Category: Chatswood

Chatswood is located on the North of Sydney. We have to go through Sydney Harbour Bridge if we want to go there. The suburb is named after Chatties Wood.

Shanghai Stories 1938

Shanghai Stories 1938 Review:

Shanghai Stories 1938 is located in The Concourse, Chatswood. The building is right next to Westfield Chatswood. Their menu is more on the expensive end of the scale. There are the usual expensive Chinese dishes, such as lobster or abalone.

Xiao Long Bao – $ 11.80 – 8 pieces

Xiao Long Bao is one of the most ordered dishes in the restaurant. Since there were quite a few of us, we managed to order two sets of them.

Steamed Shrimp and Chives Dumplings – $13.80 – 8 pieces

We ordered these dumplings for those of us who did not eat pork.

Drunken Chicken – $11.80

Drunken chicken was part of the cold dish in the menu. The steamed chicken was soaked in Chinese liquor and chilled.

Jelly Fish with Cucumber – $14.80

This was another dish from the cold section. You can buy cheaper-version packaged jelly fish from a Chinese store. Obviously, this one was a bit fresher than that.

Sweet and Sour Baramundi – $43.80

Despite being one of the centrepieces, the fish was quite underwhelming.

Whole Peking Duck with pancake – $68.00 – 16 pieces

When we go to a fancy Chinese restaurant, peking duck becomes one of the units of measurement. The peking duck in Shanghai Stories despite being pretty good was pretty expensive. We only received 16 slices of duck with 16 pancakes. So, technically, it’s not even a whole duck.

Second course – Fried Noodles

This dish came at the very end. They probably have forgotten about it if we didn’t ask.

Prawn and Rice Crackers in Tomato Sauce – $24.80

When the dish arrived, it did not remotely look like the one in the menu. Instead of beautiful big prawns like shown in the picture, we received these tiny krills. Ironically, the soup ended up being our favourite for the night.

Boiled Bean Curd Slices Yangzhou style – $26.80

Personally, I think it was just tofu and greens. It should be noted that the tofu was very fine.

Salt and Pepper Squid – $28.80

It was quite an uneventful salt and pepper squid.

Chinese Milk Dough – $8.80

This perfect pairing for a mud crab dish was transformed into quite a sweet dish with condensed milk.

The final verdict for Shanghai Stories 1938

The high price point at Shanghai Stories 1938 was not met with high standards in service and food.

Did you know?

Shanghai Stories 1938 is part of a restaurant chain with the likes of Taste of Shanghai.

Rating for Shanghai Stories 1938:

6.5 / 10

Taste: 6.5 / 10

Price: $45 per person

Place: 7.0 / 10

Details:

Shop 4 & 6, The Concourse
405 – 409 Victoria Ave, Chatswood 2067

+61 2 9412 3880

http://tasteofshanghai.com.au/brands/shanghai-stories-1938/

Apr 20, 2017
Hawker Lane
Dining Experience:

We were invited by Sibling Agency and Scentre Group (aka Westfield group) to try Westfield Chatswood’s newest food precinct, Hawker Lane. If the name is not clear enough for you, Hawker Lane consists of 13 Asian restaurants, an ice cream place and a Taiwanese milk tea place.

When we arrived at the venue, we were given a sample of coconut juice topped with marshmallow and cake. They had a promotional at the Hawker Lane: When you made purchases at Hawker Lane of $20 or more, you received the coconut for free. The coconut really stole the show that day.

One Tea Grill – Baoger

One Tea Grill was the first restaurant we went to because we were so curious about their burgers. Their main attraction was the slider burger with three different kinds of burgers: ramen, matcha and rice. They also had three different patties: wagyu beef, teriyaki chicken, and green tea ice cream with red bean.

Cheers Cut

There are quite a few Taiwanese XXL fried chicken stalls in the city. The interesting bit about XXL chicken is its XXL size. It is seriously big! As you can see in the picture below, it is around three times the size of regular Taiwanese milk tea glass.

