Party and food

Yesterday was the Hari Raya, so we went out to get some free food. Hmmm food always seems better when it was the Hari Raya, as opposed to CNY. No questions as to why.

I made my niang Yorkshire pudding again (hubby was hinting so much), and as there was too much left over stuffing, i stuff them into tau fu pok, just like niang dou fu. Not to bad. got to make a note that I was too heavy handed with teh Sage yesterday. The Sage from Asda is more powerful from that from Tesco, and I must use it sparingly! Pity I did not take a photo! I made so much! Oh yeah, I should not say I made it. Hubby told everyone he did it. Hahaha.. but not sure why they come to me for recipe instead. I should ask them to go to him.

Another note.. not to buy the Yorkshire pudding from Tesco value- they are so out of shape! The sainsbury and Asda versions as much better.

I will make it again in 2 weeks time when we do the steamboat thingy! I wonder how I can find teh proper fish meat for a real niang dou fu...

With great reluctance....

... I will have to bring the chocolates I bought to the office for my colleagues! {cry!!!}

Damn thief-stole my wallet and my credit cards... I could have bought a lot more chocolates! Now I only have enough to give away, and have nothing for myself :(. I only ate 1 praline. That is all. Sigh! Once i got the energy and time to download my photos, i will upload my chocolate photos. At least, i can look at them

Brussels- more than just sprouts

Brussels is a pleasantly small but interesting city. If you only have 1/2 hour, you just need to go to Grand Place, and take a dash to see the pissing boy. That is all you need to see to take in the city.

For a start, this is a very very multicultural city.... there is a wide variety of good food.

Food to try: Chocolates!!!! Belgian waffles, traditional belgian food, Belgian beer, French food (apparently, the standards here are really high!), seafood!

But if you have more time, then you could go to one of those touristy alleys teeming with seafood restaurants. Yes, these are tourist traps, but they make severely seafood deprived Londoners happy, especially when there is someone else to pick up the bill. Every shop essentially have the same menu. The Brusselians (is this how you call them??) tell me that there are only two good restaurants in that alley... so you have to choose your restaurant carefully, and go where the locals go!

For some authentic Belgian food, hit the In't Spinnekopke-which means spider's web at 1, Place du Jardin aux Fleurs-1000Bruxelles ( www.spinnekopke.be). You really must make a reservation for this one! There were still huge queues when we left at about 10 pm. The menu was literally huge and in French! However, the waiters speak good english, and you basically have 4 choices if you want something authentically belgian. Chicken, beef, or salmon cooked in creamy sauce, or just mussels in white wine! All are really good! Of course, you have to take these with one of those Belgian beer. They dont call brussels beer city for nothing. This is a beer city, and the stench of urine which greets you at some Metro stations will confirm that is indeed an alcoholic city.

However, my most satisfying meal was at a Chinese la mien restaurant! It was an accidental find. I just say this pregnant woman doing her la mien at a glass window, and i thought she looked really serious, although not too experienced. The la mien did not disappoint me. Really good! Yummy! The soup was really tasty, and i could taste beef stock in it. I finished every drop of it, but did not get any Chinese restaurant syndrome. That was a miracle for someone who is so sensitive to msg! I will usually start to flush and feel nauseous after just a few mouthfuls of soups when eating out. The duck meat turn out really good too, although i was disappointed that it was fried, not roasted. The name of the restaurant is Au Bon Bol, at 9 rue pau devauxstraat, at a street opposite the La Bourse. I was really impressed with these chinese women who spoke excellent French, English, and yes, you can still tell the distinct china accent in their mandarin!


Food pictures to come soon. And by the way, I actually bought souvenirs and presents- and finished spending all my money on my first day here!

- where do asparagus come from?**Farm outing** & blue bell valley day

We went to Rectory Farm in Oxford to "pluck" asparagus yesterday morning. May is the British asparagus season, and I wouldnt want to miss the experience. If I did not go yesterday, I would have to wait till next year because all my weekends are gone until mid June (which will be the strawberry season!).

[list of PYO farms in Oxford]

The day started off grey, and MS was somehow delighted, I guess. He hated the sunlight, but I was wondering why are you so worried when you are in a farm? There should be some cover! Wrong!

