Category: Chinese

One of the most common food in the world, but it can be ultra perfect. Chinese can also be considered one of the cheapest restaurants you can get in a suburb.

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
Tim Ho Wan – Burwood

Review:

Tim Ho Wan was arguably the biggest name to appear in Sydney’s culinary world in 2015. Tim Ho Wan restaurants in Hong Kong are considered to be the world’s cheapest Michelin-star restaurant. When they announced that they would open a restaurant in Chatswood, the earth shook… well maybe not to that extreme, but the anticipation was suffocating. For the first few weeks, queue could be seen outside its store and people waited up to four hours (or more) for it!

Fast forward to mid-2016, we went to one of their branches in Burwood and there was no queue. Mainly, it was because a lot of people over-expected the restaurant to have the same quality as the ones in Hong Kong. Nevertheless, Tim Ho Wan Burwood was still decently filled.

We have never been to Tim Ho Wan in Hong Kong and our comparison was based on Yumcha restaurants in Sydney. Instead of having trolleys pushed around the restaurant, you need to order the food in Tim Ho Wan.

Braised Chicken Feet with Abalone Sauce – $6.80

I love a good chicken feet dish! It was quite a decent portion and pretty well presented at Tim Ho Wan. However, there was an apparent deficiency in the taste department.

Prawn Dumpling – $8.30

Wasabi Salad Prawn Dumpling – $7.80

There were only four options for dumplings at Tim Ho Wan and they were all seafood. We tried steamed prawn dumpling and deep fried wasabi salad prawn dumpling. They were quite on par with dumplings in other Yumcha place.

The next three plates are part of dishes that were called Big Four Heavenly Kings in Tim Ho Wan

Vermicelli Roll with Liver – $7.50

Vermicelli perhaps isn’t the best word to describe the dish. I have never seen a rice noodle roll dish with liver.

Baked Bun with BBQ Pork – $7.80

This is the dish that got everyone talking about and at the same time criticised Tim Ho Wan: Baked Bun with BBQ pork. The bun looks like an under-baked PappaRoti bread. It had quite the right fluff and, according to my friend, it was pretty nice and sweet.

Pan-Fried Radish Cake – $6.00

The radish cake has pork meat inside. Excluding the desserts, the whole dish in Tim Ho Wan is meat-based. So, if you are a vegetarian, you might want to stay away.

Vermicelli Roll with Beef – $7.50

It was similar to the other vermicelli roll, but this time it was filled with beef instead of liver.

The final verdict for Tim Ho Wan

I think Tim Ho Wan has been heavily criticised for being sub-par to its main branch in Hong Kong. After the hype has died down and the chefs can concentrate on producing the food instead of being a fast-churning production line, we could see that it was a decent restaurant.

Did you know?

If you have never been to a Yumcha but you are not a pork or seafood eater, you might want to reconsider your visit. There are only a handful of dishes that you can choose from in Tim Ho Wan that are neither pork nor seafood.

Rating for Tim Ho Wan:

7.0 / 10

Taste: 7.0 / 10

Price: $5.80 – $9.90 per dish

Place: 7.5 / 10

Details:

Shop 173 – 175 Westfield Burwood

100 Burwood Road, Burwood 2134

+61 2 8719 9888

http://www.timhowan.com.au/

Jun 1, 2016
Golden Century Seafood Restaurant

Review:

This week we are writing about one of the more famous Chinese restaurants in the city: Golden Century Seafood Restaurant. Despite being in Chinatown, there is usually no shortage of people queuing to dine at the restaurant. Early dinner is your best bet to avoid the queue.

You can see a few tanks filled with live lobsters, mud crabs, abalones and many different fishes. The price for these live seafood is driven by the market, so on a good day, you might actually snap up a bargain!

We were there in a big group of eight and had quite a number of dishes ordered. Unfortunately, as with any other Chinese restaurants in the area, service is not their forte.

Crab Meat and Sweet Corn Soup – $7.00

I thought it would be a small bowl of soup as the big bowl costs 10 times as much. I ordered three of these and three of the next one. It became apparent that we had ordered way more than what we needed.

Fish Head Bean Curd Vegetable in Soup – $7.00

This soup was a bit more ‘challenging’ to the previous one because of the head element in the menu. I actually enjoyed this one more. However, one must be careful of the sharp teeth that the fish has.

