Picture of Dream Taste, SE15 3LS

Historical version 20 of Dream Taste, SE15 3LS (view current version)

Pretty decent Chinese takeaway in Nunhead. (Much of the interweb seems to think it's in East Dulwich, though.) They also do some Thai food, which (according to doop) is a very Chineseified kind of Thai food, but tasty enough if you like that kind of thing. Don't know if they also do eat-in.

Various combinations of Kake, doop, and Bob have ordered from here several times since we discovered it in early 2008. The food always arrives promptly, and is well-packaged, fresh, and hot. Some of the dishes come in those cute little cardboard cartons. Aww! This is definitely one of our favourites among the takeaways that will deliver to SE16 (though note they charge an extra £2-3 delivery for addresses in SE16).

Grilled Peking dumplings, sampled in February 2008 and again in July 2008 (£3.60 for six) weren't bad at all; good, thick, chewy skins, well cooked, and nothing wrong with the filling either. Our February 2008 order also included some pretty good crispy duck with pancakes (£6.90 for a quarter, which comes as a whole piece that you shred yourself) and hot and sour soup (£2.20), which was good apart from the tough pieces of chilli skin floating in it. "West Lake beef soup", sampled in July 2008, was good, with a mild flavour, large swooshes of egg, and peas well-judged enough to please even Kake, who is very fussy about old, overcooked peas.

We've also had the dim sum platter for two (£7 per person from Just Eat, £7 for two from Hungry House ) a couple of times now; this includes four har gao, four sui mai, and two cha siu bau. The har gao are made in a press rather than properly pleated, and the wrappers aren't really up to scratch - but it would be quite a lot to expect proper har gao from a little local takeaway like this, and they certainly satisfy the dim sum craving. Siu mai are fine, and much neater and more compact than the enormous waterlogged floppy things that the Laughing Buddha have been delivering us recently.

Mains were also fine. Pan fried salmon in soya bean sauce (£4.90) was good; the salmon was encased in a thin batter to preserve its tenderness. Aubergine with peppercorns and spiced salt (£3.50), a dry dish along the lines of salt-and-pepper tofu, was well-flavoured and not too greasy. Beancurd with green peppers in black bean sauce (£3.50) had a generous proportion of beancurd, and the beancurd was cooked well too, not over-fried like it is in some places. Vegetarian ma po tofu (£3.50) isn't bad, but like the hot and sour soup has a slight tendency towards overly-tough chilli skins.

Egg fried rice (£2.20) was competent if nothing special. House special fried rice (£4.50) has a slightly unusual presentation; it's basically a box of egg fried rice with all the other bits and pieces laid neatly on top.

Thai special chow mein, sampled in July 2008, had a decent level of chilli heat and some very well-judged seafood, including non-rubbery squid and king prawns just on the edge of being undercooked (a good thing, in Kake's opinion).

Ewan comments: Have ordered the Thai green curry with vegetables twice before, which is an acceptable though not particularly amazing Thai dish. In March 2008, I ordered the Chinese mushroom and bamboo shoots (£3.10) which went down perfectly well with some rice. However, the aubergine with peppercorns and spiced salt was really of a higher order and very good indeed, a lovely combination of a dry batter with the aubergine which I would highly recommend for every future order from here.

secretlondon ordered Dim Sum and Thai Chow Mein from Just Eat. She was charged £14 for 2 boxes of 2 cha siu bau photo, 2 boxes of 3 har gao and 3 siu mai photo and 2 portions of sweet chilli sauce. The £7 was listed as price per person, for a minimum of 2 people. The Thai Chow Mein had quite a lot of seafood photo.

You can order online from Just-Eat or from Hungry House. Note: if you order from Hungry House and pay by card, there's a £1 surcharge, compared to a 50p surcharge on Just Eat. They deliver to SE5 on Just Eat, but not on Hungry House.

Food last sampled by secretlondon, September 2008.
OS X co-ord: 535100 OS Y co-ord: 175600 (Latitude: 51.462739 Longitude: -0.054987)
This is version 20 (as of 2008-09-13 14:52:10). View current version. List all versions.