When we entered the farm and SH pointed out the asparagus plots, my eyes strained to see where the asparagus were! Those looked like bare plots! Nothing there! Rows and rows of brown-greyish land. Where is the asparagus? I finally understood when we got off the car (and given plastic bags to PYO-pick your own).

Asparagus are some kind of sprout- we need to pluck- ie bend it, break it, tear it off and pop it into the plastic bags! The asparagus we saw were nothing like those in the supermarket. Firstly, the colour is purplish, not green. I know why it is green in supermarket- By this morning, some of mine turned greenish. Therefore, green= not so fresh anymore. We pluck those thick juicy looking ones- thicker than the size of most fingers! I even tried one on the spot. I found it edible& crunchy. The rest found them horrible.

I plucked quite a bit and was expecting to pay at least £10. Just 5-6 sticks in the supermarket comes up to £1.99. Guess what we paid? About £3 for just less than a kg. WOW!

Yesterday night we had asparagus-juicy, crunchy, sweet. Much better than the usual stuff! We had it again during lunch, and will have enough to last use till Tues, at least. :) Thank goodness it is the bank holidays, and I can afford to let our urine stink. Asparagus gives you urine that smells like heaven.

After plucking the aspragus we went to the town centre to have lunch, before hitting Wytham woods(Woods of Hazel) for blue bells! We missed the "season", but found a patch in the valley which was still blooming. It was as if we were in a fairy woods. I will post photos when I am done with my mugging.

Related sites:
www.asparagus.org
http://www.asparagus-in-kent.co.uk/growyourown.htm

finished the Bak Kua..

We finished the Bak Kua, in 4 days. 8 precious pieces between us.

My friends have been angels- they bring me Bak Kua whenever they come! Haha... I think everyone knows that I love to eat.

ET brought almost 1kg of the thing near CNY, and worried about being caught. Hers was a normal packaging. The first time smuggler just hoped that no one would suspect a gal in business class smuggling.

EC is probably a much more experience smuggler, and brought a vacuum packed box. Gosh, that is a very costly version of Bak Kua, each slice preciously packed. She also lugged here two boxes of laksa and curry mix. That got my cravings settled till I go home :)

I will cook the laksa in an authentic manner, having discovered Hoo Hing C&C at Park Royal. That is a HUGE chinese supermarket!! Being a distributor, their stuff are really fresh! The bean sprout were so crunchy, and the tofu and to fu pok were fresh :)

Argh, the gals know me well. I am so touched. Hmm.. I wonder if I will get durian one of these days. Ok, I know that is too greedy, but I can start wishing :)

stuffed with spanish food

Meet up with EC on Thursday, and we attacked La Tasca for dinner. To our pleasant surprise, there was an eat all you could promotions for a tenner per person.

We were rather "weak", and therefore could only polish about 9 tapas dishes- most of it vege based like salads and aubergine. Hmmm... Hope to go there another day, more prepared, and break the "record". Hubby said that the highest number he ever heard was 52 plates for 4 blokes! Wow...

I like the Ealing branch of La Tasca because the food is yummy, the atmosphere is great, and the sangria is fantastic. All the waiters are Spanish! This is a place where reservation is a wise idea, especially if you have a party of 4 or more.

New invention: Niang (stuffed) Yorkshire pudding

Yesterday I invented a new recipe- Niang(stuffed) Yorkshire pudding

It all started because I have some extra mini yorkshire puddings from Sainsburry and I had no place to put them, and I also had some mincemeat left after another attempt to make "lion head". The lion head attempt did not materialise because we had eaten up all the meat balls before they get a chance to be stewed into lion head. Instead, we just cooked them with "tang hoon"- mung bean noodles- soup. Yummy!

The accidental invention of niang yorkshire pudding was yummy!

Ingredients
6 mini Yorkshire pudding shells (can get those frozen ones from sainsbury, or DIY)
1 bowl mince meat
1 egg
1 tbsp of corn flour
1 tbsp of those "flour" you use to make instant mashed potato. (I think this is optional)
about 1-2tbsp of milk (this is to make the stuffing more watery, so that the puddings will turn out soggy in the centre, crispy outside)
1 pinch of pepper
1 pinch of italian herbs, a bit of extra thyme if you like it

How to do?
Mix all these things together
Fill up the "centre" of puddings with the meat
put into oven for 10 minutes.


