian column in Guardian. And women just love his food.

There is something extremely likeable about the brand Yotam has created for himself. It’s like everything you imagined organic food – healthy, delicious and expensive – to be. There are four Ottolenghis’ dotted around London, and quite a startling 15 years or so it has been for the native Israeli philosophy major. In 1998, he who had come to Cordon Bleu in London to study food before going on to solidify his pastry experience in The Capital, The Kensington Place group (with Rowley Leigh) and then become head pastry man at Baker and Spice (which I believe is somehow tied to the origin of Gail’s). Eventually in 2002, he opened his first Ottolenghi and the rest is history, as they say.

It has been a poster-child kind of success story, therefore the recent opening of his latest venture, Nopi (for North of Picaddily (circus)) is expected to be a high profile – amongst the obsessive gluttons – production that should have industry onlookers salivating with undulated respect.

On the surface, Nopi looks like the latest and greatest Soho-based, egalitarian and super hip all-day diner, though this could not be further from the truth. This is not Polpo 2011, ladies, this is something a lot more precise, better choreographed, a slicker operation; equating to a ridiculously pricy menu.

Naturally, it’s already submerged in overbooked sessions, being that it has only been opened for less than a month. There was no chance in grabbing a table for a late Saturday lunch, so instead I just showed up at 15 minutes before lunch service was planned to stop, to see if I could snatch a small corner table for some solo dining. I did much better, as they placed me at the bar. Décor is kept as elegantly as humanly possible, furnished to a brass and crème finish. The room is a long and narrow rectangle, and it feels rather like eating in a well-dressed and permanent marquee.

Staff are chillaxed and all smiles, the restaurant has a generally laid-back attitude about it, which is rather modern of them. They appear to carbonate their water, and the choice of still or sparkling is on the house.

The ambiance is something Alan Yau would be proud of, understated slickness, all the small touches you expect restaurants to get right, they have got right.

Everything came with a smile.

Kingfish carpaccio, curry powder, lemon oil, shiso, samphire £10

The luxury thick cut carpaccio, the densely buttery texture that melted accordingly, not unlike a Tsar cut of salmon. Crusted with curry powder and then drizzled with lemon oil that set off an ear-ringing zestful charge of citrus. The shiso and samphire was ample for decorative purposes, I think. This was a small platter of glorified sashimi, executed in splendid fashion. It was hard to fault it, in fact I loved it, though I couldn’t shake the feeling that this could well have been done before, such as say the Nobu new-style – wet, drizzly and zesty – sashimi. Is this really worth a tenner?

Twice-cooked baby chicken, lemon myrtle salt, red pepper sauce, £10

Next up was the first broth-boiled, then grilled, twice cooked baby chicken. Sweating with lovely chicken-stock juices. The sweet chilli mix it came it was very good, the chicken itself was reminiscent of soya chicken, redolent of chilli, broth, ginger and spring onion. But again, I couldn’t help but experience another bout of deja vu, that this apparently innovative recipe had been done before elsewhere, and in this scenario, a Chinese soya chicken rice recipe. It is not better than Uncle Lim’s Hainanese chicken rice recipe in my humble opinion, and I am mindful of the fact that Nopi fuses Medi and Asian recipes, but I find myself asking the obvious question : Is any single chicken wing and half a thigh really worth ten pounds?

It didn’t even come with a small bowl of stock infused rice.

Slow cooked pig cheek, celeriac and barberry salad, £10

By the time the third dish landed, I was sold on the fact that this kitchen could cook anything. Everything was delicious, like this buttery tender, superior slow cooked cheek that easily put the Brindisa version to shame. It was intense. Served with an extremely citrusy shaved celeriac salad, which for some reason, failed to equalise in flavour, and was palate piercing instead. Luckily the sourdough was fantastic, and helped to soak up and dilute the strong flavours. It carried a subtle bitterness, as if it was made with tea leaves.

Baked lamb belly, mixed mushrooms, sumac, £12

The procession of savoury hits reached a summit with this dish. I loved every bit of this highlight of muscular on muscular flavours. Sitting on a bed of yoghurt (or crème fraiche), the soured cream took the edge of the intensity of the mushrooms, for the gloopy texture of the cream against the mushy fried ‘shrooms, I felt it created a very stylish texture. The rolled lamb belly was expectedly pungent, but in this tirade of strong flavours, it was not overpowering, rather it was just succinct.

Pineapple galette, pandan, coconut ice cream £7.5

The smell of sweet, hot, burnt, sugar over hot, sweaty and burning pineapple. The winner was the exceptionally thin crust, the pineapple slices sat on, producing just the slightest crisp. The clotty and dense coconut ice cream was regal. Thicker than any gelato than I had ever eaten. This was an ace pudding. It wiped away all the previous strong flavours and left me with a cooling sensation.

The meal was fabulous. I could not fault it for the cooking and for its sheer likeability factor; I believe it is poised to be overbooked for many a cold night in the months ahead. However, I just cannot shake the feeling that they have pumped so much hard work in dazzling clientele that they have managed to fool everybody with their pricing. Plus a double espresso and five small plates of food, the bill was a whopping £58.50 – one hugely expensive all-day diner.

