Sichuan Folk

Having booked a table a couple of days before we went meant that I spent the next couple of days literally daydreaming of the food I was about to devour. How could any place live up to my imagination. It did. The waiter gave us some advice on our meal chooses so we swapped some which proved to be a good move. The squid starter was amazing. We ordered quite a bit so I can’t remember all the dishes but we got a variety of meats plus a prawn dish & a veg dish. All very good. Arni must have come up with his line after visiting this place as I will be back!

I am always searching for some delicious spicy Sichuan food.
On the night that I came here, the tables were almost completely full! We could hardly get a seat. They made some room for us thankfully and we didn’t really have to wait. When we left, I saw that the place was just totally packed and no available tables at all, so perhaps if you’re going you should get a reservation to be safe.
Anyways, the food was not bad. It was not that spicy actually although it did have some authentic qualities to it, it just was not quite there. We got the spicy cold beef was good, but like I said it was good but there wasn’t enough flavor. I think the twice cooked pork was better but wish that they would give us more than 4 little buns. The dumplings were not bad, but no spicy sauce at all. They were out of the herbal tea… and I was like «noooo» That is a must when eating spicy! But it was ok since I am trying to stay skinny I just got water. :P
I saw some other people getting the hot pot which looked interesting.
The waiters are all very nice and helpful. The restaurant inside looks very clean and beautiful, which is rare in London!

I wanted to do a Chinese New Year dinner gathering with friends, and this place came up as one of the few restaurants in London where you can do hot pot. Who knew there were such limited options? When I tried booking online, I could only do it for a maximum party size of 6, but I followed up with the restaurant to extend the reservation for 10 people. They also have this strange policy where online bookings are cash only, whereas if you book by other method (presumably by phone), you can pay by card. I’d recommend the latter for convenience of payment, but I suppose it is rather convenient to be able to book online as well. We were given a round table in the back of the restaurant, perfect for a social gathering of friends, and two large hotpots that had two flavours in each. They were even able to accommodate one of my friend’s dietary restrictions by making one of them vegetarian broth.
The deal is £21.80 for all you can eat, which started off with two heaping trays with all the classics you can think of, including some impressive and interesting additions such as fresh crab, mussels, and spam. You can then ask for top ups of whatever you want, and we got at least 2 more platters of lamb and spam. The only complaint we had is that the imitation crab was not taken out of the plastic wrapping, and it was a pain to do that by hand. There is an array of sauce ingredients in one corner of the restaurant, and you can help yourself to additional spoons, bowls, napkins, etc. Service is incredibly quick and when we ordered beers or top ups, we received them almost instantly. The staff were also extremely attentive in filling up our hot pot with additional hot water. I could not have asked for better service, which is almost surprising to find in a Chinese restaurant!
I’d definitely come again. We all ate to our heart’s delight, and the food and service were both top notch.

Came here in search of the numbing pepper and spicy food. Left feeling like ate so much oil and salt.
Here is what we ordered:
Dumpings — pretty good, could be served at a higher temperature.
Smacked cucumber — delicious peanut sauce
Twice cooked pork — came with 4 baos (steamed buns), tasty but soo OILY
Spare ribs — fried in a batter and tasty — but make sure you have water or beer to wash it down!
Seabass — fun to see the whole fried, fish looking like it’s trying to jump out of the dish. It was a sweet chili flavor. It was crunchy and tasted good, but there isn’t much meat to the fish.
Overall — the dinner was pretty salty and oily. I felt inspired to do a cleanse the next day.

