Link Measham Cantonese Restaurant

About five or six years ago, the Link was my top pick for eating out in our area, then it inexplicably closed and changed into a succession of Indian restaurants. Don’t get me wrong fine restaurants in themselves, but the Link was the best Cantonese restaurant I’ve ever eaten in. I was so pleased to see that the original owners had returned and reopened it again, but there’s always the worry, would it really be as good as I remembered?
Set on the bottom half of Measham’s main street, the Link is a renovated pub, with copious parking to the rear. A decent sized restaurant, with seating suitable for all sizes of party. As it was a quiet Thursday night, we managed to get the round table (more social) with the ‘Lazy Susan’ in the middle; great fun was had by all rotating the dishes around the table. The service was as friendly and helpful as I remembered with prawn crackers to munch on whilst you peruse the huge menu. Being rather lazy, we went for the set meal C for 4. Set meals range from around £15 per person for the Vegetarian to about £25 for the full works banquet.
The first course was a platter to share with sesame toast, won-​tons, chicken satay, barbecue ribs, seaweed and spring rolls, all very tasty and a great start to the meal, the chicken satay being particularly flavoursome. The next course was superbly cooked aromatic duck, eloquently served up by the owner; perfectly cooked duck, shredded spring onion and cucumber, with sweet plum sauce — perfect!
The course pacing was perfect, 15 – 20 minutes between each course, the TsingTao was flowing down nicely, the signs that the Link had returned with a bang, were good. The main courses were the only thing that could knock this from a 5 star rating, thankfully the four dishes that came with our set meal were largely a triumph, the beef in black bean sauce, just melted in the mouth, the two chicken dishes were bursting with flavour and the seafood dish in a birds nest, had a good variety with scallops, mussels and squid, but lacked a little flavour. The large portion of Yung Chow Rice that came with the main dishes complimented each dish perfectly too.
A great meal, overall, I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to see a restaurant return, this will definitely become one of our regular haunts again, happy days!