In 1909, London’s first Chinese restaurant was opened by Mr Chang Choy off Piccadilly Circus. Named simply ‘The Chinese Restaurant’ – so exotic! – Choy specialised in what was described as ‘imperial banquet’ style cuisine which required at least half a day’s notice to prepare. Customers were then required to pay a hefty deposit in advance to cover the purchase of ingredients for such imperial delights as ‘sturgeon bones’, ‘fish maws’, ‘gelatine’, ‘dried cabbage stalk peel’ and ‘chrysanthemum shoots’. A 1937 edition of Where to Dine in London declared that, ‘Englishmen who have spent their lives in the East will appreciate the traditional menu’. Hmm, I wonder.
You sit where I tell you,’ he fumed, plonking me down at a table full of chain smokers
Years earlier, a recreation of a popular Hong Kong restaurant was shipped over to London for the 1884 International Health Exhibition held in South Kensington. For seven and sixpence bewildered Londoners, more used to bread and dripping, could gorge on ‘sinew of tiger’ and ‘claws of bear’ followed by ‘yellow of crab’ and ‘blood of duck’s head’.
By the 1970s virtually every neighbourhood in the UK had at least one Chinese takeaway often consisting of little more than a tatty teak counter and some sticky menus featuring standards of the day such as ‘egg foo yung’ and chicken chow mein. Those unable to afford the luxury of leaving the house could feast on boxes of Vesta Chinese ready meals, freeze dried atrocities containing everything the ‘busy housewife’ needed to recreate a bland, boil in the bag approximation of one of the world’s finest cuisines.
These days you’ll struggle to find bear claws or even egg foo yung at your local Cantonese but peek through those grubby PVC strip curtains and you’ll still find Chinese families slaving over multiple woks in service to tipsy locals in need of quick and easy sustenance.
At the less glutinous end of the culinary counter Chinese fine dining is everywhere with swanky new ‘signature’ restaurants lining up for a slice of London’s billionaire gourmandcracy. China Tang, hidden in the basement of the Dorchester, opened in 2005 and quickly established itself as the celebrity hang out du jour with the likes of Mariah Carey and Clint Eastwood exchanging notes on the famously succulent Peking duck. Those fickle celebs may have moved on but Tang’s dim sum remains in a puffy league of its own and they still serve around 50 of those glistening wildfowl per sitting.
The once-venerable Ivy, now effectively a chain, has also been branching out with their popular ‘Ivy Asia’ restaurants aimed squarely at the ‘envy-my-lifestyle’ Instagramers. The food here is standard pan Asian with a decent stab at the now obligatory blackened cod but the Kardashian-esque customers appear more interested in the photogenic cocktails and fake cherry blossom than the not insubstantial grub.
Inspired by 1930s Shanghai, Park Chinois in Mayfair is a riot of tasselled red lampshades, gold embellishments and vast booths. You could easily be in one of those Upper West Side art deco joints popular with mobsters named ‘Paulie’. Don’t miss the caramel and miso tart from the ridiculously cheap set menu. There’s even a full on dinner cabaret in the basement.
Over at Hutong, I spotted actual Chinese people enjoying fistfuls of obscenely plump tiger prawns. Billed as the latest edition to the Shard’s ever expanding list of ‘dining experiences’, the experience here being the vertiginous views across London. Diners are given a maximum of one hour 45 to complete their meal so if you’re a slow eater best bring indigestion tablets. On the way out I dutifully pinned a hastily scribbled wish to an indoor tree and prayed the sky high lift would bring me back to earth in one piece.
Like Hutong, Tattu – note the trend for sexy single word names – is popular with London’s super wealthy thirty-somethings. Set among the vast hi-tech advertising hoardings of Outernet, London’s newest ‘destination space’, the menu includes millennial favourites such as Mongolian mock beef and wok fried angry bird, dishes that feel a million miles from nearby Chinatown’s more gloopy offerings. Of course Chinatown is the real deal when it comes to authentic oriental dishes with this year’s Chinese New Year celebrations attracting bumper crowds. Venues vary from cramped upstairs rooms to sprawling canteens displaying rows of headless ducks that either entice or repel.
Before refurbishment in 2014, Wong Kei on Wardour Street took great pride in being known as Chinatown’s rudest restaurant where customers were treated with contempt. Back in the mid-1990s, I remember a surly waiter telling me to ‘fuck off,’ after I dared to ask for a non smoking table. ‘You sit where I tell you,’ he fumed, plonking me down at a table full of chain smokers. As a starving student I wiled away many a rainy afternoon in ‘Wonkies’, taking my time over mountainous plates of absurdly cheap Singapore fried noodles. This once legendary watering hole has now cleaned up its act along with its greasy lino tables and is now just another reasonably priced but forgettable tourist destination. As restaurants homogenise, eccentric one-offs like Wong Kei are increasingly rare, which is a shame. Still, at least we’re no longer being served ‘sturgeon bones’.
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