Had the hot pot, 21.5 quid per person, can have as much as you want. The hot pot was nice, had pretty much everything you’d normally expect :)

My review here has to reinforce Uli’s sound judgement written below.
This is a Chinese place that reflects the flavours of traditional Sichuan cuisine. Surrounded by ridiculous hipster vintage clothing shops bordering Shoreditch /​Liverpool Street it’s certainly less in your face unlike other places nearby which adds to its charm.
If you are going in without a Chinese speaker that’s fine because the menu is pretty clear. My standard go to items are the Gong Bao chicken and the fried beans without pork. Those beans are heavenly — one of my former colleagues introduced me to it and I sometimes try to recreate them when home but I just can’t! There must be some chef secret. It’s basically beans and garlic :) simple but effective.
Other items worth recommending is the tender sichuanese fish not to be confused with a fried fish they offer which is a little heavy on the oil (minus one star)
Ultimately for good authentic Chinese food at reasonable prices — worth checking out.

Maybe closer to 3.5 stars — I’d have to go back and give it another whirl.
I had the dumplings to start but they were a bit mushy and the flavour was good but maybe just not as strong as I would like. Then I had the spicy dry chicken (with bones) which was also pretty good but they over-​fried the chicken a bit and it was just a real pita to eat given all the bones. Some fault goes to me though because I was warned…
These places are making me really look forward to going back to NYC and getting my Chinese food there — its just on another level.
Overall the staff was on it and very nice and I did like what I ate but I may not go back…

I have had Sichuan Folk three times now and I will safely say that it is the best Chinese food I have ever eaten. They have some pretty exotic things on the menu, but the twice cooked pork and everything I’ve ever had with the lip-​tingling sauce have been like new experiences.
Maybe there are other spots that are better, but out say 100 Chinese restaurants I have been too in my life, this easily tops them all.

We found this on Unilocal and it’s a very decent Chinese restaurant in Spitalfields that favours-​as per the name-​Sichuan cuisine over the far more staple Cantonese. I was therefore intrigued to try it as Sichuan is far more prevalent over the pond. The scene from «Beetlejuice» came to mind as I entered where the lady, having moved to the sticks Upstate, remarks when picking at her Chinese takeaway“what, they don’t do Sichuan here!”
I was a little put off by one review describing it as a slightly basic interior, but whilst hardly China Tang it is a pleasant and fairly minimal interior with no harsh lighting. We arrived not long before closing but service was still very friendly and helpful. I confess to having an irrational hatred of menus such as the one here which show pictures of the dishes-​none in my view look very appealing. Anyway, the menu itself has a real emphasis on meat and offal, though still does seafood. I was going to try the frogs’ legs and will certainly return to do so. However, for now we played it safe. I was gratified to receive a response from our waiter that I had «ordered well» .
To start we had two lots of the dumplings-​vegetarian and pork. Both were excellent but I particularly liked the pork ones which were rich and spicy (the pork was nice and lean). For mains, we had chicken in peanuts (I know, not exactly adventurous!) and the double cooked pork as well as peashoots and rice. The pork came with four dumplings and we were told to use them by breaking them open and stuffing the pork inside. I thought it all excellent, but I particularly liked the chicken. The pork was good, though it had a little fat which I’m not massively keen on-​still very flavourful though. Overall, a great and reasonably priced experience. Somewhere some frogs are walking around with legs that I will shortly devour at Sichuan folk.

You can tell a Chinese restaurant is good when:
1. The staff is Chinese
2. The portions are huge
This place covers them both, but I didn’t have such a nice impression when I first walked in. A friend brought me here yesterday as we were both starving and when it come to eating, we eat like hungry wolves.
Don’t expect luxury or fancy décor, as the interior looks pretty simple. This is why I wasn’t so sure that I’d be enjoying my dinner, but my friend told me to wait until the food comes.
The staff speaks English, even though the waitress struggled a little to understand our order, but it was fine.
I got excited when the portions came that quick and hell, was I hungry. When I saw the enormous portions, I knew it was going to be special.
We ordered noodles with shredded chicken, chicken with Chinese mushrooms and some salad with the most delicious dressing. It is all about the gravy and the combination of flavours. I was obsessed with the noodles and I wouldn’t mind to eat them every day. We ate as much as we could and we couldn’t even finish all the meals. The friendly waitress asked us if we wanted to get the food packed for home, but eating food hours after it is served it’s just not my thing.
They don’t offer desserts though, but I think the main meals are filling enough. This is a place you must go only when you are very hungry as you are going to eat A LOT.

