Randomness Guide to London Menu

Chinese restaurant in a small side street just off Leicester Square. According to a sign seen in the window in April 2009, dim sum is served noon-5pm Mon-Sat and 11am-5pm Sun.

Kake, Sarah, and Lex visited for dim sum on a Wednesday lunchtime in April 2009. It was reasonably busy, but there was a table free for us, luckily quite near the front; the place goes back a fair distance and there's not much natural light at the back.

Scallop cheung fun (£3) weren't bad; the scallops were good, but the wrappers were a little thick. Scallop dumplings (£2.40) also had a good flavour. Vietnamese spring rolls (£2.20) were nothing special. Fried turnip paste (£2.10) had a good browned crust on it and a decent texture. Spicy tripe (£2.10) wasn't particularly spicy, but it was certainly tasty. We were intrigued enough by the char siu croquettes (£2.10) to give them a try; they turned out to be small pastries rather than actual croquettes, but they were pretty good, served warm with a generous filling of flavourful pork wrapped in a good, properly flaky pastry. (Note: prices given here may not be current — see below.)

Service was efficient; tea was brought to the table the moment we sat down, our teapot was refilled assiduously during our meal, and our food all arrived quickly. Our final bill was around £14/head for more than enough food (14 dishes) plus tea. It wasn't clear whether this included a tip or not, since it wasn't itemised — but adding up the prices afterwards revealed that either they applied a 15% tip without telling us, or the prices in the menu displayed in the window photo of menu were out of date.

Accessibility: No steps to get in, and there's a lift to get you up to the toilets on the first floor. It is a little cramped inside though, with the tables fairly close together.

See also:

• Time Out review
• London Eating comments
• Qype comments
• Yelp comments
• Chowhound thread
• London Chow review