Unfortunately I dont know the oven temperature, as I just used the leftover heat from making cakes. (probably around 150C??) I think it is impt not to leave it too long, cos it would dry out the meat stuffing.

I think I will make more of these when I need to go for picnics!


Now I got cravings for Niang tofu!!! Where can I find the fish???

Happy New Year!!!

...........this year's new year had been busy....

cooking...
eating...
meeting friends...
going to crash with people in Chinatown...

and then...........

shiver...
sweat...
shiver...
sweat...
cough cough...
sore throat.

Yes, I am sick on 2nd day of chinese new year.

I already felt more tired than usual on new year eve and 1st day of CNY. I was still at work when I realised that i felt damn cold. I even put on my coat and still felt cold. At the end I have to give up.... pull up the white flag and go home.

Now, I am in between the shiver and sweat cycle... My headache is killing me.....

Going back to snooze.......

Oh yeah, my chicken wing and peanut butter cookie was very popular!!!
Hehehh

My blueberry muffins...

...are damn good.

I will never buy from Starbucks and company again. For less than £2, I got really yummy muffins!! Hubby took 2 photos of them, and I shall upload it later.

Pork ribs in cold day...

Today I made BBQ pork ribs.

Yummy. Finished portions meant for 2 days in 1 day.

Standard?? Still not up to standard like my aunt's, but I think I will soon overtake many takeaway restaurants :) I still lack 1 orange, 2 spring onions and some aniseed to make mine perfect. Anyway, BBQ ribs in a cold winter day is super super comfort food.

Hubby aka as the joker will depend on me for happiness..... I shall not be trifled with. Nasi lemak, BBQ ribs, curry, BBQ chicken wings... etc etc..

Today is damn cold but no snow. Walking 30-40 minutes in subfreezing temperature cause your blood flow to get haywire and I get giddy when I walk into a warm building. No joke. I forgot the science and explanation of it, but I can confirm that i am a wimp.

More baking and cooking!

Saturday is the day you spend $$$. I have been happily window shopping, and fishing for bargains. I went to try some Gap jeans and realized that they do live up to their expectations for the ability of their cuts to HUG you and make you look like you lost 2-5 kgs!

However, I will have to buy a size which I think is reserved for pigs. Shit. I can only fit into pig sized jeans now!!! No way I am going to buy anything like that and keep it in my house. Now I got to remind myself that I need a new pair of jeans, and I got to lose 2 sizes by CNY if I want a new pair of jeans. It got to be Gap this time. Aw...

At the end, as usual, no clothes, but bought stuff from Boots. It is difficult to resist buying when you spend £3 on cleanser and get £6 worth of moisturizer. And as I managed to spend £5 today, I got £8 worth of vouchers. I LOVE BOOTS!!

However, the problem is going to be difficult to solve as i just discovered a nice site for cooking and baking!! I bought some foren blueberries and want to make some muffins, some low fat ones. This nice little link from BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/get_cooking/main/index.shtml?section=6&id=../recipes/xml/057.xml
"Video recipes". haha. The profiteroles look easy enough to do. I would have "skipped" the whole thing if I "read" the recipe.

My kid sister is back from her meeting in China, and she is going there again in April! Darn. I have not even been to China. At the rate she is going, she is going to get enough miles to visit me soon.

sick leave

still feeling ill.

I think this is the retribution for eating too much. My tummy still feel unwell, and I still feel like vomiting. Really poor sleep yesterday, with the urge to puke. Sigh.

Being off work today means there will be loads to do when i go back to clear for the Christmas break.

Friday is winter solstice. And it is going to be cold. Day time temperature will go no higher than 6C!! I feel dont feel like going out with that temperature, not after SH showed me her chilblains. Ouch!!! Really bad. All she did was not properly clothed and walk a little longer than expected outside.

Maybe I should just cheat and get everyone to come to my house instead. But then... i still got to go an procure the tang yuans, in china town, no less which is like almost 2 hours away. But hmmm, I really feel like making those with gula melaka inside. :) Got cravings. I also need to top up my roti prata supply. I have got the hang of making those KAWAN frozen roti prata taste and look like the real thing, and manage to fake some dhal with Sainsbury's lentil and parsnip soup. The effect is REAL COMFORT FOOD!...