Came here for lunch with a bunch of friends after visiting the Terry Pratchett mural at the Pillow Cinema.
The staff were friendly despite the fact that there were 27 of us and we turned up without reservations. They suggested the «tourist menu» which meant that for a fixed price a head, they brought out a variety of dishes (after taking note if special dietary requirements).
Other than one dish (with aubergines intended to simulate fish), everything was lovely. Spicing was excellent. Will definitely visit again when in the area.

Brick Lane. Great place for a Chinese.
Sichuan Folk sits on Hanbury Street amongst hundreds of great food places and thousands of not so good Indian restaurants.
It’s an unassuming place. Actually the room is really quite cold and functional. bare walls, blocks of tables. Not much to excite curiosity or make you want to hang around too long. Unpromising.
But the menu is full of authentic Sichuan fare which really excites, making up for the dull room. Cloud Ear Fungus, tripe, pigs trotters, cuttlefish, frogs legs. The list of stuff which will either have you screwing your face up or feeling ever so adventurous goes on and on. It’s very similar to Ba Shan in Soho, a place that has built a great reputation for similar fare and blistering spiciness (I’ve reviewed it on here somewhere).
We ordered smacked cucumber, salt and chilli squid (does anybody not order the salt and chilli squid? If you exist let me tell you you’re not quite right), twice cooked pork, duck cooked with beer, a tofu hot pot, some dumplings and a chicken dish that escapes me although it wasn’t the ‘numbing hot chicken wings’ (actual name) which I’ve had at Ba Shan and can confirm the name is most apt.
Everything that came was delicious. They pride themselves on their hot pots and the tofu one and the duck one were really interesting and intense. A real mixture of flavours and texture. Our server only too happy to explain stuff to us like how to eat the twice cooked pork which came with light fluffy pancake type buns which you use to build your delicious chinese sarnie.
This food is certainly challenging in parts (deep fried pig’s intestines anyone?) but with 20 pages of menu to get through even the most squeamish are certain to find something exciting and memorable that they can stomach.
If you’re sick of the Indian restaurants hawking their muck and want a haven from the bearded groovy wordbenders that populate this area, dive in here where you’ll find it full of people — mostly chinese when we walked in — who are just here for the food. No gimmicks, no razzle dazzle, just lots of great unexpected, ferocious cooking. So authentic are the tastes I even ventured a small ‘ni hao’ as I left. Yes, yes it means ‘hello’ but I hope it showed I felt a little bit more Chinese than I did when I walked in. I reckon this lot could make my old Adidas shell toes taste good given a few spices and a bit of time. I may even try the tripe when I go back.

One of my favourite places in London.
Twice cooked pork is mouth-​wateringly good, as are the signature dumplings.
Don’t be put off by some of the stranger things on the menu as the helpful staff are more than willing to recommend great dishes.
The beef cooked with chilli is one of my favourites too, yum.

Amazing food! It was as good as the sichuan food i used to get in Shanghai. Service was also fast and very friendly. And the price was 30−50% cheaper than other Sichuan places in Soho. Will definitely go back and will probably not go to other places now for spicy chinese food.

I came here with friends and half of us ordered «hot pot» dish. Which is £20 per head. What do you get for that money?
A pot of boiling water with some vegetables inside and chicken stock. And a huge pile of mixed meat, veg and fish.
Problem starts when everyone who is new to this starts to through all types of food inside.
Fish becomes overbooked and falls apart.
In the end the whole thing becomes a tasteless mess and they don’t even provide you with a bowl to eat it like a soup. But you wouldn’t want to.
Staff are not helpful at all. And all out food came at completely different times so some finished and others were still struggling with hot pot.
Never coming here again.

