Zhu Canton Restaurant
139/143 Alison Rd,
Randwick, Sydney
The Randwick Club is an average looking place but up on the third floor you will find Zhu Canton, a very stylish and lavishly decorated Chinese restaurant. Taking up the entire level, this place is actually capable of seating hundreds. There are separate areas featuring different décor and function rooms for private parties.
As big fans of yum cha (dim sum), we are looking forward to the promised procession of goodies. These are actually made to order, so don’t be expecting trolleys to appear. There is a dedicated yum cha kitchen which is full of furiously busy staff making everything on the go. You get what you want, and it’s nice and hot!
The vegetarian spring rolls were long and thin and served to us in a glass, with sweet dipping sauce. We ate these with our fingers and loved the crunch of the golden pastry. The Zhu signature mixed dumplings were impressive and tasty, each one a little work of art.
The White Rabbit shaped dumplings were so gorgeous, filled with a tasty vegetable selection in rice dough. Almost a shame to eat them! Another impressive plate of Manga dumplings arrived in the shape of echidnas. Vegetable-filled also, but with a crispy fried flour pastry. Too cute!
The Caviar dumplings looked like little bags tied with string. They were filled with prawns and vegetables and dressed with black caviar. The Deep Fried Taro dumplings were impressive too, with quail egg on top of a crispy nest of prawn, cheese, egg and taro. The yum cha selection ended with some lovely Baked BBQ Pork Buns. These were fluffy and delicious.
Now just for the blog, we indulged in a few classic mains from the a la carte menu. In particular, we loved the Stir Fried Diced Beef Short Ribs. They were tossed in a sweet, sticky sauce which was quite wonderful.
We continued with Paper-Wrapped Flaming Chicken, which was actually dinner and a show! Finally, a delicious Sweet and Sour Barramundi (a whole fish which was served by our waitress) was quickly demolished.
There was no room for dessert but we managed to squeeze in a super flaky custard tart which was hot from the oven. Superb!
To cool down, some delicious mango pancakes did the job nicely. How good are those, with whipped cream and mango oozing out from those delicate pancakes! Yum!
Zhu Canton is open Tuesday to Sunday from 11am until 10pm. The wine list looks quite substantial and there is also wine by the glass. Dim Sum is served until as late as 8pm here, which is great news for the after-work diners.
Those Dames visited as guests of Zhu Canton. Special thanks to Rachel Cameron and Beccy Cambridge from The Society Group for arranging this visit.