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| - One star for excellent waitstaff. I was warmly greeted and the staff were attentive and friendly.
One star for mediocre food. It was the most mediocre of mediocre. Have a meal here if you have no idea what Shanghainese cuisine is or if you truly believe that PeiWei and PF Chang serve great Chinese food. This is the place for you. Or if you don't even know where Shanghai is, because if you don't know your basic geography of China, then chances are you won't even know what this is supposed to taste like.
Do not go here if you do like Shanghainese food. It is my favorite regional Chinese cuisine and I was so disappointed by this place that I came out angry. I ordered the soup dumplings and fried rice cakes. The rice cakes were pale; they are supposed to be pan fried with a slight browning to give it some texture and flavor. These were milky white. To top it off, the chef had put way too much salt -- my taste buds were numb after the second bite. I wanted to mention this to the staff, but they were so nice that I didn't have the heart to say anything.
The soup dumplings were appalling. The skin was too thick; it puckered immediately out of the steamer and shrunk the dumplings. These done well should be plump and full of broth. Secondly, the pork meat was too brown, a sign the chef had used too much dark soy sauce. All I could taste was the soy sauce. It even overpowered the vinegar dip. And speaking of the vinegar dip, this dish is traditionally served with finely julienned ginger pickled in the vinegar. No ginger at this place. I couldn't even force myself to finish the dish, and I have never ever left behind a soup dumpling until this meal.
And lastly, the meal concluded with a fortune cookie. Real Shanghainese places would end with a small dish of canned pears or half an orange. Fortune cookies are an American invention.
I really have no respect for any place that claims it's the best (as this place does, in a sign outside) or that it serves real Chinese food, when it does neither. (General Tsao is on the menu. General Tsao IS NOT A CHINESE DISH.) This is Americanized Shanghainese. It's watered down; it's just exotic enough for non-Asians to think they're being adventurous, but it's nothing special at all. Maybe the chef here at one point knew how to make real Shanghainese food but the clientele wasn't ordering, so he gave up and stopped caring.
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