Tags
Australia, Australian Capital Territory, Chinese cuisine, Chongqing Street Noodles restaurant, Dickson, street noodles
Food in Canberra that brings back wonderful memories of China
Last month my lovely Chinese friend Peter and his girlfriend Katie took my other friend Jon and I to a relatively new noodle restaurant just near my home in Canberra. It has a very small frontage on the main street in Canberra’s Chinatown. I am not sure if I should call it Chinatown as it is only one street but it has many Chinese restaurants and Chinese food stores and is frequented by many Chinese Australians so perhaps Chinatown it is. 
When you enter Chongqing Street Noodles restaurant you are greeted by a rather large statue of Chinese nana with cat like whiskers. I have no idea who this is but maybe my blogging friends (Marta/Sophie/Edwin) might be able to help. She is also painted on the wall and depicted on plates and bowls and printed on the paper napkins. The obligatory waving cat also welcomes you.
Since going to this restaurant with my Chinese friends I have been another six times both for lunch and dinner and have booked for a group of us to go tomorrow night. Yes it’s definitely my new favourite place to eat.
I absolutely love the noodles. They are authentic Chongqing street noodles so are very spicy. There are options to have your dish mild (one chilli pictured on the menu) or incredibly spicy (five chillis pictured on the menu). I choose mild but still find the sauce a little bit lip numbing. I think you can see how bright the sauce is from my photo. But oh my goodness it is so worth that lip tingling!
On our inaugural visit, my Chinese friends ordered a cold chicken dish [again with spice] and a couple of tea boiled eggs [for those of you who do no know what these are – they are hard boiled eggs which once cooked and cooled have their shells cracked and then are placed into a mixture of water, tea leaves, soy sauce, salt and other spices like cinnamon stick and star anise]. Peter told Jon to put the egg into the noodle dish which he did so the spicy broth seeps into the egg.
Peter and Katie also ordered dishes of cold cucumber in a spicy Chinese vinegar, shredded potato in chilli oil and Chongqing street noodles with beef. The chilli theme comes out in nearly every dish on the menu.
Jon said his Chongqing beef noodles were on par with those he had when we travelled to Sichuan Province last year which means they were mouth numbingly hot!
There were two additional dishes our Chinese friends ordered which were wolf teeth chips [crinkle cut chips with yep you guessed it – spicy chilli) and brown sugar rich curd (made with black sticky rice, black sugar sauce and yellow bean powder). I do know both of these dishes are not healthy but they are so delicious so I continue to order them. I think the sticky rice is a dessert but I put them into my chilli noodle sauce – fabulous!
The beverage situation is a bit limited. Cans of coke, sprite and fanta are sold. There are also bottles of herbal tea, a prune drink, soy milk and a grass jelly drink [no idea what this is and too scared to try]. I always buy a bottle of cold soy milk – it’s quite sweet but lovely with the spicy noodles.
(source: courtesy of internet)
There is also a huge tea pot containing Chinese tea which is complimentary; great for lunch time meals. We brought our own wine on the first visit but they don’t have any wine glasses so we used plastic cups. Next time we were smarter and brought our own wine glasses and left them there. The owner and staff know me quite well now and I chat to them in Chinese so they enjoy that and guess it’s good for me to practice. It’s still funny seeing Chinese patrons staring whilst I am speaking Chinese – they seem to be very interested in hearing how well [or not] I speak.
I went to this restaurant last night with my friend Ray and the owner came straight out with my wine glasses (very kind that they wash them and keep them there for us).
The menu is four pages with only about two vegetarian/vegan dishes but that is ok as every time I visit I order the same noodle dish and now I don’t have to tell the staff; they tell me!
There are also pork and prawn wontons which my friends Jane and Natalie enjoyed one evening along with a small plate of combination vegetables. And with any Aussie Chinese restaurant there is a deep fried ice-cream ball – Chinese of course have never heard of this but I remember it fondly from thirty years ago living with my parents and visiting the local Chinese restaurant.
(source: courtesy of internet)
Looking forward to tomorrow night! Hopefully not last people to leave like on a previous occasion…but it was only 9.30pm.
Whilst in Hong Kong last year I went to quite a few fabulous restaurants for meals. One particular restaurant I love is called ToTTs (Top of the Town) and located on the 34th floor of The Excelsior hotel in Causeway Bay on Hong Kong Island. When I lived in Beijing several years ago, I held my 50th birthday party here – it was a fabulous night and I really [really] like this hotel and the restaurant/bar. On that occasion, I stayed in a suite for a few days and enjoyed breakfast every morning with spectacular views of Victoria Harbour which was just lovely. Unfortunately I have just read on the hotel’s website that the hotel closed earlier this year after forty-six years…what a shame!! 
