MAKATI Shangri-La Hotel’s premiere Cantonese restaurant, Shang Palace, has always been one of the standards by which other Chinese restaurants are measured. What makes it tick is the fact that it not only serves awesome tasting Chinese dishes using the best and the freshest ingredients possible but it also constantly introduces new and more exciting dishes regularly. Just recently, it unveiled a number of new signature creations, carefully crafted by Shang Palace executive Chinese chef Richard Thong to focus on premium ingredients and traditional methods of cooking — and he took extra care to make them all-natural and healthy as well. No monosodium glutamate, no artificial seasonings. He uses Chinese herbs to flavor his recipes plus traditional methods such as double boiling and slow cooking or braising.
The two new signature dishes that are on the Shang Palace menu are Double-boiled Chicken Soup with Conch and Cordyceps, a traditional herbal soup known to be a good source of antioxidants that help reduce blood pressure; and Double-boiled Minced Pork Ball with Cabbage. No overpowering flavors, just the right degree of flavor which comes from very natural ingredients such as conch, which is a large gastropod mollusk with a sweet, smoky flavor, and cordyceps, a medicinal mushroom in Chinese medicine.
Other new signature dishes include Roasted Peking Duck, which now comes with new pancake wrapper flavors of truffle and pumpkin; Wok-fried Garoupa Fillet with Wild Mushroom, Foie Gras and Crab Roe (Yes, foie gras, as in duck liver!); Stir-fried Shredded Beef with Mixed Mushrooms and Garlic in Black Bean Sauce; Shanghai-style Braised Beancurd with Four Treasures; Four-Hour Braised Beef with Tendon and Radish Cooked in a Clay Pot; Stir-fried Roasted Duck with Pickled Ginger and Pineapple; Pan-fried Scallops Filled with Minced Shrimp and Crab Coral; and Slow-cooked Lamb with Medicinal Chinese Herbs and Preserved Beancurd in Clay Pot.
While a number of them are inspired by classic Chinese dishes, Chef Richard has added new twists and made modern takes on them by adding Western ingredients or unlikely flavor combinations.
The Roasted Peking Duck, for instance, is the classic Roasted Peking Duck with crispy skin and lean and flavorful meat that makes it an all-time favorite, but its pancake wrappers now come in truffle and pumpkin flavors that are not usually found in Chinese cuisine.
The Wok-fried Garoupa Fillet with Wild Mushroom, Foie Gras and Crab Roe also follows this mold. Instead of the traditional Chinese mushroom, wild mushroom is used, plus cubes of foie gras, a premium gourmet ingredient more common to French and Continental cuisines, with crab roe sauce.
And lamb? Beef is more common to Chinese cuisine.
These new dishes can be enjoyed with Yang Zhou Fried Rice. Chef Richard has whipped up his own, new take on the crowd favorite, incorporating baked char siu (asado), freshly boiled shrimps and pure egg yolk.
For dessert, Double-boiled Imperial Bird’s Nest and Fresh Milk with Ginger Jus is the new, more exciting alternative to the predictable Mango Sago and Buchi. It’s a silky, creamy, milk custard with just the right hint of ginger. Besides being something new for the palate, it is also healthy and, get this, it’s supposed to help improve skin complexion. So it’s good news for the health- and beauty-conscious.
Aside from the new signature dishes that Shang Palace introduced on the first week of November (2014), the Cantonese restaurant has also reintroduced its dim sum offerings via the Yum Cha promotion that is available on weekends—Saturdays from 11:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. and Sundays from 10:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. On weekends, a dim sum trolley will be pushed around the restaurant during these hours, containing steaming pots and bamboo trays of popular dim sum items, such as Siu Mai (pork dumplings with fish roe); Xiao Long Bao (a Shanghainese soup dumpling filled with pork and shrimps, eaten by popping the whole dumpling in the mouth and then biting into it so that when the soup bursts out from the dumpling, it floods the mouth with an incredible flavor that you’d look for again and again); Pan-fried Beancurd Roll with Mixed Vegetables; Steamed Rice Rolls with a choice of pork, shrimp or vegetable filling; and Steamed Custard Bun with Salted Egg.
New selections include Siu Mai with Abalone, Spinach Dumpling with Scallop, Xiao Long Bao with Foie Gras, cute little rabbit-shaped Vegetable Siu Mai, Lobster Hakao with Caviar, and Rice Rolls with Fried Dough (which look like long fried bicho-bichos wrapped with rice wrapper, steamed and cut into bite sizes).
Shang Palace also sets up a live station that features freshly cooked congee of fish, chicken or pork, and Fried Turnip Cake with fresh egg for Yum Cha diners.
Available for Php788 per person, Yum Cha is an ongoing promotion that is fast becoming popular and drawing in the weekend crowd.
(Makati Shangri-La Hotel is located at Ayala Ave. corner Makati Ave., Makati City 1200, with telephone number 813-8888. For restaurant reservations or further inquiries regarding the new signature dishes and the Yum Cha promotion, Shang Palace can be reached through telephone number 814-2580.)
