Hunan

A rapid succession of tapas-size portions promise a unique and memorable meal.

Hunan London - Chinese Restaurant

http://www.hunanlondon.com

Hunan Restaurant Review: Authentic Chinese Small Plate Surprise ...

A total of 18 courses of food – plus the option of a whole duck or sea bream to share across the table.

A first time for me was the crispy garlic chilli beans – they were so good we even asked for seconds.

The stir fried chilli beef rib eye (21 day grass-fed Irish) was wonderful and the crispy fried slices of lamb was the best thing I ate during the entire lunch.

Arriving as a whole duck which is then cut and shredded table side and served with pancakes, cucumber, spring onion and hoisin sauce – the usual suspects.

If duck isn’t your thing go for the whole steamed sea bass with ginger and toasted soy.

Hunan restaurant review 2008 April London | Chinese Cuisine | food ...

Spicy beef slices were both chewy and oily, and I would have welcomed some actual spice to distract from the texture of the cheap meat (10/20).

“Spicy squid” continued the overcooked, chewy theme and lacked spice, while a tofu dish with black bean sauce was at least edible (11/20).

A braised beef dish had cheap, chewy meat that was cooked tolerably but was just nasty; I had trouble cutting it with my teeth, never mind the knife provided.

This meal ended with slices of pork belly with ginger that were horribly overcooked, essentially charred, and putting a few shreds of ginger on top does not disguise a blackened piece of meat.

Other than the wine list, the experience we had this evening had almost no redeeming features, and although a lot of small dishes were presented, it is not a bargain if most of them are inedible.

The Ordinary Man's Restaurant Review Series: Hunan London ...

I could say we were being culturally aware and opted for this restaurant as the perfect location to celebrate Chinese New Year, but it was nothing more than a coincidence that we were there... And so we welcomed the year of the Goat with an open mind and an empty stomach.

So, as much as I wanted seafood, and my wife beef, we had to make those sacrifices during the course of this meal (I guess, that's what all good marriages are based on, right?)

At the end of it all we were asked if we would have any main course - the choices were Peking duck or a grilled sea bass - tough choices both.

The next course that stood out for me was a grilled aubergine stuffed with chicken in black bean sauce.

A little heavy on the wallet, but well worth the visit if you have the time and are a fan of Chinese food... Hell, even if you aren't a Chinese food lover, and have an open mind and an empty stomach, make the trip out to London's Hunan!

Hunan, London SW1, Restaurant Review - Telegraph

For those of us who can take an hour to pick a starter, and often succumb to grass-is-greener envy as dishes we eschewed arrive at neighbouring tables, the menu-less restaurant has its appeal.

The owner/chef, a Mr Peng, simply cooks whatever he fancies and sends a vast array of tapas-sized dishes to the table.

As we sat in the front of a long, narrow, rather lifeless room – blond wood, plain furniture, elegant prints of imperial Chinese life and ornate vases possibly not worth £43 million at auction – the waitress posed the big question.

Spice-infused minced chicken wrapped in lettuce leaves with spring onion was far better, a dish of glorious simplicity, with an oddly popcornish feel to it.

The conceit on which the menu-less restaurant relies (and it can work gloriously, as at Morston Hall on the north Norfolk coast) is that you are a treasured guest in someone’s home.

Hunan, London SW1 – restaurant review | Marina O'Loughlin | Life ...

For at Hunan, Mr Peng's venerable Chinese restaurant in the rarefied environs of Pimlico Road, where it rubs shoulders with eye-wateringly expensive galleries and antiques shops for people who have to buy their own taste, you're not allowed to do much deciding.

I endured it, hypnotised by the allure of Mr Peng's kitchen from whence issued a seemingly unending stream of small, vastly flavoured dishes – a curious mix of Taiwanese and Cantonese with touches of Hunan and Guangdong: sharp and savoury, shimmering with chilli heat, but not so much of the Hunanese trademark ma-la ("hot and numbing", usually from Sichuan peppercorns).

Some dishes were constants – green beans in the lightest, frilliest batter, scattered with garlic and chilli ("chips", Mr Peng called them), as addictive as crisp bacon; a sultry pigeon soup served in a bamboo beaker.

The plain room has had the merest hint of a spruce-up, but the deal is still the same: wave after wave of tiny dishes, just a mouthful or two in each, about 15 or so, I'd guess.

– rustling in their self-raising flour batter like autumn leaves, as exquisite as they ever were; chunks of pickled, chilli-smacked cucumber; the thinnest, slinkiest slices of chicken breast wrapped around perfectly fresh, almost crunchy asparagus in a delicate sauce fragrant with ginger and Shaoxing wine.

Hunan | Restaurants in Belgravia, London

The cooking, however, is anything but ordinary.

The cooking is not exclusively Hunanese (a style like Sichuan, yet more ‘fiery hot’ than ‘numbing hot’), but borrows from across China.

We enjoyed the sour, peppery notes of a Sichuanese cucumber salad; the fragrant broth of our Shanghainese ‘soup dumpling’ (xiao long bau), and the chilli-laden unctuous sauce of a Hunanese dish of tender beef.

After a dozen or so grazing dishes, out came the big guns: classic showpieces of crispy peking duck ahead of silky steamed sea bass with ginger and spring onions; then chewy hand-pulled noodles.

Only if you exceed 18 dishes (nigh-on impossible) is there a surcharge.