Lunch, Ping Pong, Soho
Being a real foodie, I find that picking just one dish off a menu can be a real emotional roller coaster. Do I want this or that? I always want it all. So dim sum is a great option for me, bite-sized portions of each dish give you the chance to try a who host of things on the menu without over indulging. Sometimes, a mouthful or two is all you need to experience the dish.
We visited Ping Pong Soho on a weekday for a light lunch. The restaurant itself is like a tardis; entering from the street it appears quite small, but as you walk through it opens up and reveals a large space spanning across two levels.
To start, we ordered the crispy duck spring roll served with hoi sin sauce and roast pork puff. The duck rolls were perfection however the roast pork puff wasn't something I would order again. They felt quite stodgy, but not in a comforting way, and lacked in any real oomph.
Top - Roast pork puff
honest roast pork in puff pastry, glazed with honey and topped with sesame seed
Bottom - Crispy duck spring roll
duck, cucumber and spring onion wrapped in crispy pasty, served with hoi sin sauce
Midweek, Ping Pong offer a range of set lunch menus which are available until 5.30pm. All of the lunch menus are priced at £9.95 per person and then they also offer set menus which are available all day and vary in price. We opted for the Sichuan Lunch Basket which consists of :
spicy chicken and Chinese vegetable dumpling
2 spinach and mushroom dumplings
2 steam quinoa gyozas
2 chicken and cashew nut dumplings
2 steamed beef and kimchi gyozas
vegetable sticky rice
If, like me, you aren't a dumpling specialist, you may be thinking 'what is the difference between a dumpling and a gyoza?'. Well you'll be happy to know I'll save you a quick google search by answering that here. First thing you will notice is that they have a different shape. The dumpling is round-ish whereas the gyoza is a half moon shape. Both are filled with meats and or vegetables.
When it comes to cooking, the dumpling is more commonly boiled, and in my experience, have a very soft and bouncy feel. Whereas a Gyoza is most commonly pan fried to create a crispy texture. Both, however, are delicious.
So back to the lunch menu. The two pieces that stood out the most for us both were the steamed beef and kimchi gyozas and the chicken and cashew nut dumplings. They were both so tasty, the we could have eaten a whole basket of just these two. The spinach and mushroom were more like just plain mushroom in terms of their taste, but tasty none the less. The quinoa gyozas were not to our personal taste.
I think the price of the lunch menu is a real bargain. You get a lot of food for your money and we left feeling sufficiently full. The staff were really helpful and if you are needing a quick bite, you can also get take away. The vibe of the restaurant was very relaxed and if I hadn't have needed to be elsewhere, I could have happily sat grazing on cocktails and dim sum all afternoon.
(All pictures taken & owned by SistersDineOut unless otherwise stated)
