Taste of China

Dubai: When someone mentions Chinese food in Dubai, my instinct is to remain sceptical until proven otherwise. The city is known for its famous Indian-Chinese dishes. So, with my guard up and scepticism in place, I walked into the aptly-titled Shanghai Chic at the Ibn Battuta Gate Hotel.

Greeted by hostesses in their flowing red robes, I allowed my guard to be let down a little. The décor relaxed me even further and before I could glimpse the menu, I knew my obsession for all things Chinese wouldn't be watered down after this meal.

Starters saw my partner and I binging through a dish of dimsums, spring rolls and taro puffs. My partner enjoyed crunching his way through his deep fried taro puff with a stuffing of roast duck, scallops, mushrooms and water chestnuts. Oblivious to his delight, I was in my own dimsum heaven, sampling everything from the steamed squid ink dumpling to the lotus roots siew mai.

Tempting dishes

For our mains, the choice was so tempting that we ended up ordering two each! Naturally, a trip to an authentic Chinese joint is incomplete without a plate of Peking duck. Once on the table, it was devoured within minutes, until every last shred was just a memory logged into the best Peking duck section of my mind.

The next course proved distraction enough: I had the chef's signature dish of Shanghai-style sautéed seafood with spicy beef sauce in a crispy taro nest, with a side order of spinach tofu with mushrooms in oyster broth and truffle oils, while my partner went the sautéed beef cube with black pepper sauce route. The sauce, though delectably peppery, didn't overwhelm the senses and a bite revealed succulent cubes of beef, over-cooked to creamy perfection, with an aftertaste of pepper lingering in the mouth.

My seafood in a taro's nest was divine in ways that are impossible to describe. The edible nest was made out of fried taro roots and dough, with squids, scallops and prawns nestled within. Needless to say, I was rather possessive of this perfectly cooked dish, refusing to share more than a mouthful with my partner. By this time we'd both reached bursting point, but one look at the desert and I fell hook, line and sinker.

Desert Delights

The mango pudding with coconut espuma reminded me of a soufflé my mum made when I was a child. Espuma is the new ‘it' food in the culinary world. Spanish for foam, my coconut espuma was the result of flash-freezing coconut nitrogen into my chunky mango pudding.

The final result was a dish that should be Michelin star worth on its own, save the presentation. My partner's sesame rice dumplings in a hot ginger broth with deep fried custard dumplings was just as exquisite. For a Scotsman who's grown up on a staple of rhubarb crumble and custard for desert, a sesame rice dumpling swimming in a sea of ginger was like taking a leap of faith. Sinfully rich and intensely aromatic, the dumplings were served in sweet ginger syrup with a lump of palm sugar at the centre of each nugget.

With desert over and the pair of us stuffed like the ducks on the menu, it was time to call it a night. Except that Shanghai Chic had a surprise for us. For every Dh250 spent at any outlet in Ibn Battuta Gate Hotel, diners are given a golden key that unlocks a prize: from instant discounts to overnight hotel stay, to a year's free rent at Ibn Battuta Gate hotel apartments. The promotion lasts till May 11. As for me, the hotel apartment is still on the cards.