I was so excited that I wanted to blog about New Shanghai restaurant immediately after the meal. It was super awesome! A must try if you're into Shanghai cuisine such as xiao long bao (steamed mini pork buns) and dumplings.
Located at Emporium Melbourne, New Shanghai is a modern Chinese restaurant serving Shanghai style cuisine. They have a chain of restaurants in NSW but this is the only restaurant in Melbourne for now. I'm glad that we were early. Although there was a queue, we were seated not long after a short wait. The decor of the restaurant is modern yet full of Chinese character. It is vibrant with cozy lighting. I was quite surprised to find out that it is actually a big restaurant despite the entrance looking like it is just part of the food court.
There were so many tempting choices that at the first glance of the menu, I found it hard to decide my order. We finally settled with New Shanghai xiao long bao, pan fried pork dumplings as well as stir fried Chinese rice cake with XO sauce and shredded pork. The food came amazingly quick especially for the xiao long bao.
The xiao long bao looked really good with thin skin. You can almost see the broth through the 'semi transparent' skin! It was indeed perfect on the first bite. The scrumptious broth was tasty with a balance of flavours that a xiao long bao should have. The pork was soft and tender with just right amount in each xiao long bao.
Next came the pan fried pork dumplings. They were actually quite big as compare with those from the normal dumplings shops. The pork dumplings were pan fried so evenly that every pieces looked almost the same. Guess what? There's actually broth in the dumplings too! This was the first pan fried dumpling I have had with hot broth inside. It was again so yum. The pork was as tender as the xiao long bao's and the thickness of the skin was just right.
Lastly, our stir fried Chinese rice cake arrived not too long after the first two dishes. It was quite unique as it wasn't the traditional style but with XO sauce. Needless to say, it was good. I was particularly impressed that they actually used fried shallot in this dish. It's not usual to see fried shallot used in traditional Chinese restaurants but it is widely used in Malaysian restaurants.
Well, overall the food was two thumbs up and the price was pretty good for such a location. New Shanghai has overtaken Hutong Dumplings Bar to top my list of xiao long bao/dumplings restaurants.
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