Marinated Duck Chin – $10.00

Another exotic dish of the night came in the form of duck chin. It was the lower half of duck beaks with tongues. Despite its appearance, it was actually quite a tasty dish.

Marinated Beef Shank – $11.00

This was the less ‘offensive’ version of the entrée. The same kind of marinate but using the less exotic ingredient: beef shank.

Salt and Pepper Squid – $25.00

The first glimpse of quality at Golden Century was the salt and pepper squid. Presentation was as simple as ever, but it tasted amazing!

Deep fried duck with plum sauce – $28.00

This dish further established that Golden Century’s quality was a cut above the rest. It was definitely the tastiest dish we had that night. It was also possibly one of the best ducks I have ever had.

Beef Brisket and Tendon with Turnip Hot Pot – $23.00

For those of you who need tasty (read: fatty) stuff in your system, this is the dish for you! The sauce was thick and rich but the dish had such a balanced flavour.

‘I don’t even know what this is’ dish

I definitely did not order this dish but the waiter convinced me that I had. It’s some sort of tofu with vegetables. On the other hand, my eggplant order never arrived.

Heavenly Braised Four Vegetables – $20.50

Any dish that start with the word ‘heavenly’ will almost certainly attract people to order! As usual, I am not a keen vegetable eater and this was more of a dish to make a ‘complete’ meal.

Live Perch with Ginger and Shallot – Market Price

It was supposed to be the ‘main attraction’ of the day. Unfortunately the fish was overcooked. The redeeming factor was its delicious ginger and shallot sauce!

Complimentary Desserts

Despite their service (or lack thereof), Chinese restaurants’ best feature was usually their complimentary (it must be costed somewhere!) desserts. Golden Century restaurants actually gave us quite a few (rice bubbles, cake and watermelon).

The final verdict for Golden Century

Golden Century served great food (and possibly one of the best!). However, service is just as poor as any other Chinese restaurants in the vicinity. Unfortunately, the exorbitant price tag and service considerably damaged its rating.

Did you know?

Golden Century used to be a one-hat restaurant. I don’t think it’s a surprise why they lost their one-hat status.

Rating for Golden Century:

7.0 / 10

Taste: 8.5 / 10

Price: $20 – Market Price

Place: 7.0 / 10

Details:

393 – 399 Sussex Street, Sydney 2000

02 9212 3901

http://www.goldencentury.com.au/

Sep 25, 2015
Chefs Gallery Macquarie Opening Celebration – Part 2

Review:

In this second instalment of the Chefs Gallery Macquarie Opening Celebration, we focus more on the food that they served on the night. If you want to read about the celebration, please go to my Feng Shui Blessing post.

On Arrival – Chefs Gallery Macquarie

The evening started off with the usual canapés and drinks. Unfortunately, my camera went funny when I took the pictures of some of them: prawn and squid shu mai with avocado, and Jumbo prawn dumplings.

Luckily I managed to salvage a picture of the last entry on the ‘On Arrival’ menu: Spicy wonton chips. This dish is one of those ones that you cannot stop eating unless the plate is empty!

Chapas – Chinese Style – Chefs Gallery Macquarie

In line with the usual sharing tradition in Chinese cuisine, the service that they had for the evening was Chapas, presumably Chinese Tapas or some sort.

Macanese style mini burger filled with pork fillet, pork floss, lettuce and a sweet chilli mayo dressing

It was a light and fluffy start to our dinner service. The mini burger was small enough for me to swallow as a whole.

Shredded peking duck with cucumber, hoisin sauce rolled inside a fluffy Chinese roti

Peking duck was my favourite dish of the night. It was anything you could ask for in a Peking duck with the added extra kick of toasted Chinese roti. The Chinese roti tasted a lot closer to a Roti Pratha than the usual Peking duck wrap.

Crispy soft shell crab with fried shallots, garlic and chopped chillies, served with Chinese salad in a sesame soya dressing

Another dish that I have always enjoyed is a soft shell crab. In this dish, the crab was quite obscured by the garnish.

Crispy pork belly and barramundi pieces. Wrap both pork belly and fish in lettuce, topped with fresh basil and mint leaves. Drizzle with a dash of gula Melaka flavoured with cinnamon and mandarin peel

This dish has quite an interesting combination. It is also compounded by exotic flavours of cinnamon, mandarin and sugar (gula Melaka). You eat it similar to Korean BBQ where you wrap the meat inside a lettuce and dip it in the sauce.

