Leong's Legends, 9th March

Leong's Legends was a bit of a mixed bag. Fortunately, the things I picked out of that bag were great and on that basis I'd go back again. My friend George wasn't so lucky and it was his dishes which were duds.

I heard about Leong's Legends when I sent a plea to secret_london for places in London that do soupy dumplings after I was disappointed with the ones in Beijing Dumpling. So all I was really interested in was how well they did this one dish. And they were far superior to the Beijing ones - these ones actually had a spoonful of porky soup in them, and the dumplings themselves were tasty - light skins, fully filled.

But I'm getting a little ahead of myself.

There was no queue when we arrived and we were asked to wait on the stairs. As was everyone else who came in behind us, keeping the growing queue out of sight from passersby. We watched with a keen eye all the tables which might soon be leaving and we struck gold - we got a booth away from the slurps and chewing noises of other diners! Best table in the house, tucked round a corner at the back.

I knew I was going for the soupy dumplings but they had a variety of dishes which sounded a bit different and for my other dish I chose a ginger chicken soup with rice wine and sesame.

Stephen, rather courageously, ordered the century egg with tofu dish because he'd liked Two Hungry Girls' version so much, and then went for the old staple, braised pork. 

George was also a little adventurous and ordered stuffed dates with honey and then something reliable - an ordinary noodle dish.

The century egg arrived and both George and I said it was a mistake on a plate. A huge cube of tofu surrounded by jellified egg. Stephen didn't even recognise the egg for what it was at first. We demurred trying any until he had. When he attested that it really was nice, I had a bit. And it was! I don't think I could have eaten a whole dish of it on my own, but I did like a few bites of it. It came in a spicy/sweet dressing which was also really, really good.

Most of our food came at about the same time. Stephen's pork was a particularly good version - it had a very deep, sweetish flavour. I only had a bite or so but I would happily have a whole dish of that to myself. Fantastic.

George's noodles didn't look all that much and he didn't think they were amazing either. A bum note for him. But my siu long bao lived up to and exceeded my expectations as I said.

Hard to see but that's a whole spoon of porky broth

We were almost done with these dishes and were beginning to wonder when mine and George's others would arrive - they were the only two we'd ordered that hadn't been on the order form you fill out. We worried they were forgotten, but the waitress just assured us they 'needed time to cook'. 

A good five minutes or so after we'd eaten the rest of the dishes, my soup came out. It was full of ginger strips and pieces of chicken on the bone. Not a good dish for me to order in retrospect as I'm not great at eating chicken on the bone. The flavour of the soup was fragrant and the sort of thing you could eat if you're feeling a little under the weather. It got a little salty for me towards the end but I liked it.

Finally, the stuffed dates arrived. I don't eat dates anyway so I didn't try them but they didn't look great. Sadly, it seems they didn't taste great either (and God knows what they were doing with them that it took so long to make). George and Stephen couldn't figure out what the dates were actually stuffed with. SOme weird gelatinous substance that left a chalky taste in the mouth apparently. We asked and it turned out to be rice! Who knew.

So, for me, and enjoyable meal and I would definitely go back. They had a number of dishes on the menu that I thought sounded intriguing or just tasty. George probably had a completely different experience to me and Stephen and would say the exact opposite. 

Opium Chinatown, 26th January

I knew Opium was tricky to find. I already warned my companion to keep her eyes out for signs of it, and I had the exact address on me. And we walked right past it, standing on the corner near where we were sure it must be, unable to see it. And then, I spotted him. A lone burly man standing in front of a door. A door to Opium.

We walked up and saw the discreet sign. We said hello and informed the doorman that we had a reservation. A word in his mike and a response from his earpiece and the door was swung open and we were told to head to the second floor where we were greeted and lead up a further storey. We were seated by the window and our waiter came along to furnish us with menus. Three storeys high, we gazed down on the hustle of Chinatown, feeling smug that the people walking by had no idea we were up here or what lay behind that innocuous door. Around us on the shelves were title upon title of books pertaining to the art of alcohol and behind us was what would be described as the "chef's table" had we been in a restaurant and not a cocktail bar where the drinks were mixed up.

The menu: two pages of speciality cocktails, one giving a rundown of the classics, several pages of "prescriptions" (spirits) and on the final page, the dim sum. There were two cocktails that stood out for me for being intriguing. The first one I went for was the Royal Plums, mainly because it sounded a bit risque, but also because the use of plums in cocktails isn't something I'd come across before. It had a tequila base with chinese plum wine, poached black plum and rosemary syrup. It was served with a sprig of rosemary as a garnish - sooo aromatic to drink. The top had a thin sheen of broken ice and there were specks of the black plum in it. 