Granted for those who flooded the restaurant during the 50% soft opening, may have glossed over the bottom line after a couple of glasses (I would have too), but I just can’t see myself choosing Nopi over Polpo or even Polpetto, since the concept of sharing platters are so similar; save for that the latter restaurants are so much cheaper, and are more generous in terms of portions. On the otherhand, the food at Nopi is tastier, the recipes are better, and the atmosphere isn’t so rowdy.

Contrary to what the menu says the small plates are designed for (sharing), I don’t think they came out as intended. Portions are laughably tiny, even for one, let alone to be shared. Take the chicken wing for example, surely the most expensive chicken wing in London. If they were truly for sharing, I believe they needn’t suggest a recommended three savouries per person.

Nopi feels like a resurrected Maze (remember that?), another restaurant that has a menu built around the idea of sampling alot of successive small dishes. I feel that the Nopi portions are not big enough to be shared, but that they are just adequate for one person wanting to taste abit of everything. I had five dishes by myself, and I don’t think I would have enjoyed splitting those dishes with anybody else. The dishes did not seem scoop-able or partition-able, it might work for a couple but certainly not divisible for more than that.

The good news is that the cooking is just amazing. At least based on this one visit. Everything rolled out of the kitchen with panache, zest, passion and sheer umami.

In the end, I found Nopi not to be groundbreaking, rather I thought it was refreshing. The recipes are recognisable and are not alien to our palate. They are however, slickly repackaged, and exceptionally cooked. Fusion can swing a lot of ways if done incorrectly, but I think Nopi has got it under contol, and got the recipes just right. I think Nopi is what Kopapa should have been.

It brings the same rebooted feeling that Viajante has brought to the blurred fantasy of one global cuisine. If Viajante is esoteric folksy jazz, then Nopi is mainstream, bubblegum pop. Because of the menu’s apparent liberal nature, I believe it can only evolve to become better, as the chefs get bored with/refine their recipes. And as the loyal patrons, we have reason to keep coming back for more I suppose.

A great start, that comes with a hefty price. For now, I shall be happy to pay the price, but it probably won’t be long before they introduce some kind of set lunch menu. Lest it becomes a deterrent in light of the fact that there are so many nice things to eat in the city, for a lot less money.

The Gist of It

Nopi
Fusion, Medi-Asian and expensive. £50pp
21-22 Warwick Street W1B 5NE
Tel : +44 (0)20 7494 9584
Tube: Picaddily Circus

Soopi : TO , Wennie’s Affairs , What Katie Does, Tofufa , The Bountiful Plate ; The Skinny Bib , Winkypedia

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Perhaps it has aspirations toward becoming the Ding Tai Fung of Europe, what with the copycat white walls, chefs folding xia long bao behind glass panels. Full marks for ambiance and kudos for trying to emulate a franchise which has perfected the delivery of consistently good XLBs. Unfortunately, we’re closer to Chinatown, London, than we are to Tienmu,Taipei, and sadly that makes for a more than wary customer in me.

I cannot say I’m not glad to see Dumplings’ Legend take over from the ageing and overly torrid Lee Ho Fook – a champion way before my time, but probably because of Warren Zevon’s singing rather than for its Michelin winning ways – which in its twilight years, churned out some of the worst Chinese food I can remember. Though usually applied to restaurants with rip-off prices, my dad branded it a ‘black store’ (as in blacklisted, banned, do no enter, nuclear wastage) anyway.

Unconfirmed reports and to my best guesstimations suggest that the owners of Dumplings’ Legend also own the Leongs Legends restaurants, as well as Empress of Sichuan. So at the very least, some semblance of quality can be expected. I take the general view that LL and LL Continues (for the overspill of customers) are two of the ‘best’ dim sum restaurants in Chinatown, which says very little of the tremendously bad quality of Chinatown restaurants these days really. Perhaps because of its associations, there are recognisable LL specific dishes, such as cheung fun stuffed with seabass, which I quite like.

As the name suggests, dumplings are at the heart of the game at DL, and as a result, features no less that 7 different types of xia long baos on their dim sum menu, from spicy pork to pork with crab meat and one with fresh crab roe.

Dim sum is served to 5pm, after which the dinner menu takes over. I’ll try not to sneer at the food too much since it is Chinese New Year anyhow.

Xia Long Bao, Spicy Pork, £6.

So it seems only natural to kick off proceedings with the XLBs. If we use the above photograph as a go-by, it would suggest a dry, craggily and underwhelming affair, where in actual fact it wasn’t too bad. The stuffing was alright, the juices were alright, but the wrapping was inconsistent at best. Some were too delicate, in that the slightest tug tore it apart, letting the precious broth flow away to the bamboo steamer. Others were incredibly thick, as if it were made of lead, instead of flour. While XLBs are no longer a rare occurrence in London, few if any, rarely produce anything quite as memorable as a trip to Asia. Though generally speaking, things are headed in the right direction. It’ll be a while before we see a true standard in London that can match anything the expanding Ding Tai Fung franchise (which in the grand scheme of XLB things, is not even the very best) , but we live in hope. Who knows, we might even see a genuine Ding Tai Fung in Europe before long? The year of the rabbit is a fruitful one.

