Cafe TPT

THE worst service in London. The staff here are pigs.

After wandering around aimlessly in Chinatown for half an hour, my husband and I stumbled upon Café TPT. Oh what a wonderful surprise. We didn’t realize what time it was, and ended up being in a big rush to catch a show. Luckily, they’re so fast! My husband settled on the sweet and sour chicken which was super yummy. The sauce was just the right amount of sweet and sour. The chicken was tender and juicy. Just the right size portion too.
I had the fried chicken lo mein noodles. OMG it was so delicious. I’m craving it again right now. I added some red chili to it to make it extra spicy which was the perfect addition.
I love how Café TPT is so unassuming looking from the outside, then you enter into a tiny authentic delicious café!

Authentic Chinese cuisine that’s as close as home cooking comes in Leicester Square. A bit pricey (£45 for two — two mains, bowl of rice and one drink) and small and cramped interior. Overall, good for dinner if you’re wanting food that reminds you of Hong Kong.

Excellent! We found it through Unilocal and the place didn’t give us much promise but we decide to follow the reviews and it was also full of chinese customer so that was a good sign.
We had the seafood lettuce wraps, king prawns and Scallops on XO sauce and the stir fried chicken… Everything was delicious. Best chinese restaurant I have ever been to. Good price!

This place is the real deal. Matches the best Cantonese restaurants my mother-​in-​law from Hong Kong takes us to in San Francisco. We had perfect roast pork and Hong Kong-​style crispy noodles.

One of my friends recommend me to go there to get great Chinese food and I was not disappointed! Their hot pot is a must! Simply love it :)

I got this tip from a Unilocaler that lived in Hong Kong for a few years. It came with a strong recommendation as one off the most authentic places in town and it certainly delivered. Amazing food that didn’t taste like the usual Chinglish fare you get in this country, complete with lots of specialty choices for the braver (or perhaps just more Asian?) amongst us. The service was a bit rude and impersonal but to be honest that just added to the authenticity. Would recommend for a casual bite to eat.

If you like authentic Hong Kong/​Chinese food, you’ll like this place.
Located in Chinatown, this place is small and has the feel of a typical authentic chinese restaurant with cooking going on in the front near the window with a food elevator thing, and just a few tables on the main floor. (you may have to share a table, or wait, or be willing to eat upstairs).
I sadly don’t remember the menu but what we did order was delicious (see pics for details). We also had some beverages which were good (hot and cold milk tea). The price also is good.
The waiter was nice also and spoke english for those that can’t speak english. That was a nice change cause as every knows, usually asian restaurants don’t give good service lol.
Overall, I really liked this place and recommend it. If your in Chinatown, this is a good choice to grab a meal.

SHORT VERSION:
The food was good (I ordered the duck with orange sauce), it came out fairly quickly. But it was extremely fatty, which I know duck often is, but they only give you chopsticks to eat with so there is no way to remove the fat, which is not the melt in your mouth kind, but the really chewy kind). The pieces are also rather large so having something to cut them in to bite size pieces would be nice.
The service however is awful, while quick, the staff themselves are VERY rude. They don’t talk or really even look at you. They threw the menu on my table as they walked by, without greeting me, and never checked on me or asked if I needed anything the entire meal.
— - -
IN DEPTH VERSION:
I went to Café TPT after reading out it on
. It was recommended as an affordable, delicious place to eat in Chinatown. I myself am not super wealthy, and since I’m staying in the city for a month with no guaranteed income, I am trying to eat affordably. So I tried TPT Café. Never again.
SERVICE:
I walked in to the small establishment. No one greeted me. I finally made eye-​contact with some who worked there and they pointed to a table, they didn’t say anything to me. I sat down and a waitress walked by and literally «tossed» a menu on my table. It landed upside down across the table from me seat. I peeled it off (as the table was still wet from being cleaned and the menu was plastic (so appetizing).
After a few minutes of looking over the menu (which had an 8 pound minimum order, wish that had been mentioned in Timeout’s article), I got the attention of the male waiter (not wanting to speak to the rude Chinese woman who threw me my menu. I guess he was a bus boy because he then got the rude woman to come take my order. I ordered the cheapest thing on the menu that still met the 8 pound minimum requirement (duck in orange sauce). «Thats all?», she said. Clearly unsatisfied with my small order. «Yes.» I said plainly.
WAIT:
The food only took about 10 minutes to come out, but I had to ask for water, no one offered it to me while I waited.
FOOD:
The food came and actually looked and smelled quite appetizing. It was duck with rice covered in orange sauce. The flavor was actually amazing but all of the fat was left on the duck and with only plastic chopsticks to eat with I wasn’t able to remove it. They also cut it in to huge (larger than bite-​size) pieces, and with no knife or fork or anything other than chopsticks I wasn’t able to make the bites smaller.
Like a snake, I attempted to unhinge my jaw to fit the enormous, fatty pieces in to my mouth. Failing every time, I ended up with sauce all over my face and other patrons giggling at me from across the restaurant. I’m usually anti fork and knife at places that intend for you to use chopsticks, but at least prepare the meal in a way that is suitable for this.
PAYMENT:
I asked for the check, and again had it «thrown» on to my able. It was barely legible but considering tax is included I knew it was under 10 pounds, so I left a ten and got the hell out of there. I will not be returning.

