Barshu

TOO SALTY! Would be nice if they didn't make it so crazy salty.
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SG
3 Overall rating
Food 3 | Service 3 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 3
Monday, March 05, 2012

Based on some positive reviews, we gave this a go. Overpriced, underwhelming service and mediocre food. Not one I'd return to or recommend.
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- View all reviews by this user
3 Overall rating
Food 3 | Service 3 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 2
Sunday, October 30, 2011

Overpriced and used a lot of MSG in their food. The pork dish was cold and had to be sent back. The bill was not itemised so had to work it out ourselves. They even forgot the drinks we ordered too! Bottom line...go somewhere else.
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madonpearls - View all reviews by this user
3 Overall rating
Food 3 | Service 3 | Atmosphere 4 | Value for money 2
Friday, May 27, 2011

TERRIBLE SERVICE. We ordered 3 dishes and a starter and 2 beers between the two of us, by no means a huge amount. Food was mediocre and certainly not worth the final 65 pound bill. Everything felt like a massive chore for the staff and I'm Chinese so I'm no stranger to plates and bowls thrown on the table experience but this was pretty awful.

We had ordered a beef dish but a pork one came which we didn't mind so didn't say anything but I noticed later the beef one was priced on the bill so I made the waitress aware. They rolled their eyes and snorted right in front of us, took off a few pounds and proceeded to openly laugh at us the whole time whilst we paid the bill. This is definately not what one should expect for 30 pounds a head!

Whilst we were there we noticed at least 3 groups which arrived on time for their booking but were forced to wait outside in the cold for about 10 minutes because their table wasn't ready.

I'll definately be spending my money else where and actually have an enjoyable experience.
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A.W
1 Overall rating
Food 3 | Service 0 | Atmosphere 0 | Value for money 0
Saturday, March 19, 2011

With who: Seven of us in total, a mix of the great and the good and the work colleagues

How much: £30 a head for a great range between the seven of us. Go in as big a group as you can, better to order more. Other than that most dishes are in the £8 - £12 range and are large servings.

Come here if: you want hot, proper Chinese cooking, without the rough service and beery boys filling most of the Gerrard Street dives. Great for a (fairly adventurous) team night out.

'Chinese cuisine' is a broad label. To sum up all of the different cuisines of such a vast land under one catch all title is impossible, but it's what most Chinese restaurants in this country have been doing for years, in an attempt to cater for unsophisticated or pedestrian palates. Now, like many Indian, Pakistani and Bengali restaurants, they're starting to throw off their generic roots, and cook more authentically, as people increasingly demand it. Bar Shu was one of the original London proponents of this, to the British palate, new style of Chinese cuisine. It's as far away from gloopy, generic MSG laden shit in a tray as you are going to get.

Sichuan food is well known for its heat. The tiny red peppercorns proudly take the name of the province and appear in most dishes paired with fiery dried chillies.. When done well, the aim isn't macho heat but a level of warmth and gradual tingle, raising heartbeat and seratonin levels, like a lighter, benevolent (through still addictive) form of cocaine.

The restaurant recently closed for refurbishment and is a good looking beast now it has reopened. Several floors high on the corner of Romily and Frith Streets, it's not a small place, but it's well appointed in dark intricately carved wood and splashes of bright colour. It's quiet inside, with a hum rather than a buzz. The staff bustle, but don't push and the tables are evenly spaced. The thick menu does a good job with well taken photography and scary warnings in English, detailing the spice quotient of each dish. You won't struggle if you don't speak Mandarin. These menus are normally the signifier for a dumbed down Westernised menu, not seemingly in this case, though there was an absence of cartilage, gizzard and tripe, the usual signifiers of authenticity in a cuisine that favours texture as much as flavour. We weren't craving utter authenticity though, and mindful of the perils of ordering for seven, we instruct our server to bring us a selection.

There's not much that you'll necessarily recognise from your local takeaway (thankfully) but there are a few of the regional Sichuan dishes that have crept into a wider consciousness, notably Gong Bau (or Kung Po) a flash-fried dish often of chicken (here with prawn), lightly flour dusted and fried with a light marinade, peanuts and the lip numbingly warm Sichuan peppercorns. One of the nicest variants I've had of this dish, and the huge portion easily catered for the seven of us, each getting a couple of the large, sweet shellfish.

Thin sliced pork rolls were served room temperature, toothsome and sweetly piquant in a spicy garlic sauce. Shards of blackened beef, mini hot bites like biltong, came embued with rich chilli oils that even pleased the spice neutral South African in the group, comfortable with this North Chinese take on his national dish. Life seldom being about (sadly) meat alone, we grabbed a favourite of mine, the deep fried green beans with minced pork and ya kai, a preserved (and either absent or innocuous) mustard.

A mild and almost soothing cucumber with speckles of pulled pork was interesting, but relatively unforgettable as anything other than a palate cleanser, but there were only a couple of dishes I wouldn't order again. Water boiled pork slices were possibly the least successful. A slightly acrid broth held mushy porky pieces that had been slow soaked in the water over a period of hours (possibly days), unusual texture for the meat, but not anything I'd return to.