Has potential to be some of the most flavorful food you can find in London. I think they toned down the spice level, which I really wish they hadn’t. Next time, be sure to ask for extra spicy.
I had the twice cooked pork which was quite flavorful and had a bit of a kick (although I would have preferred spicier). The steamed buns it came with were a bit tough and the plate was a bit oily. However, I would order this again.
The signature dumplings were pretty solid. The sesame vinegar soy sauce was a nice touch but I would have preferred some ginger and Chilis in there too. Be warned that it tastes like the dumplings have a bit of cilantro in them. Some people really can’t stand cilantro. I am usually one of those people but the taste was mild and was cut by the sauce. I would order these again and ask for some Chilis to add.
A couple behind me ordered the hot pot and they were really enjoying it.
The pictures for every item on the menu was helpful — makes trying something new a little bit easier.

We’ve been here for the all-​you-​can-​eat hot pot as well as ordered a la carte off the menu.
Coming from New York, we’ve had some pretty good Sichuan meals as well as some good AYCE hot pot. Thus, the cold London winter elicited a craving for some hot pot. A quick search on Unilocal showed that for central London there were only a few options. We had been referred to Sichuan Folk for their a la carte dishes but when we saw AYCE hot pot on the menu, we were sold.
For £19.80 per person, they’ll keep serving you until you’re ready to burst! Now, in NY you can get AYCE hot pot with AYCD Budweiser/​soda for $ 27. So, it isn’t as cheap as NY and we didn’t get the drinks but, from my research, it does seem to be one of the cheaper AYCE hot pot places in London (most start at £20-£25). The one thing that I didn’t love was the fact that they didn’t have sa cha sauce (Asian BBQ sauce). How could that be?! That’s a staple for any hot pot meal and something I definitely always pile on! Adam has suggested I bring my own. Next winter I’ll definitely have to see if they’ve added it to their sauces. Fingers crossed!
In terms of the soup base, we went with a «ying yang» pot with the traditional hot and spicy on one side and the more mellow chicken broth based on the other.
The AYCE hot pot did come on a huge plate with a good variety of offerings — sliced beef, pork, chicken, fish balls, variety of greens, imitation crab meat, noodles, various mushrooms, fish slices and shrimp. I will say that these were some of the best AYCE shrimp either of us had ever had. We don’t expect high quality shrimp when we go to AYCE but these were really good! The dish had a couple of things that we just weren’t feeling — lunch meat, mussels (obviously frozen) and wish we had asked about what came on the plate since at other places you can opt out of options. We had actually also ordered some appetizers, we were starving when we got there, so were down for the count after one plate. Sad, but we definitely will know better the next time.
The other couple of times we’ve come to have their a la carte Sichuan dishes. For London, it’s quite good. Sometimes I find food in London bland so I was worried that the spices would be muted but they definitely don’t hold back! We started with a recommendation from our server, the Sichuan-​folk tripe salad (£9.80). If you love sichuan peppercorns with that numbing sensation this is the dish for you. Offal isn’t for everyone but the tripe was quite nice and was mixed with some crunchy strips of celery to give some crunch to the dish. There was some fresh chopped chiles as well as some cilantro sprinkled through. Definitely something different from the norm and quite a bright and refreshing dish.
We ordered Sichuan-​folk cumin lamb (£10.80) which came with 4 steamed buns (the type that come with Peking duck). This was a cumin bomb! The little lamb nuggets were heavily covered in cumin and deep fried. Placing some of the lamb in the bun helped to cut some of the savoriness of the dish. I found this dish slightly too salty and after all the buns were finished off we requested some rice because I couldn’t eat it on it’s own.
Like we do at every Sichuan restaurant, we ordered the Ma po tofu with pork mince (£8.50) and found it quite good! The nice thing about Sichuan Folk’s version is that it isn’t overly oily while still having a nice kick. The tofu is firmer than some other versions I’ve had but this was a really great version. We get it every time we go here.
Another dish we usually order at Sichuan restaurants was the dry-​fried green beans with pork mince (£8.50) — such a great dish. Fried green beans with minced pork and pickled mustard greens, I love this dish! Also, many places don’t actually get rid of the ends of the green beans — such a small thing, I know — but was a nice touch!
There have been occasions when I’ve had the traditional hot and sour soup (£4.80) which was quite a good rendition. Good balance of white pepper with vinegar and a nice smattering of tofu, black fungus mushroom, bamboo shoots. I would order this again but the price only comes with one small bowl so I did find this a bit expensive!
Adam and I love dumplings so we have ordered the signature dumplings (£4.80) which I would definitely recommend ordering! Made in-​house, the skins were delicate and the slightly spicy and vinegary soy sauce it was bathed in was a perfect complement.
We’ve been here 3 – 4 times in the past 6 months and it is our current go-​to when we want Sichuan! The flavors seem much more clean than other Sichuan restaurants. Additionally, it is much less oily than other places. I did find the portion size to price ratio a bit skewed and would have preferred bigger portions based on the prices; however, at the same time the food is SO good! We will be back again and again! If you’re looking for quality Sichuan, you should definitely check out Sichuan Folk!

