Protest in Guangzhou: Why would you burn garbage?
Barbie Spa: For the cosmopolitan plastic beauty in you
Obama in China: Long gone, and still headlinin'
Cinematheque: Mulan is finally Chinese again! (and other film news)
Lot o' Hotpot: Three Travellers
This restaurant deserves awards. Lots of awards. The menu is essentially Chinese food, but it’s been inspired by the best influences of the West. The concept is described beautifully in the name.
Lǎo Kè Lè is a phonetic transliteration which in English means “Very Colourful”. But Lǎo Kè Lè has another meaning too. This is Shanghainese dialect used to describe a group of Chinese people in Shanghai’s glorious age between the 1920s and the Cultural Revolution. These Lǎo Kè Lè were upper-middle class citizens distinguishable by their refined attitude to life. Be it fashion, travel, home life, food, music or knowledge, these socialites were open minded to the modern influences of the West.
The food is a fitting tribute to the prestige of a bye-gone age. Tommi, the owners' son, explained to us the pride with which the food is produced. Take for example the noodles. Their menu says: “we choose high quality all-purpose flour, milk, eggs, mashed carrots and spinach as basic ingredients for the noodles. Our noodles are kneaded by hand to form a dough…the dough is kneaded for 10 minutes until it is soft and elastic - a key to great taste.” Then, take the fact that in the food preperation there is no MSG used at all. Everything that comes out the kitchen has been lovingly prepared - “it is the food that our family likes to eat”, said Tommi.
We don’t need to explain how to order food here. The well designed menu is translated into English. The staff were excellent, very attentive, warm and welcoming. Best of all, this place is CLEAN. Many readers have been asking for reviews of restaurants where food hygiene is on a similar level with the West - well, here is it!
The best surprise is yet to come. It almost goes without saying that all the food and drinks we’ve tried were exceptionally good. The best part is - the prices are very low. The photo above is Egg-Noodles with Chicken in Spices & Fennel Sauce, just 16 RMB. The chicken was so tender, it falls from the bone and melts in your mouth. The vegetables are fresh and the noodles thick and wholesome. Their fresh fruit juices and smoothies are only 8 RMB. We tried the Banana-Apple-Yogurt, mmmmm, delicious. We recommmend you try some snacks. The Jumping Squid were delicious and a bargain for 12 RMB. Our favourite is the Deep-Fried Mozzaralla Cheese just 10 RMB. The texture of the melted mozzaralla contrasted to the crispy, but not oily, bread crumbs creates a beautiful composition. We’ve also tried the Carrot Noodle With Bolognaise (12 RMB), and the Deep Fried Potato and Beef Cakes (8 RMB) - both were superb, though it’s the Egg Noodle With Chicken and the Mozzaralla Cheese which are our personal favourites so far.
See some photos here.
Located near People's Square at 82 Huánghé lù (黄河路), just to the North of Fèngyáng lù (凤阳路). Open from 08:00 to 24:00. (Also just down the road at number 90 is the formidable Jiā jiā tāng bāo).
Cross-posted from likealocal.
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
post to facebook
this looks really good. i live only 10 min from the place, so i will check it tomorrow and will let you know ...
Yummy! MSG free Panda-Express-o-licious cuisine made for the refined American palate. Or for those who ever wondered what a Chinese person could do with hamburger helper. Is this a joke? Or is Mr. Elliot getting kickbacks from the restaurant? or does Shanghaiist just need to be more careful about who does its restaurant reviews?
last time i checked, mr. elliot was not american.
The picture, and the description of "high quality all-purpose flour, milk, eggs, mashed carrots and spinach as basic ingredients for the noodles." doesn't at all remind me of Panda Express though. The blog has a good enough track record with food recommendations, with a general bias towards local street food that I think people should be inclined to believe the author isn't full of shit.
It is true that the anti-MSG message sentiment is pretty much entirely a manner of marketing and psychosomatic response.
This is guest #4 again, I tried out this place with a friend.
Anyway I am more sympathetic to guest #2 after going to the restaurant - it's not Panda Express, but it's certainly not some mystical 1920's Shanghai cuisine once lost and only now being brought back to life, as the gushing review implied.
Really it's a Chinese take on Western food, it strongly reminded me of California fusion restaurants, except it didn't have an (inevitably embarassing) take at Pad Thai, and it left the bones intact with the meat.
But really, this is a very good restaurant with high quality ingredients, where a smoothie+appetizer+dish will cost 30 or 40 kuai. It's not fancy, you wouldn't go there to impress a date or a client, but it's a very good everyday sort of restaurant, only a couple minute's walk from the line 2 subway.
Shanghai food in the price range between 10 and 100 kuai/person is full of gimmicky, underwhelming restaurants - particularly the takes on Western foods, even the best of which I would never even consider eating at if I was in the US and they had a chain there. This restaurant is an obvious exception. I'm sure this place will do great business and I hope Shanghai gets a hundred places like it, all around the city.
So I guess the restaurant deserved a gushing review, I just don't think the author gushed in an accurate manner.