A NEWS DYNASTY
Delicious Chinese food in a revamped contemporary interior
Ratchaprasong, Thailand’s largest commercial district, is never short of gastronomic flair — in any cuisine.
At this very moment, the retaildriven neighbourhood is clearly over-saturated with Japanese food joints while continuously welcoming more venues offering trendy Western fare.
In the midst of the Nippon food attack and fad for new-world culinary trends, refined Chinese restaurants, which are favoured rather by an old and fading generation of diners, number less than a handful.
Thus the recent arrival of Dynasty restaurant brings great news to Chinese food-loving folks here.
The original Dynasty opened 34 years ago at Centara Grand at CentralPlaza Lardprao and has been among the city’s most trustworthy traditional Chinese restaurants since.
For Bangkokians, the term “traditional Chinese restaurant” usually refers to a family-style dining establishment where a typical Cantonese (aka Hong Kong) menu, particularly of fresh seafood, barbecued meat and poultry and lunchtime dim sum, is prepared by a Chinese masterchef.
Dynasty’s brand-new branch took over the lofty 800m² space which previously housed the hotel’s Ginger Japanese restaurant.
Freshly revamped to boast a contemporary Asian interior vibe enveloped by an extensive bird’s-eye view of the city centre, the restaurant is ideal for casual gatherings, business meals, exclusive dinners or big family banquets. That is also thanks to its 200 seating capacity and five private rooms.
The menu concept takes cues from the flagship eatery with a newly-appointed Cantonese masterchef Kongsun Sae Liang directing the kitchen.
Of more than 100 à la carte dishes, we were recommended three signature creations of the chef.
The first was dully listed on the menu as steamed chicken in salty sauce (650 baht). The description was misleading, as we saw when the aromatic, charred-skin chicken came before us. It made me wonder how many diners would miss this scrumptious dish due to its title.
Though looking like ordinary grilled chicken, the bird offered a uniquely flavourful taste profile that well complemented its extraordinarily juicy meat. All were enhanced by a dipping sauce made with minced garlic, salt and ginger oil.
Mixed scallop (1,200 baht) was the official name of our next dish. It was in fact a duo platter of fresh scallops done in two styles: sautéed and deep-fried.
The sautéed section was represented by supple and cotton-white scallops wok-fried with mushrooms, carrots and spring onions, resulting in a very light and natural mouthfeel. Whereas the deep-fried counterparts simply featured battered shellfish, cooked until golden brown and crispy and eaten with house-made mayonnaise.
Thanks to its name, “dragon’s tongues” (350 baht) helped bring back a dining thrill. The dish actually featured thick succulent slices of honey-glazed barbecued pork tongue, which differed from the meat equivalent due to a pleasingly gummy texture.
Chef Kongsun also put his fine originality into the dim sum collection.
Among the items I loved most were his carrot-shape prawn dumplings (90 baht). The pudgy and translucent steamed dumplings came stuffed with minced prawn and Chinese celery, the latter nicely portraying the carrot stem, to lend a tasty, hearty bite.
Equally delectable were deep-fried egg rolls with spiced duck filling (90 baht), steamed snow fish rolls in soy sauce (90 baht), deep-fried shrimp wontons (75 baht) and xia long bao (90 baht). The xia long bao dumplings, in particular, were meticulously prepared to exhibit a precise proportion of mince pork and broth and to be eaten with ginger soy sauce.
Many guests also find Dynasty’s Peking-style roasted duck (1,500 baht) among the city’s best bets. Try it and see for yourself.
Of the dozen desserts, my personal recommendations are the highly addictive deep-fried mashed Chinese date pancake (260 baht) and the super refreshing chilled honeydew melon with sago (120 baht).
At this introductory stage, the restaurant offers an all-you-can-eat dim sum lunch at 850 baht per person. The buffet, where guests have unlimited access to 60 dim sum delicacies with a choice of appetiser, soup, rice or noodles and dessert, is available daily from 11.30am-2pm.