My friend couldn't quite make up her mind and asked for a recommendation. Our wonderful waiter Oscar suggested she go for the Opium Cocktail No. 1. This was quite a spectacular cocktail that came with a side of theatre. Two types of rum and absinthe, mandarin juice, lime juice and a ginseng capsule. The receptacle was placed and the ginseng poured into the capsule, then the rest of the cocktail and then the mist began. And continued for the duration of the drink being consumed. It was beautiful. As was what it was held in. With it's little metal pipe sticking out we were of course reminded of the cocktail bar's namesake (not that we have any experience of smoking opium ourselves). 

For round two my friend went for some bubbles in the form of a kir royale and I joined her, by ordering the Kung Fu Fizz. What a drink! My favourite of the night by far with a completely unexpected taste to what I imagined from the ingredients. A champagne base with parnsip puree, honey and sweet black asian malt, I thought it might be quite a thick, sweet "dessert cocktail" with two such sweet components. But it was lifted by the champagne and malt I suppose and was incredibly refreshing. It did taste of parsnip but in a way that made you think parsnip in a drink was completely normal; it belonged. This was served in a cute teacup, continuing the Chinese parlour theme. 

To accompany our libations, we ordered some of the delectable-sounding dim sum. To start we had the crab and fennel dumplings and the lobster prawn toast. Both were delicious, but we felt that just two more dumplings wouldn't have gone amiss for the price tag. Although, it has to be said, they were far cheaper than the cocktails! The crab dumplings were 7 pounds, the toast 9.50 (well, it was lobster). Both were tasty but my favourite was the lobster toast which was really plump and juicy and the spicy tomatoey dipping sauce went well with them. 

To follow up, we had the scallop, coriander and pea dumplings. These were tasty but not quite as tasteful as the crab versions. The scallop was slightly masked by the pea flavour. Again, I thought there could have been  more filling. And if I were to be very, very picky I would say that maybe the dough was a little thick - at least at the top where it was pinched together, which wouldn't have been as noticeable if there had been more filling. 

We spent a couple of hours there which was enough to lighten our wallets considerably and also fill our stomachs satisfactorily. The bill came to a whopping 86 pounds, so this is definitely a place for a special occasion, or when you want to impress someone. I was kinda doing a bit of both.

Find the menu & restaurant information on Zomato

Beijing Dumpling, 2nd June

After a day of strolling along the Southbank, attempting to get in the mood for the Jubilee by looking at the tall ships lining the Thames, we had worked up quite the appetite. My two companions were in the mood for Chinese and so I persuaded them to go to a place on my list – Beijing Dumpling.

I found this place because one day I suddenly recalled the soupy dumplings I’d had in New York and wondered if I could find them here. I did some research and found a couple of potential places. Beijing Dumplings sounded the best of the two and made the list. As we walked in, the place was quite full but we were able to be seated within a few minutes of arriving. In the window by the entrance you see the women cooks making the dumplings by hand and they looked good. Coupled with the warm and welcoming décor, slightly unusual for a place in Chinatown, we thought we’d come to a decent place.

Almost forgot to take a picture!

Unfortunately, I have to report that the food was a bit of a let down. I was actually pretty happy with my two dishes, but my dining partners fared less well. I had come for the dumplings and so dumplings I had. You can have soupy dumplings, or soupy dumplings in soup. I chose spicy pork dumplings without soup, and then a side of salt and pepper chicken. You get about 10 dumplings in a serving so this seemed more than enough food. They come in a steamed basket and at first I was disappointed. They were tiny and didn’t seem to have any soup in them! But they did, just not all that much, so in a few of them, the juice seemed to have evaporated. But in others there was enough for me to do the ritual of making a small hole, pouring out the soup into my spoon to enjoy, and then eating the rest dipped into the vinegar provided. And they were yummy. My other gripe with them is that Stephen got the regular pork dumplings, and there wasn’t much difference in the level of spiciness between them.

My second dish of chicken was lightly floured chicken, then fried and it was quite a light, tasty dish. Definitely the best of the lot bar the dumplings.

Stephen ordered beef ho fun with his dumplings and declared that he’d had better elsewhere. There weren’t enough peppers and onions included, and the noodles weren’t as good as in other places. 

Oh dear, looks a bit slimy

The third in our party had a mini-banquet in comparison.  I tried each of his dishes and wasn’t impressed with any of them. First he had a hot and sour soup which was weirdly thick and claggy. I'm doing you a favour by not having a picture of it. Then he had some chicken and cashews which was exactly what it said it was – no more, no less, no sauce. Actually, that wasn’t too bad, it just wasn’t that exciting either.

And finally, he had chow mein, which was a little dry and underwhelming. I had no food envy whatsoever.

