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Address: 8-10 North Audley Street, London W1K 6ZD
Telephone: 020 7493 3223
Website: www.princessgardenofmayfair.com
Date of visit: 2 October 2011
Costs: Dim Sum from £2.60 per dish. Certain main courses around £30-£40
Wines and beer: Did not check – I was a guest – but it won’t be cheap as this is Mayfair
Likes and dislikes: Nice restaurant, decent food at a decent price but the waiting – despite booking – is poor.
Cuisine: Chinese – north and south
Summary:
This is a very modern and chic restaurant south of Oxford Street. Bright and noisy. Everyone seems to shout in a Chinese Restaurant irrespective of nationality. On the day we went (Sunday lunch), the place was full of Chinese but there were a significant number of non Chinese eating lunch. I was told that the clientele and atmosphere is completely different on a weekday evening.
There is a lounge/bar and two separate dining rooms.
They make you wait in the lounge despite having booked empty tables in the restaurant – is this a ploy to sell drinks? On the day I went, most people were drinking mineral water or tea so the ploy is questionable. It certainly isn’t due to a lack of staff as there were plenty.
This was a lunch to celebrate a relative’s birthday. There were 7 adults and 2 children.
We went for the usual array of dumplings – sui mai, har gaw – turnip cake, chung fun etc. They were all very good. The pot sticker was big and fat but was not crisp enough at the base. We also had crab meat fried rice – they do not do fried rice with char sui – and pork julienne fried noodles.
Princess Garden is supposed to be a Northern Chinese Restaurant and they do have unusual dishes that you will not get in a normal Chinese Restaurant e.g. Chinese smoked fish.
The total bill including 3 ching tao beer and two glasses of dry white and 2 juices came to just over £140 and we all had plenty to eat.
The food here is above average and is certainly better than most of the dim sum establishments in Soho. I rate the food here as better than Kai’s – which has a Michelin Star – down in South Audley Street.
E
Address: 8-9 Hythe Bridge Street, Oxford, OX1 2EW. Between Oxford Town Centre and Railway Station
Telephone number: 01865 202888
Website: N/A
Date of visit: 22 September, 2010
Approximate cost per head: For lunch, you can get away with less than £10. Maybe £20-£30 in the evening depending on what you ordered.
Comments on wine list/beer: Didn’t see a wine list but I assume it exist. Tiger is £3.40 a bottle
Summary:
I went there whilst I was in Oxford because of a great review by Giles Coren in The Times.
He mentioned that they had a great Shanghainese Chef and the owner used to own Opium Den on George Street.
Lets get a few non food issues out of the way:
- This place has done well out of the review, it is moving to bigger premises in George Street later this year. There are 2 copies of the review within the restaurant. One on the window facing the street and one on the way to the loo.
- According to Giles, the owner used to own the Opium Den. However, there were several promotional posters (in Chinese) in the restaurant promoting the Opium Den, so may be the links with Opium Den are still there.
- The dark wood furnishing is remarkably similar to the Opium Den.
Now, onto the food. The place advertises Shanghainese and Szechwan cooking as well as Mongolian Grill. The Mongolian Grill is a very large heated griddle. You go to a buffet table, take you selection of shreds of meat, vegetables and noodles. The chef then stir fries it on the griddle for you. The restaurant charges £5.50 for the first plateful and £4 for seconds.
The place was half full when I entered at 1.30. The clientele were mainly Chinese students.
I was offered two menus as I sat down. There was a lunch menu offering dim sum (from £3 a dish) and various rice and noodles for around £6 a dish or bowl. The main menu that promotes set meals, the Mongolian Grill as well as the a la carte dishes.
I have to say that menu was not particularly Shanghainese or Szechwan. In fact I am not aware of an autrhentic Shanghainese restaurant in the UK. Most of the dishes were Cantonese. I then looked at the dim sum menu and they were all standard items – 90% Cantonese. For example, onion cake or pancake is a must menu item in Shanghainese restaurants, another one is eels. They are not on offer here.
I had pork and vegetable dumplings, wok tip dumplings (pot stickers), beef brisket, vegetable spring roll, shanghai dumplings – shao loong pao.