Ill day and dreams of summer strawberries

Today I have been ill. No particular reasons. Just felt dizzy, and on my way to shop for christmas presents, I felt ill at the bus-stop, nauseous and dizzy. I quickly walked home before I get a chance to faint.

The moment I reached home...... to the toilet I went.. and.........puked.... puked.... puked...
Probably ate too much steamboat yesterday. We had MS and SH over, and we had hotpot! Just dumped some LauGanMa szechuan hotpot soup base into a rice cooker.. add ingredients, and fed ourselves silly. Ate and ate until we could not move anymore. Hotpot in winter is sooooooooo comfy, and a good "cure" for my chili cravings. I will definitely do it again over Christmas :) and also CNY.

Oh yeah, some very "chinese" friend of hubby actually remember than 22nd Dec is "guo dong". Haha. Hmmm.... A "banana" like me does not attach much significance to that, but I will consider cooking some tang yuan and taking in some lonely hearts who attach Guo Dong as togetherness with family and friends. Then... we can have enough people for another hot pot session... (heee ... heee..., and also I get excuse to cook/eat Tang Yuan, since the joker does not eat it)

SH told me about their fruit plucking in summer (when I was not around!!). They had such good fun. Cherries, strawberries, blue berries, blackberries.. all my favourites! There is a big farm somewhere near oxford, and you could visit for free and eat as you pluck. (Fresh berries!!!! ) You only pay for what you bring home! Of course, most of what they plucked went into their tummies. :) I am definitely going to do this next year. I will want to pluck everything. From strawberries to lemons and apples and pears. Apparently they had so much apples around their house, that no one was bothered to eat them! Yumm....

That is all I could manage to "document" today. Firm reminder to visit orchards right after Easter to dig asparagus.... and then visit again, and again, and again to pluck pluck pluck all the way to the last fruits in autumn.

Sunday ROAST and the newly crowned shopping queen

Went for a sunday roast at the local pub as part of a mystery shopping assignment. Yummy! I think I start to like roast pork-western style. This pub-George and Dragon (Ok, there are lots of George and Dragons all over England) has very decent pricing. £3.95 for a sunday roast meal- with two generous slices of pork/beef/turkey, baked potatoes, parsnips, carrots and green peas. Also included were Yorkshire pudding and some meatball like stuffing.

Although we were disappointed that they only served ONE type of food ie Sunday roast, we had no more complains after tasting the food. I loved the parsnips and the baked potatoes! The baked potatoes where so nicely browned and was crunchy outside, soft inside. And the parsnips-I never knew they could be so good! My best parsnips so far were the ones I made last winter (yeah, winter =parsnips), which was baked with ginger beer and some oyster sauce. (Creative cooking!!!)

No desserts. Disappointed.

Disappointment ended when I ordered the Baileys in Chocolate cup! It is really a bit too much to drink liqueur in broad day light with lunch, but the advertisements with Baileys in the chocolate cup tempted me! I loved Baileys-esp if they are in Haagen-Daas. It was a really small portion served in a small piece of paper-like those for making cupcakes :) Yummy. Got to sip and snip the chocolate delicately. heavens!

But the real heaven started when I ventured to the stores nearby. You cant prevent your self from going in and showing some support when the shops all have a sign "Stop Tesco from killing the town". Awww!!! Half of me says-show support, at least browse. Half of me wondered, if you are good, how can tesco threaten you??

I was in for the best shock in my life.....

And while walking home, giggling like a mad woman, and kicking myself for not discovering these places earlier...I congratulated myself as THE shopping queen!! The £1 books and this bagful of stuff sealed my status. hahaha. At the rate this is going, my colleague who bought 30 pairs of shoes in 2 weeks got to start sucking me up for tips. :D

Cranberry muffins!

Why muffins?

Muffins are one of the best invention in the kitchen. Because muffin recipes come with the instructions of "do not over mix"."Minimum mixing keeps the muffins light and fluffy"!!!

Gonna make these SPICED CRANBERRY muffins!

225gm plain flour
1tsp ground ginger
2tso baking powder
1/2tsp bicarbonate soda
100g unrefined sugar
2 eggs beaten
100ml vege oil
3tbsp natural yogurt
200gm cranberries, fresh or frozen

temperature=180C, bake for about 35 minutes.
Baking time is a bit long for muffins.

What am I going to do with my new found freedom?

