I’ve heard from the mouth of a prominent Chinese business-man that Dublin
may soon have it’s very own Chinatown
, red arch et al. If you take a walk down Parnell Street, mostly around the bottom of South Great George’s Street, the choice of authentic Chinese eateries is too much to choose from. On one side of the street are Chinese supermarkets, call shops and restaurants The other side has more restaurants, plus a very conspicuous looking pet shop called Paddy’s. Businessman and owner of Yuan Restaurant at 106 Parnell St has just opened the first Chinese butchers/fish shop in town, maybe in Ireland
. It’s at the bottom (too much bottom here) of Hill St. and owner Dawei Gu is delighted to be supplying the glut of eating-out spots on the street. “It’s also very easy to do business as I can speak the language”, he laughed. His shop sells the usual stuff plus the oddities of chicken’s feet and chicken’s hearts, hmmm. Huge bulbous pink blobs were described as salmon roe but my lunch date insisted it was cod. Cod knows.
Naturally Dawei suggested that his restaurant was the best place to eat so we hot-footed it for a hotpot (sorry again). The place was typically plainly decorated with Chinese news blasting via satellite on a giant plasma screen and not a red lantern in sight. The menu was cheap and amusing to my inexperienced Chinese palate; Pork ear with cucumber or the house special of Harlet with Sweet and Sour sauce. Though I have been to China
I remember eating as being something of a grin-and-bear-it experience. I’m not that adventurous when it comes to whelks for breakfast. We ordered the beef and vegetable hot-pot which was huge and full of tender, if a little fatty, beef chunks and lots and lots of cabbage. It was like a Chinese Irish stew and pretty good. The home-made spicy duck was more European in style with tender duck coated in corn flour and dash fried then coated in a sweet, spicy sauce and served with green peppers, yum. I was asking for it when I ordered cabbage in vinegar and I got a plate of pale veg swimming in sesame oil. But I ordered something odd on purpose. At lunch-time the place filled up with Chinese and Koreans (I think, but I can’t be sure) and lots of them were ordering bowls of broth with huge pieces of tofu floating in them. This is typical Chinese breakfast I’m told.. I still have a long way to go before I tuck in to this stuff. But Yuan Restaurant was full up and I wish Dawei Gu good luck. At €28.00 for lunch for two with huge bowls of rice and green tea it makes me wonder if the Chinese can serve up good cheap grub in Dublin
, why can’t everybody else follow?
I’ve heard from the mouth of a prominent Chinese business-man that 
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