Chinese

Bristol

BEIJING BISTRO
72 Park St, BS1 5JX
Tel: 0117 373 2708, web: www.beijingbistro.co.uk
● Good food, great value: that’s the BB mantra - and they live up to it, too. In the eight years that this noodle bar’s been open, it’s developed a great reputation for its wide-ranging Asian/Far East menu, served in a split-level, bright, light dining area with wood flooring, recessed lights and clean white walls. Service is friendly and prompt, and prices are equally cheery, making it a popular haunt for students and Asian tourists alike. Price ALC: approx £2-£5/approx £6-£9/approx £3-£5 Wine list HW approx £9.50btl. Good selection of oriental beers, inc Tiger & Tsing Tao Open Sun-Thur 12noon-11pm, Fri-Sat 12noon-12midnight. Disabled access. Takeaway available (discounts for Bristol Uni’s Hong Kong & Malaysian societies). Large groups of up to 140.

CATHAY RENDEZVOUS
30 King St, BS1 4DZ
Tel: 0117 934 9345/922 6161 (opening hrs only), web: www.cathay-rendezvous.com
● ‘Relaxed hospitality is the order of the day,’ wrote our man when dropping in for an evening at this wonderful restaurant specialising in high-quality Cantonese, Szechuan and Mandarin cuisine, set within an old Georgian building with several dining rooms over two floors and Chinese antiques dotted about. Lots of great offers, including a great Sun lunch buffet. Themed menus for special events like Valentine’s Day. Book in advance at peak times. Price ALC: approx £4-£6/approx £8-£11/£4-£6. SL buffet (12noon-3pm): £10pp (ages 5-12 half-price). Extensive range of set menus: £22pp – call for details or check website Wine list Extensive, international. HW approx £13 btl Open Mon-Fri 12noon-3pm & 5-11.30pm, Sat 12noon-12midnight, Sun 12noon-11pm. Disabled access – call for adv. Special Chinese New Year, Christmas & Valentine menus. Upstairs (with bar, disco, stage) for private hire, up to 65.

CHEUNG KONG CHINESE
2b North View, Westbury Park, BS6 7QB
Tel: 0117 973 5165, web: www.cheungkong.co.uk
● Friendly, family-run restaurant that’s been here for two decades, with most customers are known to the proprietors by name. Young and old are drawn by the quality Cantonese and Pekingese fare, speciality teppa (sizzling) dishes and Chinese melodies. Now open only at dinner, but well worth a trip to Westbury if you’re not already one of the local fans. Price ALC: £3.50-£5.50/£8.25-£12.50/£3.50-£4.25. SD £32pp (min 2) Wine list HW approx £11.90 btl, £2.95 gls Open Mon-Thur 6-10.30pm, Fri-Sat 6.30-11.30pm. Good disabled access with toilet. Parties of 20+ welcome. Takeaway available, 20% discount.

NEW
COSMO RESTAURANT
30 Triangle West, Bristol, BS8 1ET
Tel: 0117 934 0999, web: www.cosmo-restaurants.co.uk
● At an ideal location for the hungry-peeps-on-a-budget market, this pan-Asian chain is already pleasing the crowds with their ‘Eat as Much as You Like’ experience, a fixed-price culinary voyage of discovery across nine pan-Asian countries. Six live cooking stations, incorporating a teppanyaki hotplate, yakatori barbecue grill, dim sum bar, wok station, fresh noodle bar and freshly prepared sushi counter. With the teppenyaki, choose from the vast selection of fresh, raw ingredients and the chef will cook it before your very eyes. Chocolate fountain is a firm favourite with the kids. Price Lunch: daily £6.95. Dinner Sun-Thur £12.50, Fri-Sat £13.50 (kids half-price) Wine list HW £9.95btl, £2.60gls Open Mon-Sat 12noon-3pm & 5.30-10.30pm (11pm Fri-Sat), Sun 12noon-10pm. Disabled access. Parties welcome - call in adv.

DYNASTY
16a St Thomas St, Redcliffe, BS1 6JJ
Tel: 0117 925 0888, web: www.dynasty-bristol.co.uk
● It’s easy to see why Dynasty (now 10 years old) was voted one of the top five best restaurants in the UK by Alan Yau of Hakkasan and Wagamama fame. Find opulent, festive surroundings down a side-street, above a Chinese supermarke. Quick service, charming staff and quite possibly the best dim sum in the South West. Fantastically broad menu takes in classic Peking and Szechuan favourites. With chefs brought in from Hong Kong and China, Dynasty is extremely popular with Bristol’s Chinese community (their chef’s mixed Cantonese selection - assorted dim sum and steamed dumplings - is a big hit). The Dynasty empire now also embraces Obento and Zen Harbourside. Price ALC: £4-£6/£7.50-£12/£4-£6. Good-value express lunch/SD deals. Set banquet menus (lunch/dinner) £19pp Wine list HW approx £12 btl Open Mon-Sat 12noon-11.30pm, Sun 12noon-10pm. Disabled access – call in adv. 10% discount for takeaway. Parties of 20+.