I may go back for the dumplings, but I wouldn’t bother with anything else. And if I can find somewhere that’s less stingy with the soup, I may not go back at all! Does anyone have any xiao long bao (soupy dumpling) suggestions?

Ba Shan, 29th January

Similarly to the rest of the world, Stephen and I wanted to get back in shape after our Christmas indulgence. We also wanted to go to Ba Shan. We made a deal with ourselves – if we were good for two weeks, we would reward ourselves with dinner out.

Two weeks passed and I didn’t lose any weight, and Stephen didn’t even bother to measure whether he did or not. But I had been going to the gym regularly, and that had to count for something. To further our own argument, we decided to walk from our house into town, a good two hours’ journey on foot.

We wanted to go to Ba Shan because we have been to both of its sister restaurants – the Baozi Inn, and Bar Shu (which is situated diagonally opposite Ba Shan). The Baozi Inn has become Stephen’s favourite go-to place for a cheap bite ever since he first sampled their dan dan noodles. Both places specialise in Sichuan food, which is a cuisine that favours lots of chillies, on everything, though you temper this by starting with a cold appetizer. They’re also quite partial to dishes involving offal.

Ba Shan is a little pricier than the Baozi, but not as expensive as Bar Shu. It is also influenced by the Hunanese region as opposed to just Sichuan. After two hours of walking we were pretty excited to be eating and could have fallen into the trap of our eyes being bigger than our bellies. The menu labels some starters and then lists the rest under whether they’re pork, beef, veggie etc and when the price of a pork dish is the same price as one of the starters, it’s a bit of a guess as to whether it’s of main dish size or starter size. But having experienced the portion sizes of similar places, we erred on the side of caution and only ordered three dishes between us.

Those three dishes were – Chairman Mao’s braised pork belly, lamb stir fried with hot chillies and sliced pig’s ears with hot chillies. At Stephen’s behest we had decided to be a bit more ‘adventurous’ and not stick to the safe things we always choose. I was fine with this – I thought they might turn out to be similar to other odd-sounding things I’d eaten lately (boar jowl and lamb’s neck to name a couple) that really turn out to just be normal-looking cuts of meat (though the lamb neck did freak me out a bit when I’d eaten all the meat off it and could discern the vertebrae). And of course some steamed rice to make us look a little less like total carnivores.

First to arrive was the lamb and rice. Absolutely delicious, we gobbled down half of the dish before realising quite how hot it was. There was quite a lot of ginger in the dish, as well as a Christmas colour scheme of chillies – fat chunks of red and green chillies confetti all over the meet, with a few of those dried red chillies that actually aren’t too pleasant to eat dotted among them. 

Utterly delicious lamb

Then came the pigs’ ears slices and as soon as it was set down we realised we had made a mistake. They looked slimy.  And then, when you ate them, they tasted slimy. Worse, in the middle of each bit was a thin strip of what must have been cartilage. No amount of spices and herbs could disguise that texture which reminds you that you are eating something which you would normally discard. We were very dismayed. Stephen became chivalrous – he said he would eat a spoonful to make it look like we’d had some, and then fished out some of the meatier strips that were more like real pork (although still strangely soft) to give to me. Eating those gristley pigs ears just proved to me what I have thought all along – such foods as these may have had their place in a time when food was scarce (and you can apply this to snails, insects, tripe) but in the modern day there is no need to include it on menus. 

It looks better than it tasted

Thankfully we had saved some of the lamb, and the pork belly was still to come. Now, the highlight for me was the lamb, but the pork belly was indeed very delicious. It came as eight large cubes of almost crimson-coloured meat, sitting on some pak choi (or bok choy, not sure – are they even different things?) and with sauce collecting at the bottom. The Chinese/Sichuanese/Hunanese know how to braise meat. My theory is that this is because they don’t have knives and therefore need it soft enough to cut with a chopstick. Which this was. This dish wasn’t hot at all – it isn’t meant to be – but we had lots of chillies left over from the uneaten ears so I added a few to mine. And then we polished off the lamb, almost erasing all that unpleasant ear business and leaving the meal on a high note.

Like a lot of chinese places, the most applicable compliment you could pay to the service was that it was 'efficient'. We didn't have a reservation and were told when we arrived at six that we'd have to be out by half seven. As we hadn't planned on making an evening of it, this was no problem at all to us, and we were actually in and out within an hour. The atmosphere isn't too bad and the background music is a little out of the ordinary for a Chinese restaurant - contemporary pop music, and none too bad either.

One last thing – Stephen had a lychee drink as his beverage and it was lovely!

And on that note, remember:

Find the menu & restaurant information on Zomato