1) I got to go somewhere! yes, definitely. I have not been seeing enough places in the past one year. What a shame. I have not even been to Coltswold!

So, where should I go next weekend?
I am thinking:
Coltswold-including Strafford upon Avon and Warwick castle
Cambridge
Bath

2) I got to polish my English. Yeah. I got to speak better English, and get rid of all my *inglish. My grammar is totally wrong these days. I only realised how bad it is when I started blogging. Years of Microsoft word for writing and *inglish speak have slowly my my grammar. After a while, I stopped thinking about whether I am using English correctly anymore! I think my standard now is much much worse than in Secondary school!!!
Action: Read grammar books/sites!!-- Boring boring boring..


3) I am gonna learn to bake!!

Ok.. I should qualify the sentence.. I am gonna learn to bake all types of muffins!!

Hahah. Why muffins? Because muffin recipes come with the instructions of

"Do not over mix"."minimum mixing keeps the muffins light and fluffy"!!!

Muffins are one of the best invention in the kitchen. There are not many things that reward you for doing less.

And my favorite source of muffin recipes is the TESCO magazine (yes, the FREE one). There is a section of baking meant for kids (little chefs), and I thing it is the most useful section of the whole magazine. I actually look forward to the magazine because of this section.

Craving for good food

I got cravings for good food. I got to try this list ........


Japanese Foood
Misato
Ten Ten Tei (name is hilarious in certain chinese dialects:))
Koi (Paris Hilton went there in a dress that only covered her niples and lower parts of her breast)

Indian- something from Bricklane
Khan at westbourne grove

Others?

The Cow

I want my strawberries!!!! Missing Portobello market

Yeah, I want my strawberries!!! Peaches, grapes, raspberry and melons too.

Straberries and cream is just the perfect summer desert. Thinking of it made me salivate.

Portobello Market is probably the thing that I miss most about London. The Saturday fruit sweep, hahaha.

Imagine, I got a basket of grapes, seedless and sweet at £1.00. 3 gala melons for £1. 2 punnets of British summer strawberries for £1.20 or even £1.00!! In winter, we setteled for the lesser cousins, strawberries from Spain at a rate of 3 punnets for £1!!! Befor I came back , I got 2 pounds of cherries for £1.20 there, and 2 punnets of ripe yummy peaches for £1.50. Cheap?? Definitely.

Portobello has a reputation as "expensive", because people are put off by the prices displayed, particularly those nearer to the antique shop.

But the gems of Portobello market are down the road. Yes, go DOWN hill.

Nah, that organic pastry stall is crap. Expensive, and not yummy!! I would rather walk to the Wild and Natural at Westbourne grove, pay a little more, and dine with the good lookers from Notting Hill. Knowing that some stars like to eat the muffin I was having make me feel..... errr... well, I don't know. But it is better than that pathetic pastry stall!!!

The Banana and Tomato King is my favourite stall. This is where a big chunck of my fruits came from. Cherries, which are in season now, raspberry (woah, thinking of it make me salivate!!!) in winter/autumn and British strawberries. They also probably have the cheapest "fresh" bananas in town. Their apples are always crisp, and can be terribly cheap sometimes. Ok, you definitely can get 1 basket of apples for £1 somewhere else, but those probably will have bruises. If you talk about "perfect" condition apples, this is the place.

The stall next to it, (its name has the word "Banana" in it as well), is cheap too. However, you can only buy boxed, and priced items from them. Try giving them a bag of grapes/bananas whateer, and you will end up wondering why the bag is so "heavy", cos the price did not come up as cheap. The thing I will get from them is just boxes of strawberries.

Many times bitten by them, now very shy :). I get "bullied" by them whenever I go alone, and hubby not with me. Hmmm, it must be because hubby look more like a gangster, and I look more like a sheep??? hahah. But this sheep is known to "bleat" at sales people when they try to cheat, and tell them off!!

If you go at closing times, ie past 4 pm some stalls get rid of their fruits by the boxes. YOu wil get big crates of grapes, melons, apples, satsumas (something like mandarin orange, but 10 times more yummy and juicy) for £2. Some of our happiest buys include a box of satsumas, which we shared with another customer for £1.00 each. That £1.00 bought us more that 40 satsumas, and we happily ate the satsumas, and give them away to friends. Another time, we got so much grapes, ie sharing a BIG crate with another person for £1.00, we had to distribute them away.

