ARCADIAN PALACE
On 14 December 2007 (Fri.) D and I visited Arcadian Palace to have early evening meal around 5 o'clock.
In fact, we were heading toward the Green Room for sandwiches, but, as it was very very cold evening, we could not resist warmer Chinese cooking.
As I published a photo of the exterior in an earlier entry I don't do it again, but this time I did not forget to take pictures of the interior. This is a very small place, and I think the capacity is about 20 covers. It has a kind of open kitchen. It is more of a café than of a proper restaurant. Most of the dishes are combination of main and rice/noodles, and the price range is between £4.80 and £6.80, and the quantity of one dish is plenty for one hungry man. If you drink only Chinese tea, you don't even have to pay for the drinks (but jasmine tea is £1).
I noticed there were these specials after having placed our order. Left one says Fish and pork meatballs in Hokkien style, with or without noodles. Right ons is Beijin style pork and vegetable dumplings in soup with/without noodles. Chinese soup dishes are good warmers in winter season.
When we entred there there were only two people eating, but while we were there, some more people came in and more than a half of the tables got occupied. Considering it was between 5 and 6 o'clock, I can say it was rather busy. Some of the diners ordered dumplings in soup.
These are mini spring rolls D ordered (£2.50). Each one is about 5 cm in length, about one bite size.
Unfortunately the taste did not live up to our expectations. There was some vegetable filling inside, but it was too little and 90% of what we were eating was the skin. I wished they were normal spring rolls. We suspected they made them smaller so that they could be quickly cooked from the frozen state. I would not recommend this one to anybody.
This is D's shredded roast poak and vegetables in Cantonese sauce served with white rice (£4.80). D asked our waitress what was Cantonese sauce before ordering. She said it was a fruity sauce. Having tasted it, it was similar to sweet and sour sauce.
The meat had little fat, but sweet, tasty and plenty. Not bad. Vegetables were green pepper, carrot and onion: classic Chinese stir-fry affair.
The sauce was a bit over-powering and probably touch too sweet, but in total, acceptable for under a fiver.
This is my Hokin [sic] Frid Rice (£6.80).
The difference between normal fried rice and the Hokkien version is that the latter has seafood and meat sauce on top of simple fried rice. Because of the extra work to make the sauce separately, it is usually more expensive than simple fried rice.
The Hokkien fried rice of the Arcadian Palace was simple egg fried rice covered with gooey sauce of diced seafood, roast poak, mushrooms and green peas. I think it was flavoured with oyster sauce. From my point of view, the seafood was diced too finely and the sauce is too salty. It tasted all right, but I get bored while eating it. I would prefer some swist to it.
I will not come to this place to look for some specially tasty food, but it is a comfortable and relaxing place to eat without suffering any considerable financial losses.
Arcadian Palace
Unit B109, Arcadian Centre, Pershore St, Birmingham, West Midlands B5 4ST
Tel: 0121 622 3283