JADE PALACE
275-277 Two Mile Hill Rd, Kingswood, BS15 1AX
Tel: 0117 967 3851
● Relaxed, friendly neighbourhood Chinese, once voted one of Bristol Evening Post’s top 10 restaurants, that’s been around for 15 years. Large and comfortable, and good for both parties and romantic meals for two. Takeaway option available, and a gut-busting all-you-can-eat offer for £12.90pp, with dishes cooked fresh rather than laid out buffet style. Price Most dishes £4-£6 Wine list Extensive, international. HW approx £10.50btl Open Daily 12noon-2.30pm & 5.30-11.30pm. Disabled access - call in adv. Takeaway available. Parties welcome.

NEW
LEGEND ORIENTAL KITCHEN
52 Park Row, BS1 5LH
Tel: 0117 929 0806
● Replacing the short-lived Takala (which had itself replaced the short-lived Asia in Wok), this is a more intimate, personable version of successful chains like Wagamama or Cosmos. With main meals at £5 and free Wi-Fi, LOK is quickly becoming a favourite with cash-strapped students. Other mains of the Chinese variety are also available for slightly more, all prepared fresh in the open kitchen. Group bookings welcome - private basement area with licensed bar is good for large parties. Price £3/£5/£2.50 Wine list HW approx £12 btl Open Sun-Thur 12noon-11pm, Fri-Sat 12noon-12midnight. Parties welcome – book in adv. Takeaway available. Disabled access - ring in adv.

MAYFLOWER
3a-5 Haymarket Walk, BS1 3LN
Tel: 0117 925 0555, web: www.mayflower-bristol.co.uk
● It’s all about the food in this brightly lit, no-frills late-night eatery. Don’t let the odd location (in the underpass by the bus station) throw you - the Evening Post’s reviewer had this to say: ‘It serves enormous portions of the most authentic and skilfully cooked Cantonese food I’ve found in Bristol, and the staff are polite and incredibly friendly. It’s got to be some of the best Chinese food in Bristol.’ Huge menu is stuffed with regional specialities popular with local Chinese families. They do a damn fine buffet and, if you’re in the mood, have their own karaoke bar, too. Price ALC: £2.30-£6/£7.50-£13.80/£3-£4. SD: £14pp Wine list International. HW approx £9 btl, £2.50gls Open Mon-Sat 6pm-3am, Sun 12noon-3am. Disabled facilities. Takeaway discount. Separate function room available for private parties.

NEW EMPEROR COURT
26 Portland St, Clifton, BS8 4JB
Tel: 0117 973 1522, web: www.newemperorcourtrestaurant.co.uk
● Long-established, family-run restaurant offering a top-notch, extensive menu that’s ‘fit for the emperor and his court’. Specialising in Peking, Cantonese and Szechuan cuisine, the friendly team (headed up by chef/owner Thanh Que Vien and his wife/front of house Kim Lien) preside over a lively, welcoming atmosphere. Won a prestigious Chef of the Year award (Quality Cuisine UK) for excellent food and superb service. Two main dining areas, small alcove for intimate assignations, seasonal fish specialities, and a good vegetarian selection. Price ALC: £2.30-£6.45/£6.50-£10.50/£3.30. SD £20.95pp Wine list International. HW £12.50 btl Open Fri-Sat 12noon-2pm, Tue-Sun 6-11.30pm. Very limited disabled access – call in adv. Takeaway 10% discount. Separate room for private parties of 25-30.

SHANGHAI NIGHTS
Nelson House, Nelson St, BS1 2JT
Tel: 0117 945 0505, web: www.shanghainights.co.uk, www.shanghainightsexpress.co.uk
● This stylish elegant restaurant features the ‘Oriental Endless Feast’ - their legendary all-you-can-eat deal whereby you order as much as you like from the menu and they’ll freshly prepare it and bring it to the table - no lukewarm dishes under heat lamps here. Menu includes exquisite, authentic dim sum and modern takes on traditional Chinese dishes from expert chefs. Regional specialities, contemporary specials and new additions like lobster, razor clams and crab. Abundant ALC menu is supplemented with a choice of set banquets. Express service brings it all to your door, and you can order online. Price ALC: approx £2.50-£5.50/approx £6.50-£11.50/£4-£6. All-you-can-eat from the menu, served at your table: Mon-Wed £13.50pp, Thur-Sun £15.50pp Wine list HW approx £13 btl, £4 gls Open Daily 12noon-11pm. No disabled access. Parties welcome.

