Had a great meal last night
A bit, well, a lot OT, but after last night I feel like giving up cooking altogether so "Come Dine With Me", becomes "Come round mine and we'll get a cab and eat out".

Went to "Green Tea", a new-ish chinese restaurant, Burton road, Didsbury, south Manchester.

It was one of those rare dining experiences where I *knew* with every mouthful that I was eating something that I could never make as well myself if I lived to be a million years old.

Starters:

Her - Salt and pepper chicken skewers.
Moi - Wonton soup.

The wonton soup is a standard, but the broth was tasty and light, the wontons were tiny little home made affairs, rather than the "bought from the chinese supermarket frozen in a slab" ones that you normally get. The two complemented each other perfectly.

The chicken skewers were out of this world. Crisp on the outside, juicy and succulent on the inside, with a subtle, growing chili tang that grew hot, but not too hot, allied with lovely garlicy undertones and general peppery-ness.

Mains:

Her - Szechuan chilli chicken. (A pattern emerges - she loves hot food!)

Me - Beef with vegetables in black bean sauce.

This was accompanied by some fried rice and some plain chow mein to fill in the gaps.

Her chilli chicken was authentic Szechuan - it actually contained real Szechuan pepper which is so fiercely hot it kind of numbs your mouth for a couple of seconds and then the rich flavours come flooding through. A triumph.

My beef was beautifully tender - on the menu, it said just "beef", not "fillet steak", and the price reflected this, but you could cut the damn stuff with a spoon. The sauce was dark, complex and pungent with the fermented beans to the fore and the veggies were cooked but still full of life and freshness. At this point I was wishing I had a larger stomach in order to fit more in.

The rice was as good as rice gets with a nice nuttyness of sesame oil somewhere in there, while the noodles were al dente with onion and crisp beansprouts mixed in.

Truth be told, we'd have got away with ordering 1 rice, rather than 2 rice plus noodles, but they kindly put our leftovers in a doggy-bag - well doggy container - to take home and zap, once the gut busting feeling had subsided.

Cost? above-mentioned food + 4 bottles of beer, approx £40. Cheaper than anything comparable in Manc's Chinatown (eg. Litlle Yang Sing), more expensive than local takeaways, but far, far better. You pays for quality!

Sorry to come over all "Lloyd Grossman", but this was the finest dining experience I've had in a long time. Bizarrely, the place has got a couple of shocking writeups in the local press, while everyone I know who's been there raves about it, much like I'm doing here.

The waitress mentioned that they're going for a more home-cooking approach, rather than merely emulating the standard brit-chinese restaurant fare, which may have offended the reviewer's jaded palate...

If you live nearby, give it a try. You will not be disappointed. This place deserves to succeed.
(apologies_for_length, Fri 19 Sep 2008, 11:25, 1 reply)

I live in Fallowfield
and you've convinced me. Anniversary dinner is now a toss-up between Greens and Green Tea!
(Holloway_Girl To err is to be human, to be a fool is to believe, Fri 19 Sep 2008, 21:40, closed)