Venue: Connaught Place
Date: 18 June 2016

China Garden is one of the better known Chinese restaurants in Delhi and have a legacy of serving Indian style Chinese cuisine for years now. We recently dined at their CP outlet. The decor, hospitality and the overall vibe of this place exudes old world charm.

Starters

From appetisers we had Gin chicken, prawns and smoked chilli chicken. Gin chicken looked smashing – these mildly alcohol infused chicken dumplings were piping hot and were served with a coriander dip. It tasted good and went well with our Virgin Mary and Pinacolada. Prawns were a little too deep fried for us. Smoked chilli chicken was fried chicken served on a bed of roasted red chillis and whole black pepper. This dish can be any Instagrammer’s delight as it looked so photogenic and was presented well. Taste wise it was nice and smoky and not as hot as it looked.

Main Course

Sadly this is not true for the main course. Whatever we tried in main course was mostly oily, tasted similar and was terribly spicy. Be it Soy Chilli Wine Fish or Chicken Hunan it was way too spicy for us to appreciate. Kung Pao potato okra was some relief as it had mild sweetness of potatoes and seasoning but again the greasiness was an overkill. Veg Shezwan noodles looked dead, were very ordinary and disappointed us big time. Fortune rice with Black mushrooms was way better. Super fragrant and light, this rice dish could somewhat balance the mirchi in Chicken yellow bean sauce.

Dessert and Tea

The dessert and the green tea saved the day for us. China Garden’s signature caramel custard was A++. We liked every bite of this dessert. While the caramel custard provided a much needed relief to our burning palate, the green tea was super therapeutic post dinner.

Along with the good dessert, the staff’s attentiveness and hospitality compensated for the shortcomings of the food.