Black Bean Chinese Restaurant

Upon arriving in London, I surprised myself by first stopping in Chinatown for some Asian food to settle the jet lag. On the edge of Soho, Chinatown has extensive Asian food options, so it can be difficult to navigate and determine which restaurant is better than the rest. My family and I ventured into Black Bean, and ordered congee, wonton noodles, and dim sum.
The sliced fish congee felt really homey, just simply cooked with ginger and green onions as well as sliced fish. The one downside was that the fish was definitely not as fall-​apart tender as congee I usually have, and the fish itself didn’t taste that fresh. The wonton noodles were average as well, with a balance of wonton to noodle. Overall, the food was not terrible, but it also did not exceed my expectations of what I would find in London Chinatown.

After freezing for 2 hours in the harsh london environment I stumbled upon this restaurant in London’s China town. It had the most reasonable prices and most easily read menu, so my friend and I went in to warm up and fill our bellies.
To start I ordered a hot and sour soup which was bland in the start, but after adding soy sauce it tasted great! My friend ordered a chicken spring roll which was amazing! For mains we shared a chicken and cashew plate (tasty and recommended) and a friend noodles with met and seafood (amazing!). The portion sizes for the mains were pretty big and could easily be shared. The only real let down was the fact they made you buy rice on the side which isn’t normal in America because you are just given a side of rice with every order anyway.
Good place to try if you are looking for good Chinese food in the soho district. Overall we spent £27.60 with drinks, starters, and mains. There were plenty of set menus for groups of people which looked decent if you are ever up for that as well… Which I plan on trying next time! :)

Fast service & huge selection, but the food was just mediocre due to saltiness (and I’m a salt-​alcoholic) & greasiness.

Those of you who have lived in London for awhile and frequented Chinatown may have noticed the relatively quick turnover of restaurants. There are some old stalwarts like Wong Kei, where tourists go to literally get abused but new restaurants seem to come and go at quite a rate. I’ve heard on the grapvine that it may be for tax purposes but who knows?
Black Bean has opened on the site of Tai Ka Lok, one of my favourite hole in the wall places in Chinatown where I could go for a plate of cheap BBQ meat and rice. They had a nice touch in always serving a bowl of free soup of the day. Sadly, it shut and Black Bean has finally risen from its ashes quite a few months later.
Well, it’s no longer a hole in the wall and with decorative features such as cool carved stone dragon motifs on the wall, I think they’re aiming to go a ittle more upmarket. However, happily, their prices are more mid-​range than upper range like Plum Valley next door.
Like a lot of restaurants in Chinatown these days, they offer a variety of cuisines — dim sum is available during the day alongside the mainstream Chinese dishes.
I ordered beef brisket noodles in soup to test how they cook basic dishes, which is an important foundation for restaurants. This was nice with the meltingly tender brisket sitting in a flavourful soup alongside nicely chewy thin egg noodles.
I couldn’t resist some dim sum and ordered ‘fish fin dumplings’. I’m not sure if dim sum restaurants are bowing to political correctness but these used to be shark’s fin dumplings and with shark hunting under the spotlight, they may be having to change the composition of the dumpling or they may be merely changing the name so as not to offend people with shark conservation sensibilities. These were nice with the meaty robustness of the dumplings being enhanced with some chilli oil.
I also ordered some thing I hadn’t seen before on a dim sum menu — deep fried bean curd skin wrapped glutinous rice and duck. Haha, I sometimes forget to let my sensible head rule and let my stomach loose. It tasted exactly as described! Glutinous rice and duck usually comes steamed in bamboo leaves and honestly, the deep fried bean curd didn’t really add anything to the traditional way of serving it.
Black Bean has plonked itself right into the mid-​range of Chinese restaurants on Chinatown’s main tourist drag of Gerrard Street and while pleasant, I probably won’t return as it doesn’t have anything to particularly distinguish it from the crowd. I will miss Tai Ka Lok