China Court
Verdict: 7/10 (Nice dim sum)
On the 6th April 2007, Dim and I visited China Court for dim sum lunch.
Our initial plan was to go to the Warehouse Café in Digbeth, but it was for some reason closed at this occasion (it was supposed to be open according to the opening hour notice on the door). We did not know what to do, and we returned to our routine.
Our usual haunt is Golden Pond, but we decided to do something new and went to China Court instead. We had been there already once, but then the prawns were a bit smelly and, even though the food in general was good, we had been reluctant to revisit since.
Once inside, it is almost as we were in Hong Kong, and the 80 or 90% or clients were Chinese or other East Asian people. The dining area is very spacious and
Going up the stairs and arriving at the entrance, we saw 4 or 5 Chinese people standing there. We thought they were waiting to be seated, so stayed there. 5 or 6 minutes later, they just left. I don't know if they could not wait, or they were just there to chat blocking the entrance, I don't know. As we were ignored by waiters, D stopped a waitress in black uniform, who seemed to be a supervisor, and we were finally seated.
D was still on Lenten diet and we needed to avoid meat, fish and egg (fortunately there are very little dairy products in Cantonese cuisine). At this point, we noticed that the dim sum menus, both Chinese and English, are not marked with V for vegetarian. This is inconvenient for vegetarians. The dim sum menu of Golden Pond has V marks.
We ordered 5 items as usual. I managed quite well to dodge non-vegetarian stuff, but the one looked safest was not: plain porridge. It was cooked with chicken stock. All the same, it tasted lovely. I don't know about you, but I love eating deep-fried dim sum with porridge.
This is shredded squid deep-fried in batter (£ 3.60). It is not a vegetarian choice, but squids and prawns are as good as vegetables by the Orthodox standard.
Comparing the same dish offered at Golden Pond (do you want to compare ?), the squid strings are thicker here. This is one of the best dishes to go with porridge. The red sauce is Chinese sweet chili.
These are vegetarian spring rolls made with bean curd sheets (£2.60). This one I could tell from its Chinese name that it was pure vegetarian. Inside the skin is mixture of vegetables and mushrooms.
I thought they were very nice, but D, who does not like Chinese mushroom, did not share my opinion.
Next up were the prawn and scallop dumplings (£2.90). Their Chinese name contained the name of this restaurant name in it, so I would guess it is their specialty.
We had the same dish last time, and then the prawns were stinky, but not this time. They were delicious.
The filling was two prawns and a sliced scallop. Just that. Not minced nor mixed with other stuff. They must have used fresh ingredients. Besides, the crystal skin was also very good.
The last to arrive was prawn spring roll made with bean curd sheet (£2.90). This was not in deep-frying section on Chinese menu and I guessed it was cooked otherwise. I was wrong and we ended up having two similar dishes. My error.
This is the filling: roughly minced prawns. Tasty, but maybe not exceptionally so.
I like bean curd spring rolls, but the down side is that they tend to contain quite a lot of oil. Not only they soak up, but they tend to keep oil in between sheets. I would not eat many at a time.
One surprising thing when we requested bill was that now they add automatically 10% service charge (if you watch closely you can read £1.50 of gratuity). In London, the practice is ubiquitous, but in Birmingham it does not usually happen if you don't go to the posh restaurant or you are in a group of more than 6. Normally we would have left £1 each, so they saved us some money.
Apart from the initial confusion, it was an enjoyable meal and we will return.
P.S.
After the lunch, I bought some sweet buns from their bakery. I wrote a report on my blog.
China Court Cantonese
Unit B109, Arcadian Centre, Pershore St, Birmingham, B5 4ST
Tel: 0121 622 3283