The pork and vegetable dumplings (£3.50) were essentially pao dough pan fried with a mixed minced pork and Chinese cabbage filling. This was fine. The vegetarian spring rolls (£3.00) were as they should be and it was served with a sweet chilli dip.
The wok tip (£3.50) were ok but were covered in sesame seeds – a first for me world wide and I have eaten quite a few of them. The base of the pot stickers could have been crisper. The shao long pao (3.50) had exactly the same filling as the wok tip and no soup or stock inside the dumpling. It’s the soup that makes these dumplings famous. What was also disappointing was that the wok tip and shao loong pao were served with a black vinegar that had no ginger in it. Traditionally these items are served with a slightly sweet vinegar with shreds of ginger in it.
Next came the five spice beef brisket (£8.00). This was cubes of tender beef in a sauce. The dish was served hot. Traditionally this should be served cold in aspic, sliced up like brawn.
With 2 Tiger Beers and service, the bill came to £28.80. Not cheap but not pricy.
My conclusion is that the food is all right but it is not 100% authentic and certainly, the menu is dominated by Cantonese dishes not Shanghainese dishes.
I am off to New York in mid October. I shall certainly visit an authentic shanghainese restaurant.
Giles, may I suggest that you go to Singapore, Shanghai, Hong Kong, New York or Vancouver and try out a proper Shanghainese restaurant. The food is very different from Sojo. There is a shanghainese restaurant in Kuala Lumpur but I do not recommend it. This is not an invitation, so, please don’t send me the bill.
E
PS. So Jo means burning wine, a type of hash spirit in China.
PPS I am sure that you all know that chop suey is an american invention. Did you know that crispy duck is a british bastardisation of the original dish. In China, it is a salty duck deep fried. No pancake, no hoisin sauce.
Address: 28th Floor, 1 Peking Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon ,Hong Kong
Telephone number: + (852) 342 88 342
Website: http://www.aqua.com.hk/
http://www.aqua.com.hk/#/?eng&hutong&concept
Date of visit: March 2010
Approximate cost per head: $500 plus. There is a tasting menu at $888 per head.
Comments on wine list/beer: Really upmarket list for HK. Prices start at $450 + per bottle and you can get first growth at a ridiculous price
Summary:
This is part of the Aqua Restaurant group – url included – they serve northern chinese style food in this restaurant.
Aqua specialise in upmarket restaurant (Italian, Chinese, Japanese etc) located in “specialist” buildings. They have a restaurant ontop of the “old” Dickens and Jones, Regent St, London.
Hutong occupies the whole of the 28th floor of a building sited on the Kowloon side of the harbour. This place has probably the best HK skyline night view – better than Felix (Peninsula Hotel). The view from the Kowloon side is more interesting as the view on the Central District water front has all the interesting buildings (HSBC, Bank of China etc) whilst the Kowloon side is more standarsised.
We shared spring rolls, lamb kebabs, braised prawns, string beans with minced pork, steamed bread rolls and apple strudel (chinese version). This was washed down with a bottle of Italian water and a bottle of 2001 Barbera (Piedmont). Total bill came to $1481 including 10% service charge.
The food here is strong on presentation. Food on the whole tastes quite good.
The two dishes that were a bit bland were the prawns and the steamed bread rolls.
Re the others: the vegetarian spring rolls were served with a spring onions and black vinegar dip on a black tile. The lamb kebabs were very spicy but moreish. The string beans were just right with a good bite and the minced pork extremely lean. Portions side were pretty good.
It was a great meal in a fantastic place ruined by MNBA (Virgin Amex card) who refused to authorise the transaction – this was the third time that same day when I had trouble. Twice I had to take a call from their Indian call centre asking the same questions to make sure that my card wasn’t stolen. Each time, they promised to put on record that I was in HK and spending money. This time, I had to call UK to get the transaction cleared (the call took 15 minutes as the operator kept having to put me on hold). That was the last time I used the card in HK. No such trouble with my Waitrose (HSBC) card.
By the way, you will need to book days if not weeks ahead. You can book online. They do not take bookings more than a month ahead.
E