Twice cooked pork belly, another Sichuan classic, comes recommended. The pork belly is boiled in a garlic, ginger and salt marinade before being fine sliced and stir-fried. Ants Climbing a Tree is another famous regional dish, thin rice noodles in the ubiquitous chilli oil, with the 'ants' made up of minced pork. It's good, but not worth the trip alone. Boiled beef slices with 'extremely spicy sauce' was overly apocalyptic in its description and while it was warm, the spice built well within the dish rather than beating you around the head. The flavour of the beef came through, and this, despite being one of the last dishes, vanished quickly.

Bar Shu is definitely a recommendation. Compared to some of its siblings over Shaftesbury Avenue and into Chinatown proper, it's clean, friendly and focussed on delivering decent food rather than turnover. Rolling out into a snowy London night, the warmth and satisfaction from the Sichuan heat stayed with me, though that could have been the booze..
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www.grumblinggourmet.com - View all reviews by this user
7 Overall rating
Food 8 | Service 7 | Atmosphere 6 | Value for money 7
Thursday, December 02, 2010

GRIM, GRIM, GRIM!! Never again will I or my family set foot in this place. Should have learned my lesson last time but thought I would give it one more chance.

The only good thing was some raw, finely sliced mange tout with garlic- small plate for £7- bargain..NOT! At least it was edible I suppose, unlike the foul pork dish that was way worse than anything you could get in one of those revolting all you can eat buffets. The meat was not indentifiable as such, it was pure flabby gristle covered in goggy batter floating in a gloopy, processed tasting sauce. Beancurd was at least identifiable as bean curd, but with no flavour and it was mushy, with a bit of numbing flavour but no heat whatsoever. Those three dishes plus grated (raw) potato, a tiny portion of rice, an average bottle of red and two small (warm) beers came to a staggering £80 for 3 people!! Service was non exostent and restaurant completely empty. Hmmmm...wonder why. What a massive inexcusable rip off. Avoid at all costs, they obviously have unashamed contempt for their paying customers and with any luck will close down.
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kedi
0 Overall rating
Food 0 | Service 0 | Atmosphere 0 | Value for money 0
Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Went back to Bar Shu with some business friends even though I had vowed never to return after my first visit a couple of years ago due to the appalling bad service we received then.

Happy to say that the waiter/waitress team seems to have changed and the new team is far more customer-friendly.

The prices do seem to have gone up after the refurbishment but food is generally still good.

I would have much appreciated if they could itemise the bill as it just gives the total amount. Hence one can't check if the bill is actually accurate. Shouldn't there be some regulation requiring restaurants to itemise bills ?

But at least we weren't shouted at this time ! ;-)
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6 Overall rating
Food 7 | Service 6 | Atmosphere 7 | Value for money 4
Saturday, November 20, 2010

The food was way too salty, and i generally like salty food. I love sichuan food and was really looking forward to Barshu but left so disappointed, could have been good but the extreme saltiness ruined it.
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SG
2 Overall rating
Food 1 | Service 1 | Atmosphere 4 | Value for money 1
Sunday, November 07, 2010

Went to barshu last night and was extremely disappointed. The decor was quite smart, and the restaurant was busy with what appeared to be a mainly chinese clientelle (Usually a good sign), but as soon as I saw the menu I knew we were not in for a good experience. Firstly, the prices seemed extortionate. We decided to order a couple of vegetable dishes as starters and a plate of green beans was nearly £10! We also ordered a fried potato dish but the potato seemed almost raw, with big lumps of dried chilli that strangely didn't seem particularly hot. The bean dish had ground pork in it, and was pretty tasty, but it wants to be for a tenner, and it seemed to contain a massive amount of salt and probably MSG.

Things took a turn for the worse when we ordered mains. A boiled beef dish was rubbery to the point of being inedible, and again, the chilli content seemed strangely flat, and not really even spicy. We also ordered a pork dish that I thought would be slow roasted meat, but was in fact rubbery, cheap and nasty streaky bacon, boiled in a cloying sauce. Not very authentic! A chicken and mushroom dish fared slightly better. The mushrooms were tfairly nice, but it was way to salty and again the chicken was not the tender morsels i had hoped for. The quality of the meat in these dished was extremely low, and bearing in mind each of these dishes is so pricy, (the chicken dish was £18!) I really felt like I was being ripped off. Service was smug and they took away our menus between course, we had to virtually beg to get them back.

So, salty, tough and unapitising meat and extortionately high prices. Definitely best avoided!
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kedi
3 Overall rating
Food 3 | Service 3 | Atmosphere 4 | Value for money 0
Thursday, September 09, 2010

We visited Barshu for lunch for the first time, having heard the reputation. Perhaps this reputation was based on dated information as we left disappointed.

The prices were staggeringly expensive for dishes that should be relatively in-expensive. We decided to order 3 starters and 2 rice as we found the the main course offering not very appealing. We also ordered two drinks. Total bill came to £50 for two people.

The food was merely average/acceptable but for the cost they charge, you can find equal pleasure simply going to any chinese restaurant in soho for literally half the price.
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Sawyer - View all reviews by this user
5 Overall rating
Food 4 | Service 5 | Atmosphere 7 | Value for money 2
Monday, July 12, 2010