Shanghai Blues, Holborn, London

I really like this restaurant. I didn’t go at a time when a pianist was playing, but I’d hope that would add to the experience.

The dark and refined decor tries to create a more intemate and romantic atmosphere. The service was strange. Overly attentive on my wine glass, but quite fleeting with table service.

The dim sum is very good, but you are paying premium dollar for your meal. I found everything very good quality, but it is not really value for money. You are paying for the image.

For full review & photos: http://bit.ly/b4Hq0a

We decided to take advantage of the 20% off offer displayed on their website and organised a luncheon for a group of us (12 in total) on a Sunday lunch. It was pretty deserted and I think never achieved more than half occupancy, which was a bit of a shame as the seating and décor was rather pretty and certainly a far cry from the typical Chinese dim sum parlour.

Speaking of typical Chinese dim sum, the food here is most definitely not “as per standard” in style and construction. Some might even term is as a “Hakkasan wannabe”. Anyway, onto the food…

“Chilean Sea Bass Fillets & Diced Asparagus 'Cheung Fun'” – the sea bass fillets were individually great to eat, but the taste were a bit subdued by the flour coating of the cheung fun. Not bad but, definitely needs more sea bass fillets.

“King Prawn & Chinese Chives 'Cheung Fun” – I still snigger and jeer at the “king prawns” found here, but anyway this was a decent if not particularly special version of a typical dim sum dish. Its worth noting the cheung fun was soft, light and not over cooked.

“Quail Egg & Seafood ‘Sao Mai’ (minced scallop, prawn, crab meat & baby pak choi wrapped with quail egg)” – taste and texture wise this was actually a really good siew mai with lots of seafood flavour infused and the seaweed wrapping gave it an interesting taste not usually experienced while eating dim sum. The quail egg was largely decorational for me though.

“Original Shanghai 'Xiao Long Bao' with minced pork & chef’s special stock” – one of the worst XLB I’ve eaten. Firstly, nice and cute presentation but I didn’t really know how to scoop it properly - just doesn't work. Secondly there was no very little soup stock within the XLB and lastly the barren desiccated little things just didn’t taste that nice either.

“Pan-fried Turnip Paste with Dried Meat with XO Sauce” – this dish drew praise from the entire table for the delicious XO based sauce. The turnip pieces were a contrast of textures with a crunchy coating but delicate and soft interior. We ordered a couple extra portions after we finished the first two plates.

“Mooli Croissant” – finely julienned strands of sweet turnip encased within a little pastry shell. Was surprisingly nice and tasty.

“Baked Mushroom & Seafood Bun” – not only was this a rather small bun to begin with (pretty sure I can stuff 3 into my mouth!), but there wasn’t a lot of filling inside as well. The bun itself is pretty nice though, slightly sweet-ish, soft and airy (just like the filling). Seriously, more filling please!

“'Char Siu Bao' Barbecue Pork Buns” – the bun was not too bad without any of the alkaline taste sometimes found, but Shanghai Blues has been way too stingy with the filling, which itself lacked sufficient richness and meatiness. Poor show.

“Shanghai 'Shui Jiao' in Exotic Chilli Sauce, dumpling with prawns, minced chicken and mushrooms” – not sure how exotic the chilli sauce was, but it had just the right level of spiciness to light up the dish without making me choke and splutter. The dumpling itself was not bad.

“Sampan Congee with Minced Beef” – don’t recall any minced beef… the porridge was pretty good though with lots of little offal bits floating around while I liked the consistency of the porridge in the typical HK style with its sticky starchy consistency.

Shanghai Blues, London 09

“Steamed Rice with Chinese Mushrooms, Cantonese Chicken & Chinese Sausage” – considering how easy it is to make this dish (PigPig does a fantastic version I gobble up with glee, its almost criminal how they can serve this underseasoned and without enough sauce for the accompanying rice (there was a fair amount of white rice left behind as there wasn’t enough tasty stuff to eat it with).

“Mini Egg Tarts (Sweet)” – pretty disappointing and dull; the custard wasn’t particularly creamy or sweet enough while the pastry seemed a bit on the heavy side.