Scallop & Cheese, Mashed Taro, £2.50.

I really enjoyed this fried puffer, not entirely sure what sort of processed cheese they used (probably the cheapest ones they could find), but it was great. Something about the grainy texture of the mashed yam, the sliced and diced scallop, the melted cheese….mmm. Or perhaps it was my palate requiring reorientation.

Siu Mai, £2.50.

Rich shrimp flavours, much more than that of pork fat – a good thing, spongy and spring-like, I thought it was pretty good.

Sea bass Cheung Fun, £3.30.

Not pictured, and which came sans any sauce whatsoever. It was nice though, if a little suspect. It was cold, suggesting that it might not have been freshly steamed, but for what it was worth, the texture was consistent, and slithering seabass went so well with rice flour. Reminiscent of Leongs Legends.

Durian Puff, £3.20

Aha! Finally the pièce de résistance, this I loved. Served warm, the sweet durian paste was flossy and appears to have been made with real durian flesh intermeshed with the preserved kind. In fact, we liked it so much we ordered two. It could do with even more durian and abit less pastry, and while it’s no comparison to durian puff specialists which can be found in the food hall at say Takashimaya in Singapore, it was of a good standard.

We paid £36.10 for all food, drank a mix of chrysanthemum and poli, and overall I thought it was not too bad. It’s no Wing Yip, but its as good as it gets in Chinatown terms. I wouldn’t mind returning for the XLBs to be quite fair, and expectedly, the bottomline is slender.

Happy Chinese New Year folks, Nian nian yiu yu, and may you eat fish a plenty.

The Gist of It

Dumplings’ Legend
Chinese, £20pp
15-16 Gerrard Street W1D 6JE
Tel: (020) 7494 1200
Tube: Leicester Square

Har Gao : Marina Metro ; Greedy Diva ; Chowhound Thread; Food Fight

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The fish counter at Wing Yip always gets my undivided attention, whenever we visit to stock up the larder. It’s those massive tanks with the filtered running water, the sound of an artificial waterfall, filled with still live and flopping crabs and lobsters, mussel stacked upon mussel and probably some of the cheapest rock oysters in town. Wing Yip are like the Ikeas’ of the Asian perishables industry, self proclaimed ‘Superstores’, the premises are giant warehouses which stock everything a Chinese restaurant could ever want, from giant bamboo steamers, to 19″ cast iron woks to the latest hoi sin sauce to hit the market. Majorly wide shopping aisles too. You can even get Roast duck in a box, dressed like a box of Gran Prix roses with a plastic window. No kidding.

There are two eateries at this particular Wing Yip superstore. The smaller one is a ‘dai pai dong‘-style, bistro/cafe which I frequent on week nights – Cricklewood is closer to me than Bayswater – for one platers. I much prefer their soya chicken and good manners to the step-on-you-and-die attitude accompanied by benchmark roast duck at Four Seasons. Oh and the orange-skinned bbq squid too. As with many Oriental superstores of its ilk in the UK, there’s inevitably a full sized Chinese restaurant on location, big enough and decorated with enough traditional trinkets (red lanterns, small red platform/stage) to host banquet dinners. The name of the restaurant is Wing Tai… but not that I really noticed, I have always thought of it simply as The Restaurant at Wing Yip.

Rather than wait for an invitation to a Chinese wedding, I urge you to head down to Wing Yip, with four or five warm bodies, at 12pm on any given Sunday for proper dim sum, at risk of preempting the report… but ahh, it’s the holiday season, and my brain is decaying to mush with the daily countdown to Christmas.

I love going to Wing Yip on Sundays not because the dim sum is world beating (which it is not), as you will have experienced much more clinical work at Central London’s starriest counterparts, Yauatcha to drop one name, but the thing with dim sum is that it is equally about atmosphere as it is about dumplings. It is a family affair, a gathering of close buddies, a time to reflect with the relatives, hive mind catching up, all contributing to the bustling, overcrowded, chaotic liveliness, that truly conveys the feeling that the weekend has reached its peak. That the spirit of dim sum is not one of glamour or trend, but rather to indulge in the company of those close by, over steaming dumplings and tea, on the day of rest, to let your hair down, almost completely.

In the last couple of years, I’ve been going back to Wing Yip about once a month, and I do think they are improving their output. Most dishes are actually pretty good, as I will illustrate.

Three selection Cheung Fun, £3.80.

Firstly, the rice noodle roll was al dente, strachy and springy and held together well. Stuffed with three different options, shrimp, char siu and scallops, and doused with sweet soya sauce. Yummy. I had no complaints.

Congee with pork ‘bones’ and fermented cabbage (I think), £3.90.

Proper texture, gloopy and dollopy as Cantonese style ‘juk’ should be. The flavours were stocky, slightly salty, and overall just a hearty experience, which in London, usually means something a little watered down, but this was far from it. About the only thing missing were slices of you tiao.

…Alot of food arrives.

Midway through lunch, the steamed dishes joined the fried stuff. The fried taro puff was great, and while I’m no fan of intestines, the better half really enjoyed the tripe.

Satay Baby octopus, £2.50.

Sweet and spicy.

The obligatory shui mai and har gaw. £2.50 each.

