Hunan Food @ Penpenxiang 盆盆湘湘菜馆

I was passing by the area looking for a place to eat when I noticed a new addition to the Nanshan Road neighbourhood. Being ever curious, I decided we should pop in and try out the food. When we arrived, there was only one table having a meal and after settling down, over the course of the meal, I discovered that was actually the restaurant owners eating and posing as guests. The restaurant was that new! Excellent! I always love going to newly opened restaurants. I have a theory that a restaurant is at its best when it first opens and is anxious to please and attract a group of regular diners. Portions and taste, during this honeymoon period, is at the most generous and of the highest standard. This honeymoon period usually lasts between one to three months after which, once the restaurant has garnered a steady stream of regular diners, the quality of the food starts going downhill rapidly.

The first to arrive was the restaurant's stir-fried garlic chives and black fungus (韭菜木耳). The black fungus was sliced into strips and garlic chives appear to have been brought in daily from Hunan directly as the taste was slightly different from the garlic chives that are available from Guangdong. The freshness of the chives combined with decent quality fungus made this dish particularly good. This in my mind is a perfectly done dish where the chef merely brings out the freshness and the taste of the ingredients but does not smother the food with spices.



The next dish was fried bamboo shoots and pork slices (竹笋肉片). This too is another dish that depends heavily on the freshness of the ingredients than the actual seasonings. In this case, the chef passed with flying colours having picked the bamboo shoots that were tender, sweet and crisp. Once you have the right ingredients, it is up to the chef not to mess it up. And mess it up, he certainly did not. An excellent dish that was polished up in minutes.



The honghu lotus rhizome soup (洪湖莲藕汤) arrived later. Unlike Cantonese cuisine or Western cuisine where the soup normally has to show up early, Hunan food does not appear to have any specific order for soup. The soup was one of the best I have had in a long time. The lotus rhizome was crisp and sweet and the soup was rich to taste and one could keep drinking bowl after bowl of it and not get tired.



Finally, I ordered the classic Hunan dish, fish head with chopped chili (剁椒鱼头) which is in my mind, the acid test for a Hunan restaurant. I would love to say they hit a home run and went four for four. Unfortunately, I could not. The fish was reasonably fresh but somehow I think the chef might have gotten his timing slightly off and the fish came slightly over done. The chilis topping the fish was pretty well done but I would rate this as average. And certainly not a fitting grand finale to the meal which had up to this point been going brilliantly.



In all, it was an excellent meal. I will certainly come back to this restaurant and try more of their foods in short time and I would be happy to do repeats of all except for the fish.

The address:
Penpenxiang, Nanhai Building, Nanshan Road, Nanshan District, Shenzhen 盆盆湘 深圳南山南山大道南海大厦
Google Map Directions



UPDATE: More Hunan food at Penpenxiang.