The rest of the restaurants are:
- Aqua S – Dessert
- Chachu’s – Indian
- China Chilli – Chinese
- Dumplings & Co – It had not opened when we were there
- Gong Cha – Drinks – Taiwanese
- Jim’s Malaysia – Malaysian
- Lamb & Cumin
- Noodle Warriors – It had not opened when we were there
- Madame Nhu – Vietnamese
- Makanai – Japanese
- Mao Cai – Chinese
- Nahm Jimm – Thai
- Sushi World – Japanese
We also tried quite a few other restaurants on the day. The one that really stood out was Lamb and Cumin. We love the marinated lamb satay!

There was one stall that we missed out when we were there because we actually did not see the stall inside the precinct. I have tried the ice cream from the main shop for Aqua S in George Street. They are known for their sea salt ice-cream.

We also did not go to Mao Cai / China Chilli as the queue were ridiculously long on that day. Despite our curiosity, we could not be bothered queuing for it.

Details:

Level 2 Westfield Chatswood, 1 Anderson Street, Chatswood NSW 2067

(02) 9412 1555

https://www.westfield.com.au/chatswood/dining

Hawker Lane
Dec 8, 2015
New Shanghai

Rating:

5.5 / 10

5 for its service!

Taste: 6/10

Price: $16per person

Place: 6.5/10

Review:

My first impression of New Shanghai was a very positive one. There were plenty of people willing to queue up, given the restaurant status of only residing in a food court. The décor inside was equally brilliant. It was made to resemble a street-side restaurant with an open kitchen theme. It reminded me of the other Chinese Restaurant I’ve reviewed, Din Tai Fung, mixed with authentic dining experience.

My good impression was short-lived. The waitress was pretty impatient and she actually walked out on us in the middle of order. She might have assumed we wouldn’t order any drinks or other food. We ordered hot tea from a different waiter.

The first dish arrived was Stir-fried Spinach with Garlic. It was a very plain water spinach dish with garlic. The second dish also followed suit of being plain. It was the Lamb and Leek Dumpling. It’s kind of reminded me of the frozen dumpling from Coles, with the additional vinegar and soy sauce (which can be obtained from the supermarket as well!).

Their hints of excellence came in the form of Deep Fried Calamari in Salted Egg Yolk. I would recommend you to enjoy this dish with a bowl of rice since it can be salty. Despite the egg yolk, the calamari was still crunchy and easy to chew. They also did ok in terms of its presentation.

Next dish to come was their specialty, Pan Fried Bun. This was the first time I enjoyed a bun, half fried at the bottom with meat filling and tasty broth inside. You might want to take it easy in enjoying the bun since the broth was quite hot when it was first served. You can also add soy sauce, chilli sauce and/or vinegar according to your taste. It was a mixture of sweet and crunchy bun with savoury filling.

We had to ask for the next dish (twice) before it eventually arrived. It was Drunken Chicken. It is a classic Chinese Dish served chilled and is supposed to be served as an entrée. However, this particular dish was bland and did not look appealing (and most certainly not an entrée). Furthermore, it turned out to be our last dish of the day since another waiter told us that our Deep fried chicken with special garlic & chilli sauce was not on the list of things we ordered.

The final verdict: They might have a nice Calamari and Pan Fried Bun, but their service was one of the worst I have ever experienced in my life. Not only the waitress left us before I finished ordering, she actually forgot one of my orders. Considering the queue, I was astonished that it wasn’t met with at least a decent service.

Did you know?

There are several branches of New Shanghai all around Sydney. The one in Bondi Junction is more of a food court stall rather than a fully-fledged restaurant. I think this setting actually works better for them at least they don’t use the terrible service. I’m sure I would’ve given 0.5 or 1 point more.

Details:

Shop B-038, Chatswood Chase, Chatswood, NSW 2067

02 9412 3358

http://www.newshanghai.com.au/

Oct 2, 2011