I was pretty surprised with these – this for me is the acid test – as I think they got ‘em spot on. Bursting with flavours of prawn, and a hint of pork fat in the back of the tongue, and spring-like in texture, great shui mai. Similarly the har gaw bounced like a basketball, with a juicy, prawn filled centre.

Steamed rice with Salted fish, £3.90.

Or you could also get one with steaming spare ribs, generally speaking, these steamed pots of rice are fab. My mum used to cook them just like this, and they are amazingly hearty, perfect for the wintry season. The entire steamed pot means that all those lovely juices that eek out of the fish during the steaming process would be reabsorbed by the rice, in essence leading to a flavour charged base of rice. Not many places in London do this, so there isn’t much in terms of comparsion. But it would be nice if they would pump up the variety in toppings, instead of just salted fish, which could be rather bland to some.

If they did Chinese mushrooms, chinese sausages (lap cheung) and some pak choi throw in, that would be a dream steam.

Tapioca and yam dessert, £2.30.

Served cool (probably already prepped in the fridge), milky, syrupy with chewy pearls and stodgy yam – just as one expected. Great way to end the meal.

So the burning question is if Wing Yip – being that it is such a trek to the North West – is worth the trek out or not. Well, food is pretty good, not quite the best as I said, but good enough to leave you satisfied. Prices are fair, and comparable to most dim sum serving restaurants in Central, but at the end of the day, I do think it is worth an expedition simply because it has great atmosphere. It is always full on a Sunday, and I think it says alot about how much people like it. To savour the ambiance – save for perhaps the Royal Chinas – alone is worth the wait. Do bear in mind though, if you go there at the height of lunch at 1pm, you will be in for a long wait for your ticket number to be called. So I do recommend to either turning up early or abit later. And then afterward, make sure you visit the Superstore, in fact, make the trip anyway to stock up your pantry with exotic perishables, like oyster sauce (by Lee Kum Kee no less), black bean sauce and try some bottled bird’s nest (ready to eat and pre-cooked in rock sugar) by Brands. And do swing by the fish counter and tell the live crustaceans, I said hello.

The Gist.

Wing Tai at Wing Yip
Chinese, £25pp
395 Edgware Road, Cricklewood
NW2 6LN
Tel: 020 8450 0422
Bus : From Kilburn Underground, take the No. 32 or anything to Cricklewood till you see the Pagoda.

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Food is much more accessible and democratic over on the right side of the Pacific. There is so much diversity, that at times, I find it ironic that the gourmet awakening (of sorts) is taking place in London, where food blogs are as plentiful as fishes, as opposed to the rest of Asia. That might just be an indication of how advanced the broadband networks are in London however or perhaps we crave the good life because we feel the dearth. Oh how I miss Asia.

There are food courts in the shopping centres, and then there are the stand alone market spaces erected specifically for a plethora of hawkers to sell in the same space. Whatever the permutations might be, the general rule of thumb across stalls would invariably be dirt cheap pricing (I’d imagine to stay competitive with their neighbours), often one plate meals, and one would buy food, drink and dessert from separate stalls. It is like a curating form of eating, and it’s an experience which I miss sorely.

Food courts were a way of life for me, memorable since we would visit every Sunday morning. Everybody whose anybody would bump into everybody, people had their preferred stalls, and it was always a precarious game to arrive early to jostle for tables. My family loved a particular char kuey tiaw hawker, others were into lao su fen soup (silver needle noodles¹. A plate of Kuala Belait’s finest char kuey tiaw would set you back no more than $1.50 (about 75p), anymore would be daylight robbery. What else do you do after morning mass right?

Setting foot on to large warehouse space on the 2nd floor of Pacific Plaza brought back pleasant childhood memories. It’s not as cramped as most Asian food courts (being brand spanking new), features alot less food stalls (whose number should increase with time) and it lacks the history and buzz of a living breathing food machine. It’s still in infancy afterall, but its a good start. Seemingly rising from the ashes of the now defunct, but much loved, Oriental City², I suppose many view this complex as its spiritual successor. Some of Oriental City’s original tenants have even set up new operations at PP.

It opened it’s doors toward the tail end of 2009, since then, I’ve returned on a few separate occasions to try the different cuisines on offer, the missus in particular loves PP, a place to grab a quick bite. Half the hall remains unoccupied (as of July 2010) however, and I’m a little disappointed that it has stayed relatively obscure throughout its short tenure. PP deserves more human traffic. There are merely eight stalls open for business, most with obvious names indicating their representative cuisines : Spicy Thai (for Thai), NP Star Snack Bar (Malaysian), China House (Chinese), Hot Korean (Korean), Shan (Japanese), Nambu (Japanese); Seleramu (Malaysian) and Darjeeling Momo (Tibetan). Also, there is a pretty capable Japanese bakery on the ground floor, Tetote Factory, which sells rather good ‘Asian influenced Western’ bread and cakes. Prices amongst the stalls are competitive, averaging £7 for a one plate meal, less for smaller dishes. I’ve compiled this report from three visits.

China House

The menu is overly long, and is visually laid out across the entire front of the shop. It also appears to be the largest of the stalls in PP, taking up what looks like four individuals units. They offer a mix of Cantonese and Sichuan dishes, and dim sum.

