Sydney DAY 2: Yum Cha Lunch at Regal Chinese Cuisine

Regal Chinese Cuisine
http://www.regal.com.au/html/regal.htm



This place was recommended to two of the guys by ex-Sydney locals. Yum cha is great group food so we thought we'd check it out. Funnily, we walked through many streets before finding The Regal and when we left (after a hearty meal), we realized the restaurant was literally just down the road from where we were staying.

It was, in hindsight, not the best idea to get yum cha on Easter Monday. Even in Brisbane, these kinds of places are popular on public holidays and in Sydney, this is the case x 1000. Regal was huge but it was packed to the brim. People were leaking out onto the street.



We fought through and the bravest of us managed to secure a table number. After nearly a half hour wait, we were seated.



The service was chaotic, not really due to inefficiency but simply because they were so busy. The entire restaurant was buzzing with conversation and trolleys rattled past our table dangerously. We were seated in a corner and I suspect this is why some of the trolleys missed us... although it was quite annoying when we wanted something specific only to see the trolley zoom past, never to return.

A good thing about yum cha is you pretty much get to start eating straight away. We picked a whole stash of items... I won't go through each individual dish.

Mini steamed dim sums

Crystal prawn dumplings

BBQ pork ho fun rolls

Tripe

Braised chicken feet - one of our favorites

Trio of... fried things (don't know what they're called sorry!)

Black pepper beef

Prawn balls with crispy crouton coating (I loved this one!)

Prawn toast

Braised chicken pieces

Glutinous chicken rice wrapped in lotus leaf (silly photo since you can't see the inside)

Meatballs (we didn't like this one)

Ho fun with peanut and oyster sauce

Lobok, taro and water chestnut pan-fried pudding cakes

Overall, the quality of food at Regal was quite good (better than Brisbane, not as good as Shanghai). We liked everything we ordered minus the meatballs - they just tasted weird. I like how some of the items get made, or heated, fresh for you when you ask for it. These particular trolleys have built-in cooking elements. No one likes stale/old yum cha items so this is a good way of avoiding it. I was really in the mood for mango pudding but that was one of the trolleys that skipped our table :D.

Regal charges $2 extra, per person, for public holidays. The price of each dish was quite reasonable, food was good, the restaurant was furnished nicely but it was so noisy and busy. I can't say the ambience was pleasant. That's something we have to deal with when it comes to popular places I guess.