Best cheap little noodle shop in China Town. Char kway teoh is particularly good. But my prawn dumpling soup had a bone fragment. What kinda prawns have bones? I suspect piggies!

My favorite place to go in Chinatown. The restaurant is really tiny, so there is usually a queue by the door, but usually half of the people waiting are waiting on takeaway orders.
A HK-​café style (茶餐廳) restaurant, that also does good Malaysian style hawker food. My favorite thing to get here is the Malaysian rice noodles in egg sauce (滑蛋河). They come out in a giant bowl full of seafood, fish cakes, pork, charred rice noodles, swimming in an eggy sauce. They give you a small dish of chilis to dump in as you please. Their roast pork (燒肉) and bbq duck (燒鴨) are also excellent.
My only disappointment is that they do not open before noon on weekends. This isn’t any different than most of the other Chinatown restaurants, but it still annoys me. Aren’t Chinese restaurant owners typically known for being industrious? If I find myself lurking around Chinatown before noon and starving, I’ll usually go next door to Old Town 97.

Great place for some some lovely Chinese food. I don’t really know how to classify it — it’s a weird combination between a café and a restaurant but I do like it. Food is amazing and quite delicious with some minor things that need polishing. The staff can be a bit forgetful but I guess that’s forgivable since I received so many apologies when they misplace my order.
Anyway, good place to eat in Chinatown.

We were out late on our first night in London and as we were looking for food we wandered into Chinatown. We decided to have a bite here. We had dumplings, curry laksa, and glass noodles. The food was good and inexpensive. The crispy pork over rice looked delicious as well. I don’t know how this compares to other restaurants nearby but it seemed to have a decent offering of Chinese/​Singaporean food.

If you’ve never been to Hong Kong and wanted a little taste of it, this is the place to be. The restaurant front with its narrow opening, roast duck hanging in the window, hot broth steaming next to it… but that’s somewhat normal nowadays for a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown right? But once you sit down, you know you’re in the right place. A menu tossed at you with the expectation that you already know what you want, order quick, eat quick, get out quick. Oh and the noise. Don’t expect to hear yourself think, let alone a decent conversation with your meal mate. But what really hits the core is their fantastic food. Admittedly, the food they serve is not actually always found Ina typical HK café but whatever they serve is good.
Must have? Sichuan style string beans for £7.50. Best I have ever had. Also mango sago with grapefruit and bean curd for £4.50. What! HK dessert at its finest. And the portion is giant (comes in a little cute bucket/​pail)
Should have? At least one sizzling stone pot dish. No not your typical HK dish but they have a whole listto select from and you simply can’t go wrong. We were recommended the aubergine/​eggplant with fish sauce and minced pork — delicious. About £9.
Things you also should know:
— menu on wall that’s not on paper
— they have a pretty large seating area upstairs great for groups
— minimum £8 per person charge
— 10% service charge added on top of ur bill
— open until 1am!!!
4.5 stars. We came here two nights in a row after out HK guest told us she came here two days in a row herself.