‘Special’ Shuimai Dumpling.

It’s nothing more than a prawn and pork shuimai really, fleshy, the bursting flavour of prawns, I didn’t expect it to rival some of the city favs but this was pretty good.

Minced pork on rice with egg (?)

This was from one of my earlier visits (which was way back in May) and I can’t seem to remember what it was called. And I didn’t take notes. I do however have this impression that it was a little like a steamed sausage mince…

‘Saliva’ Chicken.

One from the Sichuan section, nutty, spicy, oily and interestingly enough, the chicken (Bai Zhan) was surprisingly good, managing to be juicy, silky with that lively taste of spring chicken. No Uncle Lims³ however, but not bad.

Soya Chicken rice.

And it’s the same story with the chicken rice, the chicken was soft (soft being a major criteria at least for me), not bad but not quite the best around. I won’t pontificate about the merits of what is a pretty standard one plate meal.

Hot Korean

Spicy Cod with egg fried rice.

The portions were huge! For £6.80 it was a steal, the batter was fried to a bubbly crunch, softened by a runny spicy sauce. Peppery, but also a tad too much salt however, my mouth was beginning to dry out a little, and I wonder if the chef had been a little liberal with the MSG. I appreciated that the rice was only shallow-fried, it maintained the creamy starchiness of steamed rice, as opposed to individual rice grains. Though, if you were a purist, it shouldn’t be bland and sticky, it should be fried overnight rice, grainy, oily, rah, rah, rah.

Kimchi pancake with seafood.

Tremendously generous servings, at £3.50, yet another steal. Dough-ey, and a little bitterness perhaps from the kimchi. It had a home-made feel about it which I enjoyed.

Spicy Thai

The better half really rates this stall, she was a regular at its former output in Finchley Road.

Jungle Curry with Duck

And I am inclined to agree. Bamboo shoots, aubergines with a citrus punch and a mildly peppery kick helped to make the flossy duck an appetising treat.

Tom Yam Soup.

A tomato based soup, bamboo shoots mushrooms, spring onions, red peppers and coconut milk. Sweet, sour and mildly spicy.

Tom Ka Gai

Or a spicy chicken soup, distinctive due to it’s creamy white appearance. It smelled great too, wonderful aromas of coriander and coconut milk; appetising stuff.

The quality of food across the stalls is good enough, but that’s besides the point when the bottomline is so slim. At the moment, Pacific Plaza is still a barren platform and a far cry from what Oriental City once was, but I’m hoping that with time, perhaps someday PP will become a destination for families and friends to go for cheap and diverse Asian food. I suppose, that has to start with the local communities around Wembley, to embrace it before the rest of London does, and hopefully establish a constant flow of people to encourage even more independent operations to occupy the empty stalls, and thus create more options for the prospective diner. I think it can only happen if people are looking for the next Oriental City, and I suspect many of you share my affection regarding lively food courts. I do hope it does not continue to remain relatively empty, and that popularity picks up as word of mouth spreads.

Wembley is more accessible than Colindale I imagine, and if you happened to be in the area (England play Hungary on 11th August, and the Charity Shield is a few days before), I recommend hopping across the road to PP to fill up your tanks either before or after the game, it won’t break your wallet, and is ultimately better than the rip-me-off grub served inside the stadium.

The Gist of It

Pacific Plaza
From around the Pacific, £12pp
Engineers Way HA9 0EG
Tel: +44 (0) 207 409 7747
Tube: Wembley Park

News of the Pacific: North/South Food ; Danyul.net ; Will Eat for Money ; Meemalee’s Kitchen ; Randomness Guide to London ; Ferret Fabrications ; Tamarind and Thyme ; It Ends with Dovi

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All text and photography on this blogpost is copyright and belongs to Kang Leong, LondonEater.com. If you repost this without my permission, bad things will happen. So please don’t do it.

Eight (baat) is phonetically similar to fortune (faat) or “about to hit the motherload” more like and is significant if you’re Chinese¹. Chinese being a culture which has an insurmountable archive of superstitions and a belief system that links fortune to being fortunate. Lady luck is not a bad thing to have on your side, Rob Green could do with some. People will go to great lengths to associate themselves with the number 8. Like bidding for a mobile phone number, car license plate detail, the house number, the more 8′s and multiple 8′s – my brother’s mobile number ends with triple 8s – in one’s life, the more prosperous one’s life might turn out to be. So it is believed.

Imagine my delight when I saw the number 88 stamped across one of the giant red pillars outside My Old Place. It’s like winning the lottery, yes… just a number indeed, but if superstition was anything to go by, it would appear to be working. The modest restaurant has garnered gleeful reviews² online, the Guardian critics especially love it, but more than that, the layman raves about this place too. The word amongst the various social circles (Facebook mostly) is that My Old Place is one of London’s finest Szechuan restaurants, Taiwanese people in London especially love this place. Situated in the shadow of Liverpool Street station, it is the sister restaurant of Gourmet San³ and together are two of the foremost Szechuan restaurants in town seen as the substance to the stylised shell of more centrally located and faddish joints Bar Shu and Ba Shan to name a few.