TEOHS
28-34 Lower Ashley Rd, St Agnes, BS2 9NP Tel: 0117 907 1191
Old Tobacco Factory, North St, Southville, BS3 1TF Tel: 0117 902 1122
● See Thai, Malaysian, Singaporean & Indonesian.

WATER SKY BRISTOL
Eastgate Oriental City, Eastgate Rd, Eastville, BS5 6XY
Tel: 0117 951 2888, web: www.watersky-bristol.com
● The huge 400-seater Water Sky opened in August 2007, with a head chef who previously cooked for an international corporation based in Hong Kong. Vast menu of traditional Cantonese cooking served up in an opulent atmosphere, handily situated above the Wai Yee Hong oriental supermarket. All-you-can-eat menu, £15.95pp, lets you choose from 65 different dishes (daily 11.30am-3.30pm). Dim sum menu available (ALC) 11.30am-4.30pm, main menu available thereafter. Price ALC: £2.80-£7.50/£7.95-£10.50/approx £3.50 Wine list International. HW from approx £12 btl Open Daily 11.30am-11pm. Disabled access, lift to restaurant. Parties welcome.

ZEN HARBOURSIDE
First Floor, Explore Lane, Millennium Square, BS1 5TY
Tel: 0117 920 9372, web: www.zenharbourside.co.uk
● Venue’s food editor paid a visit to this ambitious venture from the same family behind Bristol’s long-established Dynasty and the more recent Obento: ‘Zen is a cool, contemporary and stylish place, imaginatively designed to dispel any sense of an industrial unit that the functional Millenium Square premises could have had. There’s an intriguing private party going on in an upstairs dining room, a scattering of mostly Chinese couples around the main area, and a lively Chinese gathering enjoying fondue-style hotpots round a couple of big tables.’ Specialising in regional cuisine drawn from more than 23 provinces in China, the menu features many authentic dishes that you won’t find in other Chinese restaurants. ‘The philosophy behind Zen is, partly, to reveal how Chinese regional cookery has always incorporated diverse ingredients into interesting dishes. Chinese restaurants often serve this kind of food, rarely printing it on English menus - Chinese customers simply ask for it - but in Zen you’ll find the likes of ‘Man and Woman Offal’ alongside more predictable sweet and sour spare ribs.’ Attentive, friendly staff will happily take you through the selection and help you follow the Zen concept of constructing a balanced meal. Last word from Venue was: ‘Very satisfied with a memorable meal served with friendly eagerness for under £20 a head.’ Price ALC: £5.50-£7.80/£7.50-£25.80/approx £3.50. Lunch: All-you-can-eat buffet £5.95. Lunchbox £3.50. Sat-Sun 50% food with voucher from website. SM: £20pp Wine list HW £11.90 btl. 2-4-1 cocktails 5-7pm Open Daily 12noon-12midnight. Disabled access & toilet (lift to restaurant).

Bath

NEW
HON FUSION
25 Claverton Buildings, BA2 4LD
Tel: 01225 446020, web: www.honfusion.com
● While contemporary foodies expect the ‘fusion’ idiom to translate into something Wagamamama-esque, this relatively new kid on the Widcombe ‘scene’ takes a far simpler route - established back when the Chinese takeaway was as exotic as we got and sweet and sour chicken was an adventurous option. But blimey, it’s good stuff. Said Venue’s reviewer: ‘Spring rolls are fresh ‘n’ crispy; chilli prawns are plump and properly hot; crispy duck is a text-book example of the genre; a whole, steamed sea bass fillet arrives in a just-off-the-hob basket sprinkled with zingingly fresh herbs; pork chow mein is as gloop-free as a meaty noodle melange can get... and the sweet and sour options are refreshingly non-sickly.’ There’s a decent wine list to plunder and a two-course feast (with plenty of sharing dishes) shouldn’t set you back more than around £25. Price Soups/appetisers/sides £2.80-£7.50, mains approx £7-£10 Wine list HW approx £14 btl Open Daily 12noon-11pm. Disabled access. Takeaway menu available.

