| Chinese Restaurants | |
| The Oriental Pearl | The Phoenix |
| The Willow | The Station Inn, Tollerton |
| The Jade Garden | The Royal Dragon |
| Maxis | Kings Castle |
| Siam House Thai Restaurant | Jumbo's Chinese Buffet |
Chinese
Oriental Pearl, Tower Court, 693 737
Not in the greatest location
in York -adjacent to a Kwiksave carpark - but they serve good food. It
always looks well prepared, as if someone has chopped and shaped the vegetables,
or selected decent mushrooms from the market (let's be serious: Kwiksave's
vegetable section).
The restaurant is nice enough inside and I've never seen it completely
full. Perhaps this is due to the location, but there is no denying that
prices are a bit on the high side with a standard main course coming in
at around £8. You get what you pay for, however, and the restaurant
seems to be kept busy enough as it is, processing takeaway orders for
the nearby housing estates.
I'm not a great fan of Chinese restaurants, but if someone was to ask
me to recommend one in York, I'd opt either for here or The Jade Garden.
Neither will disappoint.
Do not despise the snake for
having no horns, for who is to say it will not become a dragon? So they
said in the 1970's on The Water Margin. In the same way, do not despise
The Willow for having no decent food, for who is to say you may have been
there on an off day?
On the other hand, I can but report on what I had. We visited for the
afternoon buffet. (Why are buffets always disappointing and stressful?
And why is the fattest family in Western Europe always there on the same
day as you, stacking their plates high with the ribs?) I had, therefore,
a wide variety of dishes to choose from, but it all boiled down to cheap
meat cuttings mixed with wallpaper paste, tomato sauce, sugar, pineapple
juice and MSG. Bilge, the lot of it.
The food, however, was better than the decor. Do not visit this restaurant
in daylight hours. To call it dilapidated would be a compliment. There's
even a clapped out disco. Is this to take your mind off the food? I often
think the Chinese are cynical about their Western customers, but did they
put this in on the basis of "a few vodka and cokes and the Birdie
song and nobody will remember the food"? As for the toilets, well,
let's face it, Chinese restaurants have never been big on this aspect
of their dining experience, but I'd have been more impressed with a plastic
bucket and a packet of wet-wipes. Need I go on?
The Willow - eat it and
weep.
The Jade Garden, Tower St, 636 481
"Nice here, in'nit?", is a comment I'd expect to hear in the Jade Garden. There's nothing really spectacular about it, and nothing to complain about either. Food is fine - I usually have one of their noodle dishes - and the decor verges towards the plain. I prefer my Chinese restaurants to have red and green fire-breathing dragons hanging from the ceiling, as it takes my mind off the banality of the food. Try their Roast Char Siu Pork dish, which is one of the more unusual offerings. It's actually one of the best Char Siu dishes I've had, sliced pork swimming in a rich, dark soy sauce. Drink copious amounts of liquid afterwards though. There's more salt in it than the Dead Sea. They could also do with a non-smoking area - last time I visited, some idiot was polluting everywhere with his cigar. I watched as he exhaled smoke into his girlfriend's face: romance isn't dead, eh?
The Royal Dragon, Barbican Road, 623 134
Now this is more like it. Two big golden dragons with fiery red eyes adorn the wall, and stare angrily at you as you flick rice onto the floor with your chopsticks. So do the waiters. We took the "serve it all at once and we'll pick away at it" approach, and had aromatic duck, salt and chilli ribs, sweet and sour chicken with fried rice. Yes, the meal was a cliche, but not too bad. Ribs were disappointing and there weren't enough pancakes with the duck though. Restaurant itself is pretty big, with a large car park around the back and both were full the Saturday night we were in, so it's best to book. We were seated in a room adjacent to the main area, and had to signal for service as you can be forgotten quite easily in here, seemingly. Nice pint of John Smiths, and small cups of coffee at £1.50 a throw (with numerous refills). We've been in much worse.