For the next three dishes, it was quite a revelation for me that Chefs Gallery put so much pride on their noodles. Not only that they had special Noodle making session on the Opening Ceremony, they also served three noodles dishes (of different colours!) for the Chapas.

Spinach handmade thick noodles, wok fried with prawns, mussels in shell, baby calamari tubes, Chinese shitake mushrooms, dusted with seaweed and sesame powder.

Personally this is the one I liked best after the shredded Peking duck. From the appearance, it looked more of a seafood dish than noodles. It also had quite a strong seafood taste (too strong for Janni the chef). But, who wouldn’t want to try a green-coloured noodles dish?

Fish noodles served with chicken soup

Although it looked quite ordinary, there was nothing ordinary in terms of its taste. It was quite a unique noodles dish with texture I’ve never tasted before!

Knife-sliced sorghum noodles served with a Shanghainese spicy sauce

The sorghum noodles dish was also pretty interesting. It was slightly pink in colour and was cooked with wonton. I kinda like the taste, but unfortunately I wasn’t a big fan of spicy dishes.

Dessert – Chefs Gallery Macquarie

Signature “Piggy Face” sesame bun and “Totoro” marshmallow arranged in an edible garden setting, beautifully presented and served with ice cream.

We would have enjoyed the desserts a lot more if it wasn’t closer to 10 PM on the night and I wasn’t on my 12^th plate for the day. I have always loved the cute-looking ‘piggy face’ buns since the first time I went into the restaurant. It was delightful to see the playful, shared-plate dessert at the end of the banquet.

Details:

Macquarie Shopping Centre Shop 407

197-223 Herring Rd, North Ryde, NSW

+61 2 9267 8877

http://chefsgallery.com/

All About Food Blog was invited by White Works Public Relations to be the guest for the Chefs Gallery Macquarie Opening Celebration dinner.

Dec 8, 2014
Chefs Gallery Store Opening Feng Shui Blessing – Part 1

This will be a two-part chronicle as I think it’s important to tell the story on the actual procession and not just the food.

The second part (the food review) will be available for my next post. I will update you with the link on this page when it is published.

Chefs Gallery Macquarie

I went to the Chefs Gallery Macquarie Celebration Dinner / Feng Shui Blessing because I was invited by Stewart and Leonardo from Whiteworks Public Relations. The event was attended by quite a few notable names in the culinary industry, including chef Janni Kyritsis. Thanks to Chopinand from ChopinandMysaucepan.com, I was spared the blushes of not knowing his achievements!

There were quite a few attractions before the feng shui blesing ceremony started. We were entertained by Master Calligrapher (which I forgot his name – apologies) demonstrating his skills in writing our names using Chinese calligraphy. A friend of mine gave me a Chinese name “??” a long time ago, so I’m getting that calligraphy made.

In front of the master calligrapher, there was a Guzheng zither played.

After a few rounds of finger food and light refreshments, the procession was opened by the usual ribbon cutting ceremony by the owners.

The table was already pre-arranged and I was sitting next to Chopinand and the guy who sponsored the drinks for the night. On our table, we had three distinguished chefs, including Janni, the MC (Claudia Chan Shaw) and a news reporter. The table was beautifully presented and each of us received a token resembling ancient Chinese gold ingot in gold envelope.

Chefs Gallery Macquarie restaurant was decorated with Chinese Calligraphy all around the restaurant and there was a lot of hanging brushes for Feng Shui purposes.

More information about Chefs Gallery Macquarie centre can be found on their website and this media release.

Feng Shui Blessing

So what is Feng Shui blessing? Feng Shui House Blessing website offers quite an extensive article about the practise.

Claudia Chan Shaw (our host of the night) explained that Feng Shui literally meant wind and water. It is generally used to create a balanced chi for your establishments. It involved several steps including the cleansing rituals and appeasing the Gods (in this instance it included the God of kitchen).

The Cleansing Rituals

Appeasing Kitchen God

Appeasing Gods

Noodle Master Pei Lin Jai demonstrating his skills

The last ‘attraction’ of the night was Noodle making session by Noodle master Pei Lin Jai (aka Chef Panda). Just like in the video above, chef Pei Lin Jai masterfully demonstrated how he created four different types of noodles on the night.

The first was ‘regular’ noodles.

