House of Ming, a new upscale Chinese restaurant with an Indian accent, opens next week (Thursday 25 May) in St James’s – handily close to both Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament. Specialising in the cuisines of Canton and Sichuan, the restaurant is part of the St James’s Court hotel, owned by the luxurious Taj […]
Amy Poon’s Wontoneria opens on 7 February for a three-month residency at 23 Charlotte Street in Fitzrovia, the ‘incubator space’ run by revolving-chef restaurant Carousel, in a step towards reviving the family’s famous Poon’s restaurant at a permanent site. Her father Bill Poon, a seventh-generation Cantonese master chef, opened his first restaurant in London’s Chinatown […]
Master-chef Tong Chee Hwee, a pioneer of contemporary Chinese cooking in London as the culinary brains behind the rise of the Hakkasan group, is to launch his own restaurant in the city for the first time. Named Gouqui, it will occupy the former site of Garfunkel’s in Cockspur Street, off Trafalgar Square. Born in China, […]
Spectacular hand-pulled noodles can be watched as well as eaten at a new restaurant in Chinatown, called Kung Fu Noodle because the cooks look like they are practising chopping movements from the martial art made famous in the 1970s through Bruce Lee’s films and Carl Douglas’s hit single. The noodles, from Gansu province in northwestern […]
A new high-end Chinese restaurant is set to open near St James’s Park this month where no expense will be spared to offer the most luxurious ingredients. The Noble Palace, a stone’s throw from Buck House, will serve Peking duck with a choice of Beluga caviar, abalone, or black truffle pancake. Its menu will serve […]
Hip Liverpool Cantonese outfit Yum Cha is to open its first branch in Manchester this spring, at the £250million Kampus redevelopment on the former Metropolitan University site between Piccadilly station and the Gay Village. The Merseyside connection will be reinforced with Madre taqueria and Middle Eastern specialist Maray also moving into Kampus. Manchester’s own Cloudwater […]

Chef Andrew Wong’s latest restaurant Kym’s is to open this September in The City’s new Bloomberg Arcade. The steel and glass culinary arena, designed by Norman Foster Partners, is Bloomberg’s new European HQ. Already in situ are brands such as Shake Shack, Homeslice, Koya, and the new and lavish Brigadiers, which Harden’s previewed in depth […]

Yu and You, Copster Green “An unremarkable building on the A59 between Preston and Clitheroe houses this remarkable Chinese-inspired restaurant”, where the food – “a westernised style” of Cantonese cuisine “like no other” – is “not heavy or greasy”, with “higher quality ingredients than you’ll find in many Chinatown based operations”. Service is “impeccable” too, and even if “the […]

Hakkasan Mayfair W1 Chinese New Year Menu: £88 pp (available now) “Fast paced, seductive, club-like” – these “wonderfully vibey” operations may be “so busy and very noisy” but have founded a global brand on the strength of their “feel-good” ambience and “brilliantly executed Chinese/pan-Asian cuisine”. However, even some fans concede that they can also seem […]

Nicholas Lander in The Financial Times reviews Kai Mayfair, Grand Imperial at Charing Cross Hotel and Four Seasons on Chinatown’s Gerard Street, in anticipation of Chinese New Year (the Year of the Dog begins on 16 February)… “The long-established Kai Mayfair has a menu that is well attuned to wealthy clientele. While the high prices could, I suppose, […]