I admit it's ages since I've eaten in here. It's a small restaurant that's been around for a while, which suggests it has a loyal clientelle, as it's not exactly in the centre of town. Food was standard Chinese, verging on the expensive. Service was also standard Chinese: abrupt, grunting and efficient.
The Station Inn, Tollerton, 838897
Ten minutes drive north of York, this looks like it once was a country pub which has been converted to a Chinese, and not a bad one at that. Try the Salt and Pepper mushrooms for a starter and the Singapore Noodles for a main course. Both are very good. We also tried Sweet and Sour Chicken, but the massive battered chunks of meat were a bit unappetising. The fried rice was a radioactive yellow, and also pretty tasteless. Nice wine list recommending wines to compliment various dishes, and they serve a good pint of Theakstons too.
Maxis,
York Business Park, 783 898
I heard this new restaurant out at the White Rose Business Park must have cost about £1.5m.. And believe me, you are going to help pay for it! If you think that £11.90 for a distinctly average Sweet & Sour Chicken, Fried Rice and Prawn Crackers is value for money then good luck to you. But frankly, you're daft. I tried the Salt and Pepper ribs as a starter, thinking that at £7.80 they must be quite good. Well, they were, and it was a big portion, but £7.80?! Come off it. We visited in the opening week, and it was chaos. I won't go into too many details and will put what we experienced down to teething troubles, but if you're putting this much investment into a restaurant then perhaps hiring staff with a basic knowledge of rudimentary English might be a good idea? At one point, we were visited by four different waiters trying to understand what exactly our minor complaint was about! Eventually we gave up. So good luck Maxi's. I hope you attract the custom you're looking for, but we'll be making the short drive 'round to the Oriental Pearl instead, which you make look exceedingly good value for money!
Kings Castle, 33 Swinegate, 633 668
The name inspires thoughts of opulence, grandeur, luxury and courtesy. The reality is my arse. This is perhaps the most basic, miniscule and unpretentious restaurant in York. It should, in fact, be a kebab house. A kebab will be cheaper than some of the food on offer, espescially if you drop by for their business lunch which is five courses for thirty five pence, or something like that. This means it is mobbed (although there's only ten people in). Because of this, we once tried their free takeaway delivery service. I think it arrived three hours after we placed the order. WIth the Kings Castle, you seriously get what you pay for.
York's only Thai resaurant as far as I'm aware, so just as well it's a good one. Blink and you'll miss the single door entrance that leads you upstairs to the dining room from the street. It's not too big a place, so if Thai's your thing be sure to book on weekend nights. Thai's not particularly my thing, but I found the food highly aromatic, fresh and nicely presented, pleasantly washed down with some Thai beer. In fact, I'd choose this over any other Chinese/Cantonese in the city, so I can't say fairer than that. Check their website by clicking here.
The first York restaurant to name itself after its prospective clientelle, Jumbo's provides non-stop Chinese buffet all day, every day. Opened in January 2002, the decor is almost canteen style, a simple enough style for a simple concept - you take your seat, then take a plate and help yourself to what's on offer. All the usual Chinese food is there in abundance, Sweet and Sour Chicken, Chicken Curry, Satay Beef, Lemon Chicken, Chow Mein, Spring Rolls, Spare Ribs, Noodles, Fried Rice and so on (with the exception of aromatic duck, which is £2 a head extra). There's also a sweet buffet, with apples, oranges, fruit salad, banana fritters, jelly and ice cream. Even the coffee comes with non-stop refills. It is without doubt the best value Chinese meal in York, all you can eat for £6.99 with occasional specials, like on a Sunday before five when it's £4.99. And it doesn't matter how many times you visit the buffet, because there will always be several hippos up there many more times than you. (In fact, you soon begin to wonder why the staff are all so thin - do they know something we don't? Credit where it's due though, the waiting staff were some of the friendliest and attentive we've come across). All in all, it seems like a winning formula, and I wish them well, but to be honest I'm not really into the concept. The food cools very quickly, some of the less popular dishes look disgusting as they sit and stew and I have a serious problem with some of the greed on display. But I hope they bring some of the more expensive restaurants (Maxi's) into line with the real world.
