ALL DAY DIM SUM @ Chuen Cheng Ku 泉章居 Dim Sum Palace- London China Town

Aaaaaaah! I never realised with all the times I go to China Town that there's actually a restaurant that serves DIM SUM ALL DAY !! Both my brother and mother said to me I used to go there when I was a baby and as a child... Really?!! I don't recall such moments. It also used to be my dad's regular dim sum restaurant when he was out and about... Didn't even know that too!! Childhood stories start flooding in when you grow older... ¬,¬""

It was Mr Stingy's (my brother) birthday earlier in the week (last week), and I said we'll go and find a place to eat dim sum, so we chose this place as I also wanted to find a place that serves dim sum until late anyway (a mission I felt I needed to complete as a reader who left a comment asked about where to find a restaurant that served dim sum after normal serving time)!!

Outside Dim Sum Palace a.k.a Chuen Cheng Ku

Their menu outside

Dim sum is served until 11.30 pm

Dim sum all day!!!

Well this place has been around for so long that I walk pass it, and never think about going in there. Arrogance? No. Idiot? Yes. I think it's undergone some renovation on the outside, but it's very minor. And with its hard to read Chinese characters at the front, which looked like a few scribbles to me, Chuen Cheng Ku 泉章居 a.k.a Dim Sum Palace (Canto: chyun jeung gu; Mando: quan2 zhang1 ju1) doesn't have any real meaning to it. But when you split the characters up... 泉 = Spring (water spring); 章 = Chapter; 居 = Residence (home)... I actually don't know what it means. Could be the person's name who owned the restaurant back in 1970-something...

Inside the restaurant

Chandelier... I know...

More of the inside

This was the place to go!! :D We were greeted by a nice lady who knew we wanted to eat dim sum. I think everyone who goes there wants to eat dim sum! This is similar to New World where they serve dim sum on a trolley - Cantonese style! My brother and I ate 12 dishes / baskets all together and it cost £37.40 including a 10% service charge. Bummer. Service charge again... Average cost per dish excluding the service charge on this occasion was £2.83. Not bad!! Unfortunately I lost all those pictures whilst reformatting my phone and Kies software decided to delete my back up pictures. ¬,¬ So I went again the next day, but this time with my mum...

Picture menu

The other side

On the second occasion, the lady at the front was missing and the waiter asked us to wait outside. Realised there should be a sign outside to say wait for someone to serve you... Oh well. Lost a few marks there.

So we were seated and the trolleys started rolling. We had these first...

Tofu Skin Roll (not vegetarian) - these are actually my favourite dim sum of ALL TIME!

Beef ball dumplings

Deep fried meat dumpling (ham sui gok) - love these!!

Yam Croquette - not as good as the one in Elephant and Castle as my mum pointed out

The food

The trolleys then stopped rolling... I wanted one more dish!! The prawn rice rolls. But when the trolley finally came, there was none left. :( So sad. The waiter said he would come back when they would be ready... But nah, so I had the bbq pork one instead. Don't eat this one very often, and this was so-so...

BBQ pork cheung fun

This time the total cost came to £21. Actual cost was £19.10, but not sure if the tea was free or not. Tea or no tea, the average cost per dish was £3.82 on this occasion... Hmmm, how comes?! It should be cheap, not expensive... I looked at my pictures later and realised the service charge can be omitted if you disagree with it! Nice! Should've noticed that earlier...

The bill!

My mother said to me the food was so-so. It's not as good as it used to be. The chef has changed. The food was kind of bland and not as good as the one in Elephant and Castle... Hahahah! I actually agree!!

CCK Buffet is upstairs from Wardour Street Entrance

My geeky rating: 4/5

Good points:

- Nice spacious restaurant

- Cantonese serving style

- Cheapish, not overly expensive

- Some friendly staff... mainly the ones serving food as I spoke in Mandarin :)

- Non-compulsory service charge

Bad points:

- Trolleys need to come around more regularly

- Keep the food hot... it was a bit warm for me

- Some of the food was a bit bland according to my mum

Address: 17 Wardour Street, London W1D 6PJ; 20 Rupert Street London W1D 6DF (There's two entrances by the way...)

Telephone: 02074371398 and 02077343281

Opening times: Mon - Sat 11.00 - 23.45; Sun 11.00 - 23.15
Dim sum is served all day until 11.30 pm (and I think 11 pm on a Sunday since they close early)!! ^_^

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