“Barbeque Chicken Fillet Wrapped in Bamboo Leaf” – not really sure this fitted in with the rest of the menu. It was a bit tricky to get the piece of chicken out of its clothes as we only had a pair of chopsticks each, and I’m not sure if it was worth the effort either. It was strongly flavoured with the barbecue-like marinade, but there wasn’t anything much else here whilst other versions I’ve tried usually has a smoky aroma from the cooking process.

Moving onto the desserts, which all seemed to be East-meets-West fusions.

“Red Bean and 'Quan Fa' Tea Flavoured Pudding” – it was an interesting idea, but one that didn’t work for me as the red bean paste was too sweet and simply hammered the more delicate jelly topping into oblivion.

“Mango Mousse & Pomegranate with Guava Sorbet” – the mousse wasn’t anything special but definitely very palatable and nice to eat. Using a tropical fruit like guava for the sorbet was an interesting choice as well which worked out fairly well.

Jackfruit cheesecake – the only item in this review which I can’t find on the menu on their website. Anyway good riddance as well because this was wrong on so many levels. For starters, it didn’t taste of jackfruit at all. Unfortunately it tasted of something far worse, descriptions from around the table ranged from “the aftertaste of vomit” to “armpit” and “like milk gone bad”.

We spoke to the waitress and explained we were worried that this plate had gone bad. She went to speak to the chef in the kitchen then returned saying that the chef had tasted it and confirmed that the rest of the batch tasted the same (presumably this was his intention then). She did offer to give us another plate (we hurriedly declined) then told us she would take this off our bill.

In retrospect, the lattermost of the descriptions above probably proved to be the most accurate as I got a couple of texts from my fellow diners who developed diarrhoea.

“Chocolate Fondant with Praline & Jasmine Tea Ice-Cream”, “Fresh Melon Almond To-Fu” and “Assorted Home-made Ice-cream” – didn’t try either of these but the respective owners looked fairly happy eating their dishes.

Containing a blend of mango, raspberry, lychee and cranberry juice, the “mango and raspberry blush” was a hit among the girls (and a couple of the guys, no finger pointing though).

Altogether, the bill came up to £21 per head including a 20% off which is available all day Sunday and lunchtime on Saturday. Service felt pretty slow throughout and it took at least 30 minutes for the first of the dishes to come out while some of them took well over an hour. The restaurant was only half-full at best too.

Although called Shanghai Blues, the food served has very few, if any resemblance to Shanghainese style dim sum and is definitely more in the mould of high-end fusion cuisine in the likeness of Hakkasan and Yauatcha. While some things were done very well, others were downright pathetic and overall I think that it could have been so much better.

Best bit: not actually tasting the aftertaste of vomit. Its funny how something that sounds so disgusting actually made people go “ooooh I wanna try!!”.

Worst bit: gastroenteritis.

I dissent with the past reviews here. I would give zero stars if possible. Honestly this place is a complete ripoff. Perhaps we are accustomed to paying $40 USD for a feast at SF restaurants then to come to London and be ripped off by a pseudo-Chinese place trying to imitate some high class blues bar/minimalistic, posh restaurant it was just bad. Or perhaps we came for dinner and not dim sum? But SF has some fantastic dim sum as well. Anyway, in regards to the dinner we paid for we can’t be fooled. The prices were horribly overpriced for what they served. For example, an individual portion of so-called crab with corn soup at 9 GBP (approx. $15) was firstly robbery, but to not put any crab (or was it so skimpy we could not even detect anything?) was insulting.

Service at S. Blues was unpolished and somewhat unprofessional (think robotic and sloppy). They try to act classy (e.g. having staff open napkins for diners) and charge extra for this type of 'show’. Not necessary. The food should be the star.

As for decor if you like black (I mean totally black with small contrasts only) and can read a menu in this cavelike atmosphere then this is your place. Funnily a guy exited just before we entered and he told his partner how bright it is outside. Well, even evening outdoors seemed to be brighter than the interior of this place.

It also seems to be a place that caters to non-Orientals who seem to believe they are dining on fantastic Chinese food. This is clearly an example of when high prices do not equal high quality. We don’t mind paying high prices for a high class place that serves truly wonderful food, but to pay high prices for a pretentious, gimmicky restaurant that serves food which is skimpy on ingredients is just not good at all. It was apparent why the Oriental locals were not dining here.

