For the 4 year “anniversary” of when Sandra and I met we decided to have a dinner to celebrate. Normally we would have tried for a Chinese restaurant and crispy duck but since I chose Royal China Club where prices are, shall we say, slightly elevated (crispy duck at RCC is £22 when you could get it for about half that at any decent Chinese restaurant) we opted for something outside our usual suspects.

Royal China Club has been on my list for a while and though I mainly wanted to try their yum-cha dishes some of their mains took my fancy too. When we got to the restaurant I was disappointed that they weren’t offering the yum-cha menu at dinner (some Chinese restaurants do) so I would have to come back again to try those dishes out. 🙂

We had our booking for 6.30. I thought the restaurant would still be quiet at that stage but not deathly empty like it actually was. We suspected the credit crunch has something to do with it. Still, it didn’t stop the restaurant having lots of waiters and waitresses milling about.

The dining room is separated from the door by a long line of big aquarium filled with live sea creatures from crabs to fish to lobsters to eels. Tables are surprisingly spread out which is a welcome change to the usual crammed atmosphere of typical Chinese restaurants. But Royal China Club is no typical Chinese restaurant, especially if the menu is anything to go by. Choices include Lobster and Spinach soup, Pan Fried King’s Scallop with Foie Gras, Frog’s Leg Stir Fried with Wind Dried Ham, and Fried Ho Fun with Veal. Prices are not exactly typical either with pots of ordinary jasmine tea being £4.80 per person! rather than the usual £1-£1.50! They do have a rather extensive tea menu actually and in addition to a range of potted teas you can also get a wide variety of ice teas and flower teas (the teas where you have a tea ball which becomes a flower.)

Sandra and I decided on a nearly all seafood menu tonight starting with Salt and Pepper Squid (£12) and Frilly Prawn Balls (£18.) The Salt and Pepper Squid was absolutely divine – an interesting twist it had fried leaves of some sort as the garnish. I think it was a basil but it worked well. The squid was perfectly cooked – light, tender and with just the right amount of seasoning. The Frilly Prawn Balls turned out to be four giant prawns deepfried with a nest of noodles and served with some sort of vaguely sweet and sour sauce. It looked really pretty but actually I was surprised the prawns were slightly overcooked and a little tough. Oh yes and before they brought our starters out we were served an amuse bouche of some sort of fried tofu skin and with radish. Nice touch.

The waitresses are very insistent on serving you. Each time they brought a dish they wanted to serve us both the first spoonful. Though of course me being me I wanted to take a photo of the dish first! We were finishing up the starters and then the mains were being delivered as we were still eating our final mouthfuls. I felt a bit rushed to be honest. Something I was surprised at in such an obviously high class restaurant such as this.

For mains we went with Tempura Lobster in Creamy Sauce covered in Crispy Rice £35.00 (a chef summer special) and Sauted Veal on Skewers with Lemongrass £16.50. I loved the lobster because it reminded me of rock shrimp tempura dishes I’ve had in Japanese restaurants in the US. Mmmm … delish. Sandra took a particular liking to the veal which I did enjoy but was a touch on the salty side. We also had the pleasure of the smallest serves of rice I’ve ever seen. The more to savour the ingredients in the main dishes I guess!

We thought that whilst we were spending we might as well go ahead and order some dessert as well. Sandra tried the Lychee Jelly with Fresh Rose and I went with the Coconut Moss and Black Sesame. I absolutely adore black sesame. If you don’t know what my dessert is supposed to be its basically a rice flour dumpling filled with a warm oozy black sesame liquid filling. To my pleasure it was cooked perfectly – but in a place like Royal China Club I wouldn’t expect anything less.

Overall we had a lovely time at dinner. The service was generally on the good side but at 15% service I would expect that they would be a lot better at refilling our glasses of tap water when our glasses got low and that food, and subsequently we, would not be rushed. Food-wise, other than what I thought was a slight hiccup with the prawns at the start, it was pretty bang on. There was obviously great attention paid to the detail in the dishes which were perfectly balanced and tasty. Was it worth the price? I would say so though I don’t imagine that coming to dine here for me would be an everyday thing. A restaurant to be saved maybe for a special occasion … say an anniversary? 😉