HONG KONG BISTRO
33 Southgate, BA1 1TP
Tel: 01225 318500/316088, web: www.hongkongbistro.co.uk
● With its functional furnishings, prosaic ‘urban fringe’ location and ‘pile it high, sell it cheap’ ethos, this place is more Wagamama than Hakkasan in both ambience and influence. The brief description of any given dish on the extensive, well-considered menu of rice dishes, noodles, soups and sides may not speak today’s foodie language of locally sourced, MSG-free organics, but neither does it attempt to blind you with the kind of pan-Asian geo-cultural lectures or gimmicky jiggery-pokery that many similarly styled diners thrust at us whether we ask for it or not. But the very fact that this efficient little Beijing-style noodle bar doesn’t claim to offer the high-faluting experience you’d expect from an Alan Yau venture is exactly what gives it its charm. What the HKB does, it does exceedingly well: well prepared, largely classic Chinese-influenced food in a nice atmosphere for a very nice price. ‘A fresh, fuss-free, fairly healthy feast,’ according to Venue’s own little chopstick. ‘Now that the Southgate Centre just across the road is no longer a building site, the HKB is set to take its rightful place at the heart of Bath’s new fast-food action’. Price Approx £30 for2 people, inc side-dishes & wine/beer. Wine list French HW £9.50 btl. Beers (inc Tiger beer) Open Sun-Thur 12noon-11pm, Fri-Sat 12noon-12midnight. Disabled access. Parties of 20+ - call in adv.

OCEAN PEARL
Podium Shopping Centre, Northgate St, BA1 5AL
Tel: 01225 331238, web: www.oceanpearl-bath.co.uk
● A vast range of Far Eastern favourites, from soups and spring rolls to all manner of goodies in sticky sauces (black bean, sweet and sour, etc), Chinese curries, vegetarian options, noodles and rice - all to serve yourself, and enjoyed with fantastic views over Pulteney Bridge. All-inclusive, rock-bottom prices mean that there’s often a long line of fans queuing all the way back to the top of the shopping centre’s escalators at peak times, which is when the fill-your-own takeaway box deal really comes into it’s own. Choose wisely, and standards here are exceptionally high. Price Lunch (serve yourself, all you can eat) £6.50 (under-10s £3). Dinner (ditto): £11.50 (under-10s £6). Meal deal (Fri-Sun 3-5.30pm): 3 £5. Takeaway boxes (fill your own, from buffet): £3.50 lunch, £4.50 dinner Wine list HW approx £11 btl Open Daily 12noon-2.30pm (last seating) & 6-10.30pm (last seating). Good disabled access. Suitable for large parties - call in adv.

PEKING CHINESE
1-2 New St, Kingsmead Square, BA1 2EF
Tel: 01225 461750/466377, web: www.pekingrestaurantbath.co.uk
● The longest established Chinese restaurant in Bath is a timeless experience, where the past four decades blend tastefully into one - pink walls, pink napkins, pink lighting, fish in a tank, subtly fierce dragons on the walls. Menus revolve around traditional Cantonese, Szechuan and Peking classics (fish, seafood and ‘sizzling’ dishes are highly recommended) and the Peking duck is, as you might expect, the house speciality: prepared entirely on the premises, you have to book this dish 24 hours in adv. Said our reviewer: ‘The Peking doesn’t speak today’s foodie language of MSG-free organics, give a name to the pig that made the pork or attempt to blind you with pan-Asian geo-culture lectures. But what it does, it does exceedingly well: Chinese food for a good price.’ Price ALC: £2.95-£7.95/£6.95-£12.95. Set banquets (min 2 people): £19.95. All You Can Eat menu (Tue-Wed) £18 Wine list HW £9.65 btl Open Daily 12noon-2pm & 6-11.15pm. No disabled access. Function room for private hire, depending on size of reservation.

REAL CHINA ORIENTAL BUFFET
Unit 3, Kingsmead Leisure Complex, 5-10 James St West, BA1 2BZ
Tel. 01225 332677, web: www.therealchina.co.uk
● Contemporary, family-friendly eat-all-you-like Chinese buffet restaurant with teppanyaki kitchen (fresh dishes made from your choice of ingredients, prepared before your very eyes). Price Lunch buffet: Mon-Fri £5.95, Sat £6.95 (child £4.50). Dinner buffet: Mon-Thur £11.95, Fri-Sat £12.95. Sun all-day buffet £10.95 (child under 140cm half-price). Wine list HW approx £12 btl Open Sun 12noon-10pm. Lunch: Mon-Fri 11.30am-3.30pm, Sat 12noon-4pm. Dinner: Mon-Thur 5.30-10.30pm, Fri-Sat 6-11.30pm. Disabled access. Parties welcome - call in adv.

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