This is the best Chinese restaurant I have been to. The food is amazing. I recommend the dim sum, scallops, sea bass and the stuffed aubergine. It has pork in there that is so tender and well seasoned. The mooli puffs are also rather addictive.

I’ve been to this place 3 times and I want to go back. The cocktails are also worth sampling. I had a lychee mojito and felt that I was sipping distilled heaven in a glass. My call back to reality was that I had started hiccuping and everyone at my table thought I was a lush. The humiliation was worth it.

I cannot rate the Xioa Loong Bao at Shanghai Blues high enough. It’s as good as the ones that I had in Shanghai and is probarbly the best in London. The juicyness and freshness of its ingredients is key to tasty Xioa Long Bao.

Shanghai Blues make the best Xiao Long Bao in London. It arrived with a little dish of vinegar dipping sauce and ginger slivers. These were really rather delicious, especially after I’d bitten the tops off and poured more vinegar into them. Being a Shanghainese Food lover - I know the best Xiao Long Bao when I had one. Highly recommended.

This restaurant would do better situated more central. It hasn’t been very busy every time I’ve been and that might be because it’s in Holborn. The decor is gorgeous, dark and sumptuous - very Hakkasan like. The service has seemed a little inexperienced when I’ve visited - but this is only a small gripe. The food is very good (much better than your average Chinatown eaterie) but also expensive. On my very first visit the rice portions were teeny tiny with each of us only getting two scoops of rice each in a portion that was meant to be big enough for two. Since then though the rice portions seem to have grown to a more ample size. I think they have live jazz here some nights but I haven’t managed to stay for that yet. I would recommend this restaurant.

Shanghai Blues is a very posh Chinese restaurant located in Holborn. Dark and mysterious on the outside it is equally dark and mysterious on the inside. More like a club than a traditional Chinese restaurant it certainly makes for an interesting meal. Just note that prices are fairly prohibitively expensive unless you have a business account or pockets lined with money. Its not a place you’d visit at the drop of a hat.

As expected from the atmosphere the service was superb - friendly and accommodating though at times slightly over-bearing. That could have had something to do with the fact we were in pretty early (just after 6pm) and were the only diners in the restaurant for over half an hour. Beautiful décor if you like the dark wood, deep red, dark blue, club-like feel to your restaurants.

Unusually for a Chinese restaurant there were a surprisingly large number and wide selection of vegetarian options for the diner’s choice and thus we decided to check it out tonight. Well, when I say “large number and wide selection” I mean certainly more than just one dish!

From a presentation perspective Shanghai Blues was spot on … unfortunately, and I don’t know if it was to do with the nature of the dishes we selected, as from the taste perspective it wasn’t so crash hot. Though not particularly bland no flavours stood out especially. The tea service was funny. At the regular Chinese restaurant you may share a pot of tea (endlessly refilled with hot water) but at Shanghai Blues it’s a whole performance with personal service of the tea which comes on its own trolley at first and everything.

The Shanghai Blues menu is very diverse and quite unusual and there will definitely be something there for everyone’s palette. For all the lack of flavour in their vegetarian dishes I think its certainly worth another go to try out some of the other dishes (and maybe to check out their interesting twist on cocktails) but I may have to save up some pennies before I can come back and enjoy myself properly!

Shanghai Blues is housed in what was once St Giles Library but is now a listed building. The restaurant and bar are in keeping with the understated luxury of its surroundings and definitely worth a visit especially if you are out on a hot date or a formal business meeting, because they have lot of large tables for big meetings.

The menus mainly focuses on traditional dishes of Shanghai and offers a unique and authentic dining experience. A selection of their best dishes are Emperor Dim Sum with Abalone,sea cucumber,Sharks fin Eel fillets in a honeyed barbeque sauce; Shanghai 'Shui Jiao' in an exotic Chilli sauce,Pumpkin dumplings with Prawns and minced Pork. The wine list is extensive and it is good: the price per head usually comes to around 49.00 pounds.

The restaurant has three distinct rooms with a Mezzanine Floor overlooking the main bar and restaurant. The well known interior designer Tully Filmer has cleverley infused 17th century and the 21st century ambiance to give a modern twist on a traditional Shanghai decor.

The result is visually stunning,and the establishment has a great service to match and it is the capital's most sought after dining experience.