As one would expect service is not dismissive, but neither is it warm, it is as it is, a contrast to the flamboyant decorations. Red fans, red lanterns, red posters with greetings of longevity, happiness, it’s like they didn’t bother taking down the ornaments from CNY celebrations. We were a table of four who had decided to pop-in for a pre-theatre numbing session before falling asleep at a Wigmore Hall recital…. they landed a Chinese menu, so I had to concede the ordering to the better half…

Clear noodles with sesame paste.

The creamy paste had flavours of peanut, sesame oil not dissimilar to a ‘satay’⁴ sauce, the mung-bean based clear noodles spongy and expectedly starchy while garlic and salt overloaded my tastebuds. Cucumber and spam (or luncheon meat…I think) also accompanied the mash-it-up, I actually quite liked the creamy, nutty paste with the noodles, but man was it salty.

Trotters….peppers….

Trotters were coated with copious amounts of tiny red pods⁵ that vaguely resemble mini rambutans. Initially, there was a tingling sensation on my palate, causing my buds to vibrate. The tingling then grew to a sting before a numbness finally settled, like micro tranquillising darts immobilising the tongue.

Before I lost my buds to the effects of hydroxy-alpha sanshool (only 3% in every pepper-pod…on average) though, I quite enjoyed the full-bodied flavours of the braised trotters, oily, fatty and deliciously savoury. My advice when you order this… scrape away the devilish mini-bombs before you start eating.

Tripe.

Oily, pungent, salty, gamey and with yet more Szechuan pepper pods. Probably the best dish of the meal. I have to say, I can take my fair share of spicy food, but this had me defeated. We opted for Cobras instead of Tigers, but downing cans of lager was barely enough to cut through the numbness.

Skewered beef tendon or Impaled offal-on-a-stick.

If memory serves, these were a pound each. We had ordered the popular lamb skewers too, but in light of all the food which had already landed, we decided to cancel the order. So offal lovers should enjoy this gruffness. It doesn’t get gamier than this, it literally tasted of rubbery fat and chilli…

Yellow chives with prawn and squid and dried beadcurd.

Not every dish was a rollercoaster ride however, this was where we got off for a breather. But it was entirely pedestrian, my notes say nothing about it, though I just wonder if it were because my tastebuds were still under the numbing effects of the pepper, seemingly the major theme of this meal.

Cumin beef.

The cumin certainly gave the beef an interesting aroma, akin to the fragrance of curry, but alas the quality of the beef itself was horrendous, that it was unchewable was an understatement. The sloppy stir-fry with what seemed like recycled lard was distasteful and utterly unappealing. The meal hit a low at this point.

Finally, Sour vegetables with fish fillet.

The sour vegetables ⁶ did little to mask the absolute dire pungency of the fish, it stank and that’s not a good sign.

We were amazed with the gargantuan portions, each dish averaged £7, but it was easily much more than we could manage. We didn’t finish any single dish and elected to take home all the leftovers, which we had to scoop into plastic containers ourselves. The leftovers lasted two days by the way. The final bill was £59 for four, £15 per person, though I thought we were ordered at least two dishes too many.

As we left the restaurant just before 7pm to make way to Wigmore Hall, we noticed how the restaurant was completely full up, mostly Chinese, and I couldn’t shake the sense that perhaps people come here more for quantity and passable quality, than for absolute finesse. Personally, I won’t be returning, too salty, way too much pepper, and questionable ingredients. I felt bloaty after the meal, having much difficulty sitting through the piano recital after, and a stirring guilt as if I had just stepped out from a greasy spoon. It leaves me to ponder about the oil they had used in their stir-fry. Nevertheless, My Old Place is cheap, abundant and abominably entertaining, if you’re looking to load up before a night-out, this might be the alternative to Tayyabs, but personally, I’m sticking with No.10⁷. It might not be a fancy number, but it is definitely easier on the tastebuds.

The Gist of It

My Old Place
£15pp Szechuan, Cash Only.
88 Middlesex Street E1 7EZ
Tel: 020 7247 2200
Tube: Aldgate East or Liverpool Street

News of the World: Clandestine Critic ; Trusted Places ; London Chow ; An American in London ; Mawi ; Matt Norman

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I have been a runaway train wreck with my commentary lately, neglecting to edit myself. Jay Rayner called it ‘a bad case of blogorreah’ and I can’t say I disagree. Chop, chop, 574 words. Starting with Sedap, Malaysian in East London.

A minor change to structure. Separating the blurb from the photographs, let me know if this works…

Thoughts

Malaysians are proud of Malaysian cuisine, a reflection of the harmonious integration of the local culture, a lovely melting pot of treasures. There are wonderful examples of beautifully cross-pollinated dishes such as the augmentation of Bak Kut Teh (Literally “Meat Bone Tea”), a pork-rib soup of exotic herbs and spices, which has Chinese roots, but which evolved greatly in olden-day Malaya.

Sedap is also the Malay word for delicious, and this East London restaurant delivers Nyonya cuisine¹. A style of Chinese-Malay cooking that is a direct reference to the culture of settlers² who lived in what was then the British Straits (Penang, Singapore, Melaka) infusing local ingredients such as coconut milk, tumeric, lemon grass, chilli as well as adapting entire Malay recipes into their cooking.