The menu had so many different things that we wanted to try that it was a struggle to decide on what to order. It’s definitely a spot worth going to if you have a lot of people so you can try an array of things.
We started with a mixed appetiser plate which included green beans, chicken and bamboo shoots in some sort of peanut sauce, short ribs in a sweet sauce with sesame seeds, some sort of beef jerky strips in chilli oil and peanuts. All were really good. The beef was particularly interesting.
Our waiter recommended deep fried fish with bell peppers. The dish had a slight kick to it and the fish fillets were coated in a nice salty batter. Really yummy. We ordered some tofu to go with it which wasn’t anything special. I could have easily made this at home.
The service was great as well. Everyone speaks English and were happy to have a chat about the menu. I’d definitely return to try some more! Beware, the restaurant gets very very loud if it’s crowded.

This place delivered some solid Chinese food on a cold winter’s day.
The signature dumplings were a tasty start to the meal – not your boring run-​of-​the mill dumplings with sauce but ones that were bursting with flavor and scallions.
I loved the twice cooked pork with the soft buns, good green beans with pork (a house specialty) and prawns with cashews.
It all went down well and was more than plenty for 2 people. It was slightly pricey but it was really good, very filling and served with a smile.
Bring cash.
The worst part about the meal was leaving so full and then heading to Brick Lane to be harassed by people wanting us to come in to their Indian restaurants.

Bester Chinese in dem wir jemals gegessen haben! Dazu freundliche Bedienung und angemessene Preise. Kein Vergleich zu dem geschmacklichen 0−8−15 Einheitsbrei den man sonst in Deutschland überwiegend bekommt.

Thanks to Katie B and Rob C for introducing me to this restaurant a few weekends ago. As soon as I spotted the non nonsense menu offerings, I knew this had to be the venue for the Unilocal Extreme Eating Event 3.0
Tonight, 8 interpid Unilocalers headed down to challenge our tastebuds with a healthy dose of chilli-​rich Sichuan food and also unusual body parts and ingredients. The menu helpfully has pictures of most of the dishes (though disappointingly there wasn’t one of the fried loofah and we were too scared to order it at £7.80). The staff speak excellent English and will help you navigate the more challenging parts of the menu if necessary
In the tradition of YEEEs, we ordered by everyone shouting out dishes which they liked the sound of and once again, we ended up with a great variety of dishes. Yinnie C won the starter round with her cloud ear fungus mushroom dish though the offal slices and thousand year old egg were great too
For mains, I loved the pork knuckle — some may find it a bit fatty but that’s perfect for me, the crispy frog legs (I initially thought it tasted like chicken and then I saw the small bones) and the ma po tofu
Everything had distinct flavour. The heat levels were enough to numb the tongue occasionally but never hot enough to wipe out your tastebuds
We left, suitably filled up and challenged though not as much as Titthankar D has been in the past — he showed us a picture of fried guinea pig that he had eaten before
Roll on YEEE 4.0. Hot pot, anyone?