Category: Chinese

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Chinese

JKG Shancheng Hotpot King 山城火锅王 – Haymarket NSW Hot Pot Restaurant Review

Tucked away at the back of a shopping centre in Sydney’s Chinatown is JKG Shangcheng Hotpot King. It is a relatively budget hotpot restaurant, with a wide selection of meats and seafoods but a lower emphasis on cleanliness and service.

Ordering is via a tablet-based system. Make sure to scroll down the page to view all offerings, as we were initially very confused as to why our options were so extremely limited.

Sauce attracts an extra charge, however as I’m not a big fan of sauce we were able to convince them to let us only pay for one serving. The sauce station was very dodgy and had a bug-zapper lamp next to it. I don’t know if this was the best decision, as while it would be good at killing bugs it was probably also part of why there were so many flying bugs near the sauce station.

The wontons in chili soup were yum. The filling was evidently housemade, which is preferable to store-bought.

For our soup bases we got mushroom and chicken broths. The mushroom broth was very shroomy with many assorted shrooms – perhaps superfluous as we also ordered a number of shrooms to cook ourselves. The chicken broth we felt was flavourless apart from being salty.

The serving sizes for fresh vegetables, mixed mushrooms, and mixed tofu were quite large, and good value for the price. Having full sized servings of all three was a bit too much for us as a couple however , and we wish that they would do half sized servings for half the price. Nonetheless, it would be good for a party of three or four.

A metre of beef was too much for us. The beef was a bit too fatty.

No complaints about the chicken.

Overall my partner and I spent around $120 on our meal including a beer. This is around the same price that we paid at YX Mini Hot Pot, however we got much more food (of somewhat lesser quality) for the money. I would recommend JKG Shangcheng Hotpot King to a more price-conscious market, for example students, who at the same time do not expect much service (it took a very long time and multiple visits for our hot pot soup to be topped up).

JKG Shancheng Hotpot King (山城火锅王)
Shop 8A/363 Sussex St, Haymarket NSW 2000
(02) 9267 6366

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Asian Fusion Café Chinese Latin American

Three Williams – Redfern NSW Cafe Review

While the name of Paddington’s Ten William cafe indicates its address, Three Williams in Redfern is not so straightforward. Situated in a dimly-lit semi-basement space on Elizabeth St in Redfern, Three Williams is named not after something with any contemporary relevance, but rather after three dead white men who already have plenty of things named after them – including entire suburbs.

The ceviche ($25) was a tangy bowl of tiger prawns, sashimi kingfish, pickled red onions, roast tomato, coriander, charred corn, lime & avocado, baby cos served with blue corn tortillas. I first heard of the term ceviche back in 2009, during the season six premiere of Grey’s Anatomy. Ceviche was the nickname lovingly bestowed upon a trauma patient with multiple water-sport related traumatic amputations, and while I learned nothing of medicine from this show it gave me a step up in being able to pronounce the name of this dish when ordering it (something my partner could not). Having never had ceviche I didn’t really know what to expect from this dish. It was certainly quite tangy and citrusy, however I didn’t quite like how soupy it was – and I wasn’t sure if I was meant to drink the soup or just use it as sauce. The blue corn tortillas (though more visually brown) were actually quite nice, and maintained their structural integrity well despite being semi-soaked in this juice. It was probably a fine dish but not one I’d order again.

Peking Duck Pasta

I thought Three Williams’ Peking Duck Pasta ($28) with angel hair pasta, chilli, coriander, onion crumb and shallots was really special. Every strand of pasta was perfectly coated in delicious sauce, and every mouthful full of umami flavours. I was initially quite skeptical about ordering a peking duck based dish from a restaurant that’s not expressly Chinese, but my partner wanted to try it and we were handsomely rewarded. I can definitely recommend this. It was delicious.

Chicken Katsu

This piece of chicken katsu ($6.50) was quite bad. The chicken meat was very thin and dry. The product was more batter than chicken, and probably some of the worst chicken katsu I’ve had the displeasure of eating.

L: Soy Latee, R: Strawberry Mimosa

The coffee was from Single O. The strawberry mimosa was cheap at $11 but not great.

