Seventeen

Wednesday, March 17, 2010 - The efficient dishes, Sichuanese classic 'mapo tofu', aka pockmarked Mother Chen's bean curd, and 'spicy beef salad', are pleasant enough but remarkable for their lack of ballsiness: the tofu itself is slippery and good but Sichuan peppercorns should numb and tingle your lips and tongue; we struggle to get a hit. It's also very light on both pork and red chilli oil...The only way you could be properly impressed with this soulless, inept place is if you were actually 17, loaded with loot and not too bothered about food, labouring under the misapprehension that sub-nightclub design equals unspeakable glamour.

Thursday, January 07, 2010 - A popular Cantonese ingredient, stone fish, is used in a classic Sichuan dish called shui zhu yu ('water-cooked fish'), where trim fillets are served in hot oil, flavoured with hot red chillies and the numbing flavour of Sichuan pepper. Dong po pork is still the best I've had: the fatty pork belly is first pan-fried then 'red-cooked' (slowly braised in a dark soy sauce); the fat becomes the texture of set custard, but imbued with rich soy, ginger and garlic flavours, and headily aromatic.