It isn’t the prettiest place — plain, tiled floors, cream walls, crammed with as many tables as they can fit into the space.
However, many customers are keen on their dessert menu, which sells regular sweet beancurd (chilled) for £3.50, and everything else at either £4 or £4.50. All the desserts are liquid-​based, and are served in aluminium-​lined wooden tubs — deep ones!
Although there are many choices, some dishes differ from another just by the addition of a fruit, or sago jellies. For example, the regular sweet beancurd can come in mango ‘soup’, with red bean, or with fruit, among several other additions and variations. It’s like how salad is basically lettuce, cucumber and dressing, but the British have created Niçoise, Wardour, Caesar, which are basically additions or renditions of what is, essentially, giraffe chow.
I ordered a tempting ‘Mango & Coconut with Black Glutinous Rice & Sago’. The mango & coconut refers to a thin, creamy ‘soup’ with both flavours. It was served cold as well, and very delicious and refreshing! However, due to the use of coconut milk and the seemingly endless depth of the dessert tub, it’s a good idea to come here with an empty stomach.
Café TPT is definitely a recommended place to visit with friends for a taste of good quality Chinese dessert!

Small chinese joint. It was pretty pricy but I chose it because it looked packed and I wanted roasted duck and this place offered a quarter. I didn’t want half or whole. It was 8 pounds for a quarter of a duck, what a rip off. It was okay too. Wasn’t the best duck I’ve tried and definitely wasn’t too fresh. Probably been hanging there for awhile. Other food looks good though.

I love TPT!
Yes, its sort of a dump, yes the staff don’t really like anyone, yes, the toilets are tiny and have buckets collecting water from leaking pipes, but this place does the best cheap Cantonese in London.
The beef brisket curry is probably one of the world’s finest — i have eaten this all over, and my friends from HK and I all agree that this is better than anywhere else we’ve ever tried it. Seriously, if you want a fantastic meal have a beef curry. The char kway tuey is good as well, and the beef fried rice can be fantastic.
I think they excel in malay chinese dishes despite front of house being cantonese!

Sometimes, restaurants can’t win. On the one hand, I’m bored with Sino-​English generic menus you see in all the main Gerrarad Street restaurants in Chinatown catering for tourists. On the other hand, when I see a restaurant like TPT Café offer food from places as afar as Malaysia to Macau, my suspicious radar comes on as to whether the chef in the kitchen can really have such a broad range of cooking experience to do all the dishes on the menu justice.
However, with the best English summer rain beating down on me yesterday, I took a hasty and spontaneous decision to take one for the Unilocal family and eat here. From the choice of Malaysian dishes including quite traditional dishes such as bak kut teh (pork ribs in a medicinal stock), my eye was drawn to the £8 laksa. Really? £8 for a laksa? Right, the challenge was on.
I wonder if they chose the term café because the seating is tight — certainly a lot of breath-​holding is required to pass between some of the tables! The waitresses were also a bit grumpy for some reason though this just reminds me of the good old days of being shouted at by Chinese waitresses in Chinatown! Yes, really! A bit like John McEnroe, people used to go to places like Wong Kei on Wardour Street to experience the abuse!
I had wanted to try their butter soft shell crab but sadly, you have to order 2 of these as a minimum. So, I settled for spicy wonton, which probably represents the fiery Sichuan part of the menu. The wontons arrived looking appropriately red in colour and covered in chopped fresh chilli. There was the promised chilli capsicum heat but not much more flavour other than the sour of the vinegar in the sauce.
Then, the piece de resistance. A large bowl of laksa arrived. Now, a philosophical question. How much can you tinker with a dish, perhaps in a misguided attempt to even improve it, before you lose the heart and soul of a dish? Laksa is a famous hawker (street) food dish found in south east Asian countries like Malaysia and Singapore where noodles and small amounts of meat, seafood and vegetables come in a rich, spicy coconut based broth.
I can see how TPT are trying to justify the £8 price tag — they added some premium ingredients like green-​lipped mussels served in the shell for effect as well as large prawns. However, in adding other things like French beans, the dish has turned into posh pseudo-​laksa. The broth has nice seafood flavour but lacked the depth of the best laksa by omitting ingredients such as galangal (wild ginger), candle nuts and belacan (shrimp paste).
Street food is best left to its humble but flavoursome roots — the European equivalent would be like trying to turn French toast into pain grillé a la francais wouldn’t work!
I didn’t have the requisite stomach room left to try their very tempting range of beancurd desserts.
A noble try by TPT and I applaud them for trying something new but I’d prefer a cheaper bowl of more authentic laksa. I may be back for dessert though

Most amazing BBQ pork and mango sago dessert. Café TPT never fails!