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A drink near Hunan?

Matthew Grant
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circeplum

circeplum

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i have loved the hunan passionately, saving it for special occasions. went last week with a couple of pals from out of town and ended up feeling rather processed and very pissed off.

the food was as good as it ever was - although when you go a few times, you realise that the dishes (the pigeon soup, the dry chilli-fried beans, the stuffed mushrooms) are replicated over and over which takes away that incredibly seductive element of surprise - but we still came out feeling grumpy.

partly, this was to do with the waiters' insistence on filling our wine glasses every time we took so much as a sip. we begged them to stop (and i can drink bloody fast) but they were on a mission.

also, we were sat beside what appeared to be the solitary, communal ice bucket so the insane dash to fill everyone else's glasses meant like we felt as though we were eating in the middle of clapham junction.

mr peng was as arch as ever. at least he tries to pretend he recognises me.

think my affair with the hunan is on its last legs. maybe it's one of those spoiled by success thangs.

ps: too late i realise, but the best place to drink nearby(ish) is the back bar at the gloriously louche boisdale, a place just designed for hideous indiscretions and bad behaviour. and i should know ...

Vanessa

Vanessa

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Clearly I remain in a minority of one.

A small part of me is tending towards Tony's side on this. But so far just a part.

As I mentioned to Tony at the Xmas do, I was relatively charmed on my one visit to Hunan. However, I could well imagine becoming rapidly uncharmed, and then positively irritated, by Mr Peng. My friend who was sitting facing towards the restaurant that evening did point out the surprising lack of variety of dishes coming out of the kitchen. Not having a menu and giving the customer the illusion of spontaneity is quite a clever way of having a very limited selection of dishes without letting on.

Nevertheless, I would be happy to return.

v

Matthew Grant

Matthew Grant

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There didn't appear to be any special dishes for new Year, but this was my first visit so am not really sure. I specifically asked for the hot duck dish that Tony described in another thread and got the reply "I'll see what i can do". Can't remember all of the dishes (approximately 12 - 14) but they included the fried beans (v. good) "Mountain Chicken" which was immediately picked out as frog by my other half much to the delight of Mr Peng who held her arm aloft in celebration. A wonderful beef dish with the beef served rare. The pigeon soup (full of flavour but a little unappetising to look at), Paper wrapped pork, we also got the spicy duck with pancakes, it was sweet, sour and spicy, a good dish, the duck must have been added to the sauce at the end as it was still very crispy.

I really enjoyed the meal, it lasted a good two hours of eating and I liked the surprise element not having eaten here before. I shall return and ask for Lobster next time. I enjoyed Mr Peng, I felt like he took some notice of us, the food was very spicy as requested and he delivered the duck dish. One criticism I would have is the order it was served in, the milder dishes might have been better served earlier in the meal.

Total price inculding service, an £18 bottle of wine, I don't remember what, a couple of beers, a bottle of water and tea to finish, £97. I though this was pretty reasonable, the food came in at under £30 a head and there was a lot of it.

One thing that was very strange was that we had no rice or noodle dishes - is this normal? A Larger table behind us did have a bowl of rice but didn't seem to get the succession of dishes that we had. I will return but can see that it might get a little boring if we were to get the same dishes everytime.

"Why would we want Children? What do they know about food?"

wgallois

wgallois

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Matthew,

On the rice and noodles front, when we went to Hunan in December I was puzzled by the absence of rice from the meal, but for some reason a small amount of rice arrived with our last savoury course. It was pretty desultory stuff and by that time I had realised that I could live without the rice as it is something that I would usually gorge on simply because I wanted to get full-up. Having said that we were given some excellent very-eggy crispy noodles which were dressed with chillis and spring onions - one of the best parts of the meal.

mogsob

mogsob

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Last time at Hunan, we were served a whole sea bass. Simply sublime. I have also had the duck dish, which is excellent as well.

Miss J

Miss J

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A note on the "no rice" thing - in my fav Sichuan cookbook, formal meals are described as being a succession of dishes (cold first, then hot), with rice brought at the end to fill up any guests whose appetites haven't been satiated by the delicacies preceding it. It's generally served with a final dish called a "send-the-rice-down" dish, which often contains pickled, hot or sour flavours.

I may be making a big assumption here, but since Hunan and Sichuan cuisines have similarities, would this possibly be the reason why you didn't get rice with most of your meal?

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