Those crates of fruits are usually very ripe, and must be eaten on the same day or the next two days, but hey, that is how you could have only fruits for dinner!!! (and breakfast, and lunch too!!) Imagine, by breakfast cereals used to be served as an accompaniment to my fruits (ie more strawberries in my bowl than cereal, hehehehe).

On the afternoon England played, I did my last Portobello Sweep, and was an extremely happy and contented gal to have no one fighting for the goodies with me, and the stall holders giving things away cheaply to go home and watch England play. Peaches, appricots, grapes, strawberries... etc etc, all those things that I tell myself I would buy and eat as much as I want IF I ever get RICH.

Now, back to reality. Back to that supermarket that I wish no longer monopolise the town.
Well, nothing wrong with them. It is just that they offer apples apples and more apples. Apples from Brazil, China, new Zealand, Washington?? etc etc. Green apples, red apples. Ok, they also offer lots of orranges, orranges and orranges. Ok to be fair, they also offer not so fresh grapes, for $3+++ a small box. It is difficult for me to buy, cos I think the grapes look like "crate" material!!! Well. SIgh..................

I walked around the aisles like a mad woman, past those expensive blueberries, strawberries, and also 3 for $3.55 pathetic looking peaches (definitely "crate" material)....finally settling on 5 gala apples. I have only eaten 1 apple (I mean fruits) since I landed, other than those generous fruit platter served by my "taitai" auntie.

I think i better find excuse to go to her place and get my strawberries?? Maybe I should also whine about the cherries and peaches??? If I whine enough, maybe her personal "fruit-er" will source for them??? Ok. Nah, better dun get so low down. Back to reality, and console myself that a durian goes for $5 or less, and news say Malaysia over produced durians this season!!!!
Woah hahaha. Poor farmers. But happy me. Cruel me. Hmmm, maybe these thoughts will affect my karma.... but who cares. i want durians!!!

And talking about Portobello, have I ever mentioned that I fell in love with Romeo Pires and thinking of losing weight for him in that fateful day when my "Shrek" was given a red card?

Ops... better shut up. Hubby will be spying here.

The definitive taste of Chinatown: Wong Kei : Eating Cheaply in London: Part 4

The definitive taste of Chinatown: Wong Kei

41-43 Wardour Street, London, W1D 6PY

Telephone: 020 7437 8408

Wong Kei or “Wang Ji” in London’s Chinatown has acquired a sort of cult status in London. Shocked by how shocked our friends were when they found out that we had not eaten there yet, we dutifully went there during our Saturday Chinatown shopping trips.

Wong Kei has three floors. And according to our friends who are regulars, getting allocated to which floor is a lottery.

We went in, told the waiter that there are two of us and was promptly shown to the basement. I feel like I walked into a “Cha Chan tang” in Kowloon. Basic furnishings and very efficient waiters who spoke in Cantonese! The moment our bums reach the chair, a pot of hot Chinese tea with two tea cups were on the table, along with two red menus.

My impression of that place?

1. Feng-shui-ed! A big fountain, pouring in water from the ground floor entrance to a pond in the basement!
2. CHEAP FOOD!!!!
3. Huge portions!!!!

I ordered a Won Tun noodles for £2.80, while hubby order fried hor fun with beef (£3.80).

I must say that the Won Tun only had bits of prawn, like the Singapore/Malaysia/Thailand versions, and too much pork to make up the size! I felt like I was eating pork ball-wrapped in wonton skin. The noodles were ok and the soup was not too bad (better than most Malaysia/Singapore hawkers, not as good as what you would expect from Hong Kong!). It is definitely a steal at £2.80, but definitely not as yummy as that in the Dragon Inn (12 Gerrard Street) which was very Hong Kong-ish!

My hubby’s hor fun was very yummy, with generous amounts of beef, although they over-cooked the beef slightly. Large portion- this is the first time a big eater like him packed the left-over home!

Verdit:

Price? One of the cheapest in Central London! The tea is free! Three of us had to pay £4.00 for a pot of low quality tea (very very bad, definitely “recycled”) when we had lunch at the Big China near South Kensington Tube! WYSIWYG- no extra charges apart from the already low prices on the menu. No service charge!

