Royal China, Raffles Hotel

I have passed by and seen Royal China at Raffles Hotel for several years but I never went in till this year. Ashley wanted to have dim sum for her birthday celebration and chose Royal China after reading positive reviews of it online. So off we went. It was so popular that it did either 2-3 seating on weekends, definitely not a place to linger after you finished your meal.

Royal China is from England and thus you can find aromatic crispy duck on the menu, done exactly like what it is in England, according to my Brit/others friends who have spent ages hunting and lamenting they could not find it in Singapore. Peking duck is not aromatic crispy duck. Good news to those who are still wondering where they can get their fill of aromatic crispy duck.

The first thing that struck us was the use of robin egg blue which was reminiscent of Tiffany & Co blue. The ambience could be noisy when crowded but it was not too bad as the carpeting did absorb some of the noise. The liberal use of robin egg blue and white was calming and had a modern feel, unlike the usual red and dark wood in other Chinese restaurants. Service was brisk, in order for diners to finish their meals in the 1 - 1.5 hour allocated.

Char Siew Siu - I could not remember if there was mango in there or it was purely just char siew.

Judging from this picture, it looked like it was purely just char siew (bbq pork). It was a bit sweet, moist and generously filled with the meat and encased in a light pastry which flaked as you bit into it. Very moreish. I liked it.

A specialty is the 7-layer steamed cake with salted egg yolk. This was not so good as it was a bit on the dry side.

Mushroom dumpling in a crystal skin which was average.

We also ordered the century egg congee which was pretty good. Another hit was the rice rolls in XO sauce.

More food - spareribs (I did not try but friends said it was not that great), siew mai was not too bad and the salted egg yolk custard bun with mango.

The salted egg yolk custard bun with mango was really good. It would be better if it was more runny. It could be the timing as we had the last seating and maybe the buns had been sitting out there for a while? My 2nd visit was the first seating and the buns were extremely good. The custard literally flowed out when I broke a piece off.

We did not order the aromatic crispy duck as it showed only half and 1 duck portion in the menu. Instead we ordered another specialty - crispy duck in a stew or something. This was a either you like or hate it dish. It was a bit mala (spicy) and came with strips of translucent noodles with pieces of the crispy duck in a vinegar sauce, similar to the pig's trotters dish sauce.

I did order the aromatic crispy duck (and they can do a quarter portion if you ask) on my second visit and it was very good. The difference between the aromatic crispy duck and peking duck is that the duck is fried to a crisp (a bit like duck confit). So you get both skin and crispy duck meat to be wrapped into a roll. With Peking duck, we usually only wrap the skin and not the meat. I like both versions.

Dessert - red bean pancake. This was good too. Crispy pancake with generous serving of red bean in it.

Despite the hit and miss nature of the food in Royal China, I still like it enough to want to go back again. If not for the dim sum, but for the aromatic crispy duck since you cannot really find it elsewhere in Singapore. There is a Chinese restaurant in Bangsar Village, KL which actually serves it too.