Service has always been exceptional at ToTTs and this occasion was no different. Our waiter helped me choose a vegan pea and asparagus risotto and my friends ordered various meat dishes including Aussie lamb chops and beef striploin with sides of fried mushrooms and grilled greens asparagus with a parmesan cheese sauce.
The desserts chosen were creme brûlée with roasted almonds and raspberries, a dark chocolate tart with stewed red fruit and a chocolate mousse.
One other day, a HK friend and her husband took us to lunch a members only restaurant in Wanchai. I wanted to meet my friends at the restaurant but they said I would never find it and I think they were right. It was through a door on the street with no markings and no number then up a dodgy lift and to an unmarked room. The only indication was this sign as we walked in through the door.
Inside was a small red painted room with several dividers enabling lunch to be a little more private along with Chinese paintings and characters on the walls and lanterns hanging from the ceiling.
My friend’s aunt is the member and she loaned her card to allow us to enjoy the food and ambience. The food wasn’t really to my liking. I do like some Cantonese style dishes but I found these missing a bit of flavour; perhaps it was the chilli that I had previously enjoyed in Mainland China. But nice to see other customers enjoying their meals and I loved the interior.
Dessert was interesting and not in a good way – I just didn’t like it at all.
Our next restaurant, again with same friends but for dinner was to 10 Shanghai. At the time it was a new restaurant and is located in Causeway Bay; this one much easier to find. 
10 Shanghai serves Huaiyang cuisine. This style of cooking originates from the region surrounding the lower reaches of the Huai and Yangtze rivers in Mainland China. There were quite a few cold dishes and I really am not a fan of cold Chinese dishes but all were beautifully presented so it was lovely to see each dish arrive at the table.
The interior was truly beautiful. Its art deco theme is stunning and reminds you of a time years ago in Shanghai where you would expect to see Shanghainese women wearing qipao [Chinese high necked dress] especially with the live retro tunes being played from the 30s.
We had eaten so much during the day but the dishes just kept on coming – our hosts wanted to ensure we tried all different types of dishes but I was rather full even before we arrived. The duck was smoked and arrived with a glass lid containing the smoke. 
And finally dessert arrived; it was a deep fried sesame ball with fresh mango, warm soy milk and rice. You have to crack the ball with your spoon, peel back the coating which enables you to enjoy the ingredients inside.
It really was no wonder Naomi and I had to walk every day. Our highest step count was 28,000 on one particular day – it was necessary though as so much food was eaten over that week.
Whilst visiting Sichuan Province our friend Peter took Jon and I to a famous alleyway called Kuanzhai Xiangzi which consists of a wide alley (Kuan Xiangzi) and a narrow alley (Zhai Xiangzi). There are actually three parallel ancient city alleyways and forty-five courtyards along them and I am sure most Sichuanese were out on the same day as us [it was a Sunday so it is lovely to see everyone out and about]. But boy oh boy; so many people!!
There was plenty to see along the way including lovely entry ways to courtyards and shops and beautiful large wooden doors with brass knockers…
And of course ‘interesting’ figures. But I feel this one made some sense [much more than others I have seen] as the province of Sichuan is known for its spicy chilli dishes and the figure was outside a shop grinding fresh chillies…
One thing that the alley has is plenty of food stores selling all sorts of wonderful hot and cold dishes to eat like beautifully displayed tofu with lots of chilli, sweet fried balls and bread along with cold rice and noodle dishes.
The history of the alley way is dated back to the Qing Dynasty (1644 – 1911 AD). At that time, the area was a city called Mancheng City or Shaocheng City where its residents were troops. As with most places left unrestored, the city decayed but in 2003 renovations began and the alley way opened in 2008. It has small restaurants/souvenir shops created to look like those from the Qing Dynasty and of course tea rooms selling delicious Chinese tea.
I really enjoyed seeing the local drinks and desserts as they are very different to what we enjoy here in Australia. Pretty drinks with what looked like hot ice coming out of the top of a very large plastic cup.
And all flavours and colours of ice cream (some more interesting than others), ice blocks, small rice cups, cups full of cream and fruit and of course watermelon.
We walked one length of the alley on the right hand side and then turned around and walked up the other way to make sure we saw all the shops…a lovely afternoon out even though most of Chengdu was with us!!
Sue's Fabulous Travels 
You must be logged in to post a comment.