Service? We did not experience any of the legendary rudeness, probably because I speak Cantonese! They were very efficient, and friendly if you speak Cantonese, and did not expect you to tip!!! (The guy at Dragon Inn was hinting for me to tip him even after paying service charge!!!) They also did not expect/pressure you to order more! NO grumbles when you want to pack your left-overs, and there was no extra-charges for packing.

Taste? The Wonton is a let down. My hubby’s hor fun was yummy, and people around us seemed to be enjoying their char siu and other roasted meat.

Location? Chinatown London.

Will I go again? Yeah, definitely! That place got "atmosphere", and I want to go on a Sunday morning to see the full "glory" of Wong Kei's dim sum hour!

If you are in the Chinatown area, this is definitely the place to fill up your tummy or have a taste of Chinese in London! If you order “dry” stuff, and you are not a very big eater, you can easily pack your “dinner” when you take your lunch! (£3.80 for 2 meals is a steal, right?)

This restaurant is frequently mentioned in guidebooks. However, remember that this is not the best that London had to offer in terms of taste, but it is more like a glimpse of Chinese “culture” in London!

P/S: To see how "cult"ish it is, read the pages and pages of reviews when you google "Wong Kei"! Here is on example of reviews

and compare it to my all time favourite: Yummy duck- Four seasons at Bayswater
(FOUR SEASONS is a must go. It is a very "sinful" place, tempting people away from their religious practices with those juicy BBQ meat! If you are "lucky", you will see tables of Malay and Indonesian speaking people devouring their char siu, and I once seen another lady with a head scarf there...I tried hard not to *laugh wickedly*)

Other related posts:

Cheap eats for London: Part 3 (supermarket options)

Cheap eats for a short london stay: Part 2

Eat well, eat cheaply in London: Part 1

London is expensive? The insider's guide to do it in a cheap way.

Yummy duck- Four Seasons at Bayswater

My friend visited me and it was a great excuse to head to the Four Seasons at Bayswater. Ehhh...no. Not the Four Seasons Hotel, but this Four Seasons Restaurant is not short in terms of fame; for people from Singapore, HongKong and Malaysia (I am sure China and Indonesia as well, looking at the crowd) have heard of the yummy duck!

That was the my first meal in London (in Nov 2005) and it impressed me! I did not feel the pinch at all to pay more than 5£ per person for just a plate of duck rice. I fell in love at the first bite, and understood why well-traveled foodies like my aunt and cousin recommend it so highly.

My first thought:
Was it a DUCK?

Then I took a second look. Yes it is a duck! It was too fat and juicy, and you could tell from the skin that it is not a chicken! It was not a goose either, because the leg was small. How did they make it so sweet, succulent and removed the duckish "odour" which make badly made versions of roast duck inedible?

The skin was roasted until it is quite thin, and yet you still find a juicy layer of fat underneath. Yes, again, no duck odour in the lard. Instead there was a nice aroma about it... really smelled good, and I just did not know what went in to make it so perfect. All this was done without overcooking the duck. Woah... Heavens!

Verdict? Fantastic! Better than what I sampled in Hong Kong!

And yet on the 2nd day of Chinese new year, it let me down!! I brought my friend there and we were unimpressed. Something was missing. The aroma? The meat was juicy and tender, not just not quite like the first one. I thought it was my increased expectation, but my friend also agreed that "standard dropped". Is it all the rumours about a different chef etc? I don't know. I only hope that it was because the chef did not work on CNY, and let the apprentice did the work.

Anyway, it was still good. Greedy me asked for two helpings of the chili oil. :)
Chili oil beats chili sauce. I am all for Hong Kong and Sze Chuan style chili oil now.

P/S July 2006:

We went back again several times, and it has been consistently better than the CNY episodes. It impressed our foodie friends. This place is famous for THE DUCK, so don't go and order other stuff and then wonder what is so special. Order THE DUCK, which you can request for wonton noodles instead of rice to go with at no extra charge. However, it still taste best with RICE!!!

Tel no: 020-72294320
84, queensway, London w2 3rl (a short walk from South Kensington Gardens/Hyde Park, very near queensway/bayswater tube)

You might want to call to book places (although they dont really allow). Or be prepared to queue at dinner times. My advice? Go during lunch! The duck is freshly roasted then!!! and no Q