Shanghai

zuzazak

consistently good 1st November 2009

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i always come here for dim sum and it's always delicious. i have read some reviews complaining of bad service but we have never experienced this ourselves. love the front of the restaurant for the atmosphere!

Samuraiman89

DISASTR 29th January 2009

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I’ve been a regular customer at this joint for the last several years and have always enjoyed myself. In the past, Shanghai was a bustling little venue with some delicious foods at reasonable prices and offered something unique in Hackney.

Things have changed though. For the past six months, Shanghai has seen a sharp decline in customers, and customers can expect to dine alone at lunchtime. The reason for this seems to be the food and service. My visits have declined because of this, and my most recent experience has truly made me an 'ex’ customer of this formerly good restaurant.

I ordered the usual array of Dim Sum and Congee dishes at lunchtime from a decidedly grumpy waiter and waited for the food to arrive.

EVERY dish turned up at the table looking very suspect and resembling nothing like the food I have ordered on numerous occasions before. The duck spring roll tasted off and the pork from the pork buns and pork congee was actually rotten, so much so, they were an incorrect shade of pale white. When I tasted the pork, it was sour and was clearly very off.

We made a complaint to a waiter and was discreetly told that due to cutbacks, the management had made 'sacrifices’ to the quality of cooking and had raised prices.

I complained further and asked to speak to management, and a chubby and melodramatic male member of staff created a scene and refused to acknowledge the food was off, and went in to a rant about the food being perfect, when it clearly wasn’t.

Despite getting a minor reduction on the bill, I would strongly advise anyone against going to Shanghai. The food is clearly a shadow of its former self and the service is clearly an afterthought.

If it’s nice Chinese cuisine you’re after may I suggest the Noodle Bar on the corner of Dalston Lane, now they know good customer service.

terryturbojr

Dalston but not Turkish 21st October 2008

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This gem of a Chinese is in an area far more known for its Turkish food. Don't let the Dalston location put you off though as the food here is worth travelling for, especially the dim sum.

The menu here is far from your usual English Chinese, forget deep fried balls of chicken here you've got such dishes as 5-spice chargrilled pork belly, stir fried baby savoy cabbage and chicken, tofu and dried scallop. When it comes to dim sum it loses the uniformity of Chinatown establishments with everything looking like it was made on the premises - personal favourites are the wafer wrapped prawn, turnip paste in XO sauce and the lean pork and preserved egg congee.

Food aside the decor is great too, once a pie and mash shop and the front still keeping the interior (the back is more standard Chinese affair) you can tuck in to your Chinese food in booths decked out with green tiling and metal eel decorated mirrors.

Niamheen at 22/10/08

I passed this last week and was intrigued. It looks lovely! I'll definitely be trying it :-)

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foodbymark

a hidden but cheap diamond in the east 14th September 2008

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I lived in Dalston for 8 months over three years ago and had walked briskly by this Chinese restaurant opposite McDonalds many times. I had perhaps passed it over as another chinese takeaway/local type place not giving it a second glance. I recently read about the restaurant in several guides to Dim Sum in London and was beyond shocked to see a restaurant in Dalston, of all places, cropping up on almost every list.

The restaurant's unassuming, but heavily stickered, shop frontage and entrance dining hall has kept it's history of previously being a traditional east end pie and eel shop that opened in Victorian times. It has kept it's original floor, oak booths, tiled walls and eel-motifed mirrors. However, the rear of the restaurant, where we were seated, is a newly-built modern dining room painted red symbolizing luck and happiness with dome skylights made from stained glass. The atmosphere is warm and comfortable as you are almost whisked away from Dalston.

Whilst Shanghai is a restaurant which claims to be modern Shanghaiese, it turns out that the cuisine is not strictly Shanghainese, as they serve some of the typical Cantonese and westernised dishes. We came for Dim Sum (also known as Yum Char) and ordered our standard dishes for comparison purposes which included bamboo steamers of Har Gau, Siu Mai, Har Cheung Fun, Lor Mei Gai, Char Sui Bao, Fung jau and fried dishes Gee Bau Har and Woo Gok. (Yes, all this just for two diners!) The success story of Yum Char was the enormous and tasty Siu Mai, small steamed dumplings with pork inside a Wonton pastry topped with a crab roe, so large they were bulging out of spoons and almost beyond a mouthful. Only the Woo Kok, mashed taro, stuffed with diced shiitake mushrooms, shrimp and pork, deep-fried in crispy batter, were slightly too salty for our tastes and the Fung Jau, chicken feet, deep fried, boiled, marinated in a black bean sauce and then steamed, were in a sauce a little too thick.

The result was a thoroughly enjoyable Yum Char to which I will give my strong recommendation. The bill was just under £24 for 8 dishes and chinese tea for two including tip. Bargain! The downside is that it is not easy to get to by unless you prepared to either drive or take buses/overland trains. We booked through toptable.co.uk and it was not very busy for lunch on a Sunday afternoon.

EDIT: Photos to accompany this review can be found at: http://foodbymark.blogspot.com/2008/09/shanghai-dalston.html

Niamheen at 22/10/08

This place looks gorgeous - I really must try it.

foodbymark at 22/10/08

thinking about dim sum has made me hungry. argh. i'm starving!!!

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lowe

Fun Night But Early 26th February 2008

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I was invited by a friend to a birthday function held in one of the private rooms in Shanghai. Never been before I was surprised by the deceptive appearance of this rather nice little resturant.
Just behind the aisles of bench seat left from the pie & mash days is a smallish restaurant which with a steady flow of customers.
The private room was fun, with karaoke and service which was both friendly and professional. For the function I attended there was set menu's (choice of two) £15 a head, drinks extra obviously..The only downside (for me anyway) is that on a Saturday night it still closes at 11PM ...Much to early for me.

MissBex

Yummy Yum Char! 5th December 2007

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Traditionally called Dim Sum in this country.. I am always one for a good yum char sunday afternoon to wash away the hangover from the night before.

Sunday's at Shanghai is awesome. Its happy hour!! Dim Sum dishes are all £1.60-£1.80. Bargain.. It's a cute little place that used to be a pie n mash or butcher or something along those lines hence the tiled decor at the front.

We were seated in the coldest room but managed to warm it up with lots of beers that our lazy susan had a great time spinning round to the 7 of us. The fancy pants waitor had a little bit of a bee in his pink bonnet but I thought he was rather funny. Service is a bit crap, but we aint in no mitchellin star place so you gotta roll with it..

Everything from chicken feet to whole/half ducks, my favourite bbq pork bun its all good - Our bill was £20 each with loads of booze and I could hardly walk afterwards, there was no need to eat that much really but I can never help myself..

tristan

8th March 2007

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Local Chinese restaurant with Karaoke rooms and Dim sum. Fast service. Cheap and cheerful. Has booths at the front that in the winter seem a bit cold and a more traditional feeling restaurant seating area in the back.