I really wanted to like Mao. I'd been hoping to visit, in fact, since it was a popup restaurant. So I was happy when a friend and I decided to try it tonight.
Showing up at 6pm, the place was closed. Its website said it opens at 6, but that turned out to be inaccurate this evening. When my friend and I came back at 6.30pm, the one long table with benches--which could comfortably seat 8, or less comfortably, 10--already had 6 people sitting around it. My friend and I ordered and the people sitting on the end squeezed down so we could fit. There's also a counter along the wall, but the high backless metal stools and narrow shelflike dining space didn't seem inviting. The one outdoor table had space for four, but it was drizzling so we opted to stay indoors.
The two staff members working did their best to cook and serve the food, but with cook staying at his station and the server also taking orders, bringing drinks, and ringing up customers after their meals, there was a bit of a bottleneck. To be fair, I don't know where a third staff member could fit, because the place is tiny.
Prices are typically steep, the Hackney location adding £1 and the word "vegan" adding another £1 so that a dish which should have cost £7 cost £9. I definitely agree when Roy Choy questions why people believe Chinese food should be cheap, and know it is a cuisine which can be elevated. It's not that I simply want Mao Chow to be Cheap Chow. But I also saw some damn tiny portion sizes and tasted some questionably prepared noodles which did not justify the price. I lived in Hong Kong for three years, so I know good Chinese when I taste it.
To break it down, my friend and I shared three dishes:
- "Gong Bao Asparagus" (£5)
- "Ginger Scallion Jackfruit" (£9)
- "Dan Dan Noodles" (£9)
The food itself was a really mixed bag, and I can comment on every dish on the menu because I saw them all up close and personal since the table is communal.
- The smacked cucumber looked good, and my neighbors gobbled up their order, but at £4 I didn't think it was a generous enough serving.
- The gong bao asparagus was very tasty. However the chilis weren't really integrated into the dish as in proper Kung Pao cooking. They were more tossed on top. (Perhaps to facilitate picking around, for tender English palates?) There could have been a few more peanuts there too.
- The bao looked nice. A double order came out just as my friend and I were leaving. But I'll never get my head around why Londoners pay so much for what is a common street food in Asia. £4.5 for a single bao is. a. ripoff. That is why I don't eat bao in London.
- Worse even than the highway robbery that is bao prices in the UK are Mao Chow's £5.5 dumplings. WHAT. Three dumplings on a plate. £5.5 means it's almost £2 per dumpling (£1.83 to be exact.) Admittedly the chili sauce they're served in is delicious (the couple next to us had ordered dumplings and let me try their sauce). It's more like a roasted chili oil with bits of chili and salt in. But I'm pretty sure that you can pick up a jar of the stuff from a cool lady at the Victoria Park Farmer's Market, for about the price of the three measley dumplings. In Shenzhen you could get 100 dumplings for £5.5. Seriously.
- Ginger Scallion Jackfruit: the best thing I had. Super delicious. Perhaps because I love jackfruit. The way it's marinated and served here, with a ginger scallion topping, over flavoursome rice, with a bit of pickled daikon? Yes. Well done. If I'd just ordered this, I'd be giving a 4-star review. (Of course you could guess I'd wish for a bigger serving, for the price.)
- Dan Dan Noodles were a disaster. The sauce, the peanuts, the vegan ground pork, even the cucumber slices with sesame seeds were spot on. The noodles? Nope. Not cooked properly. Like a big floury mass all stuck together and gloopy. I'd been so excited for the dish that I'd dug in with my chopsticks and taken a big bite. So it was really too late to send them back. And when I asked the server (ok it was a bit passive aggressive, not my normal aggressive aggressive style), "Um, is this how the noodles are supposed to be?" I wasn't holding up the worst gloopy bit, and she nodded. I regret not asking for a new order, and that's on me. But still, to serve them that way in the first place shows some serious lack of know-how.
- The youtiao and ice cream comes with a quarter youtiao (Chinese fried dough stick) and two scoops of soya vanilla ice cream topped with caramel, white sugar, and chili flakes. It looked good. I did laugh at the quartered youtiao though, remembering wolfing them down whole with warm soya milk in Taipei.
Ok, those are my words. I'm out of words now. Hope this helps you somehow. read more