Noodle Making Session by Pei Lin Jai (LJP)

He then made a finer type of noodles.

Up to the point where the noodles were extra fine! They then lit up the noodles that we thought was almost borderline smoke hazard that would set off the smoke detectors.

Noodle Making Session by Pei Lin Jai (LJP)

In addition to those ‘regular’ noodles above, he also created specialty noodles: spinach thick noodles, fish noodles and sorghum noodles. Unfortunately I only had the sorghum noodles pictured below.

Noodle Making Session by Pei Lin Jai (LJP)

With this, I conclude my first part of the review. It is truly an amazing experience watching Feng Shui blessing.

Details:

Macquarie Shopping Centre Shop 407

197-223 Herring Rd, North Ryde, NSW

+61 2 9267 8877

http://chefsgallery.com/

Nov 25, 2014
Mr Wong

Review:

Mr Wong is located in a hidden back alley of Bridge Lane just near the corner of George and Bridge Streets. Although it can seat 240 people and is considered a pretty expensive place to eat Chinese, Mr Wong is always pretty busy.

They put a lot of efforts on the decoration of their two-level restaurant and they have quite a number of dishes in their menu. You have a choice between having small dishes of dim sum or a big dinner.

Small dishes (Dim Sum and Entree)

We ordered quite a few dishes in this department (as it should in a Yum Cha place):

Scallop and prawn shumai (3 pieces) – $9.8

Prawn har gau – $9.8

Chinese mushroom dumpling (3 pieces) – $9.8

Xiao long bao (4 pieces) – $12

Prawn toast with foie gras and almonds (4 pieces) – $12

Prawn and crispy dough rice roll (8 pieces) – $15

They made each dish as we ordered them. As a result, it took quite a while to get what we wanted. However, you can actually taste that freshly-made dim sums beat trolley ones any time! The dish of note was the scallop and prawn shumai. Even my son wanted to order more of this! The prawn rice roll was a bit tricky as they cut 2 long rolls into eight small pieces.

We also ordered a couple of entree: Drunken chicken and Peking duck pancakes. The addition of goji berries in this dish accentuated the taste. I found that the duck pancakes were just okay.

Drunken chicken – $18

Peking duck pancakes (half – 8 pancakes) – $45

Big Dishes (Roast Meats, Meat, Live Seafood, Tofu and Veggies, Rice and Noodles)

Since we were mainly concentrating on the dim sum and small dishes part, we only ordered a couple of dishes from this department. The first dish, “Mr Fong’s” stir fried chicken, was my least favourite of the day.

“Mr Fong’s” stir fried chicken, water chestnuts, shiitake, lotus root and Chinese sausage – $27

However, the large King crab and sweetcorn fried rice was pretty amazing. I think this was the most posh fried rice ever! A tip: If you are a rice eater like us, please make sure that you ask the dish to be made first because rice and noodles usually come last!

King crab and sweetcorn fried rice, trout roe and crispy conpoy – $29

Dessert

When I looked at the menu and saw deep fried ice cream and butter scotch, I was sold! Mr. Wong’s deep fried vanilla ice cream was a dessert to die for. How can you handle crunchy, hot and cold, sweet, salty and tasty all in one spoon?

Mr. Wong’s deep fried vanilla ice cream served with butter scotch sauce – $14

Shamefully, I forgot to take picture of the last dessert, Mango pudding, passionfruit granita, pomelo and pearls – $14. Instead of the heavy tasting pudding you usually get from a Chinese yum cha restaurant, you got this refreshingly-balanced mango pudding.

The verdict for Mr Wong

Yes, Mr Wong is expensive… but if you are thinking about going, you should already know that. It took quite a while for each dish to come out, but every one of them was executed perfectly. I would certainly come back for its shumai and deep fried ice cream!

Did you know?

Mr. Wong is part of a large hospitality group, known as Merivale. They have several hats restaurants. Mr Wong received the 2014 Good Food Guide award for new restaurant of the year.

You can only reserve a table for dinner if you have six or more people. For lunch time, you can book it with any number of people. They also serve banquet-style menu and mud crab.

Rating for Mr. Wong:

8.0 / 10

Taste: 8.0 / 10

Price: $300 for five people

Place: 8.5 / 10

Details:

3 Bridge Lane

02 9240 3000

http://merivale.com.au/mrwong

May 28, 2014