VERDICT
It’s not everywhere that you can get hearty, complex meals for breakfast, and I really appreciate a cafe with a substantial all-day menu. Ample parking outside the restaurant makes Three Williams a pain free dining experience.

Four Williams out of five

Three Williams
613A Elizabeth St, Redfern NSW 2016
(02) 9698 1111

Categories
Chinese

Po Po 面婆婆 – Hurstville NSW Chinese Restaurant Review

Po Po is a small and authentic Northern Chinese diner in Hurstville. It’s been on my hitlist for some time now, and we finally were in the area and able to hit it up for some dumplings and noodles.

I really enjoyed the friendly, homely service, as well as the delicious dumplings and beef brisket noodle soup. We got all of our dumplings boiled as that is my favourite way to have them, and I feel that boiled dumplings are really the best test of the chef’s skill and expertise.

Pork and Chive Dumplings

The pork and chive dumplings were good!

Pork and chive and prawn dumplings

Pork and chive and prawn dumplings – also good

Xiao long bao

Unfortunately the xiao long bao were not very good. I wouldn’t recommend them.

The beef brisket noodle soup we found to be quite flavourful and delicious. There were big chunks of beef, and the flavour of the soup was neither too strong or too weak. I can recommend this dish.

I wish you could see how happy my girlfriend is in this photo, guys. This is why I do it.

Eating at Po Po really felt like eating in an authentic Chinese diner. There were plenty of other groups, mostly older Chinese couples, eating at the same time as us, and this is a group which seems an excellent barometer for cheap and filling food. One funny thing we saw was a Caucasian gentleman come into this obviously Chinese store and ask for pork rolls (which they did not have), and then ask for pho (which they also did not have). He ultimately, after much patience from the owner, settled on some pork buns. I hope he enjoyed them, although I guess he may be disappointed if he was looking forward to some Vietnamese food.

I can recommend this place.

PO PO Hurstville 面婆婆
238 Forest Rd, Hurstville NSW 2220
(02) 9580 6218

Categories
Chinese 四川 (Sìchuān/Sichuan) 重庆 (Chóngqìng/Chongqing)

ChongQing Street Noodle (猫婆小面) – Emerald Square, Burwood NSW Restaurant Review

I really wanted to like Chongqing Street Noodle in Emerald Square Burwood, but I just didn’t.

The main spicy noodles were good but we didn’t really enjoy any of the sides.

Beef was super dry, salty but otherwise tasteless.

The sides were basically disappointment after disappointment, with no hits.

The crumbed and fried sweet potato was particularly disappointing. 

Ultimately no dice. I wouldn’t recommend 猫婆小面 Chongqing Street Noodle. Go somewhere else.

2.5/5

ChongQing Street Noodle (猫婆小面) Burwood
31 Belmore St, Burwood NSW 2134
0414 698 838

Categories
Chinese

Shanghai Dumpling Bar – Spice Alley, Chippendale NSW Restaurant Review

Shanghai Dumpling Bar is one of many small street-food vendors tucked away in Spice Alley in Chippendale. We visited after Monkey’s Corner so that I could bring some food home for my partner who made the wise decision not to come out.

Green pork and chive boiled dumplings – 6 for $8.80

I ordered only one serving of green pork and chive boiled dumplings (6 for $8.80), although they snuck in an extra one for free. Service was quick, with a sub 5 minute wait for freshly cooked dumplings.

I thought that the filling was very tasty and genuine. I loved that they had the option of boiled or pan-fried dumplings, as most place will only offer the option of steamed or pan-fried. I’ve always felt that boiled dumplings are the most wholesome, and they’re also the kind that I grew up with. While the filling was good I did feel like the green coloured dough was a bit gimmicky, however respect that perhaps that’s what it takes to draw in a largely Caucasian customer base in the Sydney CBD. I also thought that the dough was a bit thick, however the delicious juicy filling made up for it. Of the eight dumplings I had, around half were broken, however despite this their flavour was not watered down too much.

I can recommend the green dumplings at Shanghai Dumpling Bar to a friend or colleague, however cannot speak for the other foods on offer.

Shanghai Dumpling Bar
18-20 Kensington St, Sydney NSW