Legend of Leong

After a late Sunday afternoon film at the Prince Charles with friends, we wanted to have some tasty food in China Town. So many places, many tourist traps, but we plumped for Leong's Legends on Lisle Street after reading many favourably mixed reviews. The décor was all timber and low lights and there was a bit of a speakeasy vibe, which was quite cool really. The restaurant was busy for a Sunday night and it passed the age-old quality benchmark of 'native' diners.

We kicked off with some some turnip dumplings, which were all shrivelled and flaky on the outside and gooey and flavoursome inside.


We also had some steamed vegetarian dumplings, which weren't too exciting really:


For the main course, Ben had the 'three cup' squid - three cups refers to the equal quantities of soy sauce, rice wine and sesame oil. With a hint of anise, this was a rich, treacly, more-ish sauce that I kept dipping my spoon into.


I had Kung Po chicken, which was sweet and fiery. It was served with heaps of whole chillies - I tried one and it blew my head off.


I'll admit that the service was a bit shambolic, dishes coming out at lots of different times, chicken instead of squid in the first instance, other dishes forgotten. But they got it right in the end, and were not rude about it at any point as some reviews have suggested. I'm no expert on Taiwanese cuisine, but it tasted great, ingredients seemed to be fresh and it was definitely a cut above the average China Town fare.