I was dining with a table of five, the tweat-up crew, we deliberately chose Sedap for its affordability and for sharing plates.

Okra (ladyfingers) is a great vegetable, slimy beans and coarse skin, an excellent distraction from the heat from spicy dishes, well illustrated in the sambal okra & prawns we began with – sambal being a sort of pickled chilli relish. I hugely enjoyed the Penang Char Kway Teow which is the Malaysian variety of wok-fried flat rice noodles which obviously is a re-jigged wok-fried Ho-fun of Canto-cuisine. Though it differs in execution, where the former is oilier, eggier and carries a distinct spiciness as opposed to soya sauce, bean sprouts and ‘wok-hei’. Sedap does them with fishcakes, prawns and Chinese sausages (‘Lap Cheung’ – like sugary salami) that gave it an intriguingly attractive fishiness.

You cannot do without rice in Malaysian/Chinese restaurants – it’s staple after all – and I’m so happy to report that all the variants from puffy plain-jane steamed rice (I grew up on Thai Fragrant), the aromatic coconut rice to the chicken-stock infused rice soaking with oily flavour, were excellent.

I enjoyed most of the curries, though they looked deceptively similar, of a muddy yellowish hue. The beef rendang swimming a thick, quickly drying, concentrated reduction with a dash of zest, meat mostly tender, though some bits were unchewablely sinewy. I liked the chicken curry, but found bitterness with the lamb. We also ordered a sweet and spicy sambal-pasted deep fried mackerel which was a little dry, similarly the sambal Brinjal (aubergines, sambal paste with shrimp) was equally deflated. I did not enjoy the roti pratha, reminiscent of the frozen supermarkets variety, too floury and carried a very subtle (but detectable) sweetness, rather than the savoury, spongy, eggy, twirl-in-the-air roti otherwise called murtabak³ which I am used to in Indian coffee shops dotted around Brunei, Singapore and Malaysia.

We ended with two versions of the Nyonya Kueh⁴ (which usually means bite-sized and sweet), the first a coconut and sugar based cake and the other a two-tier pandan jelly and salted sticky rice cake, warm and seductive. Just like buffets at Malay weddings. Teh tarik (cold) always a welcoming beverage to wash down the spice.

The final bill was a mere £100 split five ways, good value. It’s not half bad, the location prevents me from making a return visit, and I actually found the portions to be a tad small. Prices are reasonable, no single dish costed more than nine pounds. I think Sedap is good enough – personally I prefer Kiasu⁵ – and it is certainly worth a visit on your lunch break (assuming you work near Old Street), where there is a three course for six pounds deal.

Photographs

Kerabu Prawn, £6.50

Sambal Okra, £5.20

Penang Char Kway Teow, £7.25

Sambal Fish, £6.50

Roti Prata with Chicken Curry, £4.80

Three types of rice, £2.80 each.

Sambal Brinjal, £5.30

Beef Rendang, £6.90

Lamb Curry, £7.80

Nyonya Kueh, £2.00

The Gist of It

Sedap
£20pp, Malaysian.
102 Old St EC1V 9AY
Tel: (020) 7490 0200
Tube: Old Street
In Summary: Dependable Malaysian cuisine with a more than reasonable price tag, portions a little wanting, but overall not bad.

More than Words: Time Out ; Thecattylife ; The Happiness Project London ; WFG

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My first visit to Pearl Liang was a little over a year ago, going on a recommendation from Helen, the retired but still ever so amazing World Foodie Guide and whom I still look up to as the Queen of London food bloggers. Since that time, I have visited other reputable dim sum restaurants though it hasnt kept me away from Pearl Liang – it is my most frequented dim sum restaurant in 2009. I am usually averse to set menus in general though the nine piece set for nine pounds eighty is just sheer value for money, and most of all, delicious. There is this convention about restaurants serving good dim sum and the assumption is that if dim sum rocks then dinner will be appalling. It is not entirely unfounded of course, case in point : Leong’s Legends. Great dim sum, some even claim it to be the ‘best’ in Chinatown which is the view I share (if we leave Yauatcha out of this equation… different price class), however I found that like many contemporaries – including Royal China – they have utterly ordinary dinner menus. I don’t know why there is a disconnect in quality, perhaps some sort of Chinese wall exists between the dim sum and the dinner guys even though they share the same kitchen. Anyway, enough hot-air, let’s dissect some evidence. Table of six.

Lobster Noodles, £33 (Market Price)

It is well-known that Paul Ngo, the head chef at Pearl Liang used to lead the capital’s most famous restaurant for lobster noodles at Mandarin Kitchen. While the latter has maintained its legacy since Paul’s departure, it comes as little surprise that he has brought his most commercially viable creation to Pearl Liang. A variety of sauces are available including shaoxing wine or black bean and one can even choose to have it as a sashimi. We chose ginger and onion. The sauce is great, thick gravy-like, full bodied flavours, so richly aromatic of its major ingredients. Juicy chunks of lobster meat wok-fried with savoury floury bits, noodles are just a tad chewy. Overall, the dish has an effervescent quality about it, satisfyingly lively. I prefer this to the current Mandarin Kitchen.

Half Drunken Chicken with Old Wine (£15)

One from the ‘cold toss’ section. Salty soya sauce flavours, with a fruity (is that the right description?) alcoholic, almost medicinal compliment. It is served cold so the elemental flavours are muffled, but refreshing. As for the chicken itself, a very juicy texture, the breast meat is mellow, probably from a delicate poach and perhaps broken down further by the wine marinade. The leg meat was satin. My only gripe was the alcohol content, a tad high, and the balance just tipping over at times but that’s just me being pedantic. It took nothing away from the overall experience. I really enjoyed this.

Pei Pa Tofu (£8.80)

A staple offering in most Cantonese restaurants. Deep-fried tofu swaddled in a golden gravy, straw mushrooms, carrots and spring onions all feature. I cannot remember if the tofu was stuffed with shrimp to be quite honest, while the hearty sauce filled the senses, it was ordinary.

Sizzling beef sirloin with fruity mandarin sauce (£10.80)

‘Chinese style steak’, a literal translation, is usually one of the dishes I order for benchmarking purposes. I’ve done this in Chinese restaurants around the world from Singapore, Hong Kong to Sydney (not Taipei I don’t think) and is something I inherited from my dad. Usually it is medium rare and served cubed. A good example will still bloody and juicy. A good example will also exhibit the hallmark smoky charred flavours otherwise known as wok-hei. A good example will also have a skilfully balanced fruity sweet sauce, where one can taste the sugar, but in which that tarty edge is taken away by salty soya and just a hint of pepper. This had none of those qualities. The beef was ridiculously rubbery, the sauce was too salty. A horrid example.

Sauteed King Prawns with Salted Egg Yolk (£10.80) … Twice.

There were times during this meal, where I would have very nearly wrote it off. Just as I wanted out, they reeled me back in (Pacino!). These are not just your average battered prawns. These are battered with the yolk of salted duck eggs, which are pre-prepared by soaking in brine or sometimes covered in charcoal paste. The duck egg takes on an intense salt flavour, great with congee, though this is the first time I have experienced it being used as a batter, and if my research is right, a bona fide Cantonese dish. Very interesting indeed, the yolk crust formed a powdery yet crunchy batter, rich in brine flavours and with a creamy eggyness. Some of the yolk was also made into a runny juice with grainy bits of what I suspect are the egg white. Doused over the prawns, it intensified the flavours. Fantastic with steam rice, in fact I liked it so much I ordered another just to have it all over again. I’ve had deep-fried shrimp in all its various guises, wasabi, cornflakes, butter, nestum, thousand island sauce, you name it, this is my favourite recipe.

Stewed Pork Belly with Preserved Vegetables (£8.80)

We had to order a pork belly dish and this took me all the way back home. Stinky, mellow, hearty, homey and the fatty bits just disintegrated like hot butter. What excellent texture. I thought it was just right, however my Taiwanese half claims that it was a tad too sweet compared to say the Hakka recipe. The differences probably down the choice of ‘mui chai’ or Chinese pickled mustard cabbage, and in which there is a preference for it to be sweeter in order to fit Cantonese cooking.

You know me, I take – what some would say – a rather dim view of Chinese restaurants in London. Compared to most other cities around the world, I feel that our Chinese restaurants are weak. I keep hearing these hero stories of Toronto’s char siu rice from my cousins, London just doesn’t have quite the same depth or variety. I’m sure most Chinese restaurants would not hesitate to kick me out if they knew what I’ve said about their food. I still stand by the view that London Chinese restaurants are mostly – for want of a better term – lousy. I am only so critical partly because I feel that quality has slowly dwindled over the years. I feel that Chinatown circa 2002 had alot more to offer than Chinatown today. Take Royal Dragon for example, pre-refurbishment days in 2005/2006. Fantastic dim sum, amazing chinese style steaks. Now, a mere shadow of its former self. Mayflower did I hear you say? No longer the institution it once was, just surly service, more reputation than actual mettle. Other reputable places such as Matt Norman’s 9.95/10 outpost in Hampstead, Goldfish, and Hakkasan (which I was once I huge fan of during its hey day and when it was still owned by Alan Yau), are in my opinion overpriced and not worth a visit. So it is refreshing to find such good food at Pearl Liang.

Food, plus tea and rice for six came to £130, just a little over £20 per head. Great value, as it should be. The menu is expansive, it is spread across ten pages. I don’t think that everything is amazing, based on the evidence from my visit, I believe most are of decent quality. And based on this visit, I would be comfortable to take my family to this restaurant, confident that it can even impress my dad – one of the pickiest eaters I’ve ever dined with …You should have seen him let rip at Gaucho…

Overall, I enjoyed dinner at Pearl Liang, benchmark cooking and I highly recommend it if you are in the mood for affordable and delicious Chinese food. For those of you who prefer dim sum at night, I believe there is a small selection on their dinner menu, so do feel free to mix and match. I recommend the wasabi prawn dumplings.

Read about Dim Sum at Pearl Liang here.

The Gist of It

Pearl Liang Official Site
£25pp Chinese
8 Sheldon Square W2 6EZ
Tel :020 7289 7000
Tube: Paddington

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