Weekend in Guangzhou: not too spicy

One of the main reasons of coming to Guangzhou this weekend was to give Foursheets an opportunity to try the cuisine from Chef Zeng Huaijun (曾怀君), who was one of The Man in White T-shirt's partners on Chef of China (一饭封神). We had the opportunity to get a taste of Chef Zeng's cooking at her collaboration dinner at Neighborhood a few months ago, and that really piqued Foursheets' interest. Since her restaurant Song (宋・川菜) is located in Guangzhou, this gave us to impetus to come check it out.

I told Sporty Cousin about this place a few weeks ago, and he actually went on a scouting mission for us. He managed to give it a big "thumbs up", and he was more than happy to come join us tonight so that he could try out more dishes.

The restaurant is inside the Winter Plaza (冬广场) of GT Land Plaza (高德置地广场), and as soon as we walked through the front doors, we were faced with a 7-story high LED display - and it happened to cycle through the point where it advertised about the restaurant. We rode the escalator up and, as Sporty Cousin had booked us a table at 6 p.m., walked in without having to wait in line for more than an hour.

There were three of us out of our group of seven who actually can't handle very spicy food, and we were all here to accompany our spouses. Sporty Cousin did say that the dishes here aren't really that spicy, and described the heat level as about the same as the fish head with chilies he enjoyed at The Chairman (大班樓). I know I can handle that level of spicy heat, so I felt pretty good about what's coming tonight.

It took a while for the group to come up with a list of dishes to order, and we also chose to order in rounds, as the table isn't that big . We still ended up ordering too many dishes for the first round...

Sichuan authentic ground chili eggplant (烧椒茄子) - this was nice and smoky. There was heat here on the palate, but initially wasn't too bad. Very tasty.

Sliced beef and ox tripe in chili sauce (夫妻肺片) - this classic dish wasn't as spicy as one would expect.

"Mapo tofu" stewed tofu with foie gras and minced beef in pepper sauce (鹅肝麻婆豆腐) - THE classic Sichuanese dish now has chunks of goose liver (I'm not sure it qualified as foie gras) added. This was very nice with the fragrance of Sichuan peppercorns. On the palate this was definitely spicy, but not too much for me. We were trying to be restrained but just had to order a bowl of steamed rice to go with this...

Dry-fried spicy green bean with minced pork (干煸四季豆) - meh. Even with low labor costs, the kitchen didn't bother to do this properly to shrivel the beans.

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The Zhongmeister saw the menu advertising this being wood-roasted, and since this is becoming increasingly difficult to find, he wanted to try it.

Jujube wood roasted 42 days Peking duck (42天精饲北京果木烤鸭) - I'm not sure we really tasted the fragrance from the wood, but at least the skin was decent.

Pork belly slices with mashed garlic (温拌蒜泥白肉) - well... this WAS the dish whose picture appeared on the giant LED screen, so of course we had to order it!

The slices of pork were pretty damn big, and sliced nice and thin, tender with lots of fat. The sauce was slightly sweeter than we are used to, with plenty of minced garlic but not too spicy from chili. I would have wanted another order so I can get a few more slices of fatty pork...

Special peppery pig brain (秘制麻辣脑花) - Sporty Cousin insisted on ordering two portions, telling us that he could finish one of them by himself. Well, it was well-received as it's not something one finds everywhere.

Stir-fried pig's kidney and liver (十八秒腰肝合炒) - this was supposed to have taken just 18 seconds in the wok, which explains why the slices of pig's kidney were pretty tender. The liver slices were not as tender but still OK. There was a little more heat here from the chili, but the strong, pungent flavors of the kidney still came through.

Signature spicy boiled tiger grouper (招牌沸腾老虎斑) - for some reason, I had it in my head that this would be like the version from Chef Ronald Shao (邵德龍) of Mián (紅棉) - who was, coincidentally, another contestant on the same TV show. Unfortunately, this was really more like 水煮鱼, and really was not interesting at all. The fish was also pretty muddy.

Stir-fried choy sum with lard (猪油渣炒菜心) - I love the lard.

Chili dumplings (钟水饺) - the filling was pretty firm and bouncy. Pretty good.

Baked "Ziyang" beef bun (紫阳烧饼) - there was no way I would have walked out of this place without ordering these. Crispy, flaky dough with sesame and filled with meat? YES, PLEASE!

The beef had the fragrance and heat from chili, but there was also a hint of Sichuan peppercorns. I would have taken down two of these if I had room...

Crispy wagyu beef flaky pastry (和牛焦饼) - we were told these were supposed to be more numbing 麻 instead of spicy 辣, and that was absolutely right. There was plenty of fragrance from green Sichuan peppercorns, and my tongue got pretty numb. I would have loved another quarter of this, too...

Chengdu "dan dan" noodles with peppery sauce (老成都担担面) - we were completely stuffed by now, but how could I walk out without trying dan dan noodles?! I really wanted to compare it with the bowl that all of us are familiar with from the Cathay Pacific airport lounge...

On a scale of 10, the heat level here was about 1, maybe 1½. No peanut sauce here, but we've got vinegar and also what tasted like spicy fermented bean paste (豆瓣醬). Different, but pretty nice.

Homemade herbal jelly (手作内江红糖龟苓冰粉) - ya just can't end a meal in a Sichuan restaurant without some "ice jelly", and this was what was on offer. Not sure how different it is from your usual Cantonese turtle jelly (龜苓膏), but I didn't mind.

I was prepared not to drink any wine with this spicy meal, but someone very kindly brought a really nice bottle of vintage bubbly...

1990 Fleury, dégorgée en Septembre 2020 - this had plenty of age on it, so it was very nice and smooth, with marmalade, red plums, and salty plum on the nose.

The night was still young and we needed a few more drinks, so I suggested that we check out the Roof Bar at the Park Hyatt Guangzhou nearby. It's not too far and we could use a little walk after stuffing ourselves... As we walked through Huacheng Square (花城广场), I got my first glimpse of the Canton Tower (广州塔) lit up in colorful lights, with the occsional laser beams shooting up in the air.

Thinking that the bar would get crowded on a Saturday night, I asked Sporty Cousin to call and book us a table. That would be the dumbest call I made this trip. For the 7 of us, we were told there would be a minimum charge of CNY 3,000 for an indoor table, while the minimum would be 5,000 for an outdoor table. So a few of us then spent some time going through the bar's proper wine list to try to figure out what to order... Meanwhile, walk-ins aren't guaranteed seats, but they also don't have a minimum spending amount.

Jacquesson Cuvée N°745 - yeasty nose with brioche, flinty and mineral. The acidity was a bit higher as this is extra-brut, but there was still a bit of ripeness on the palate. I could smell the caramelized sugar on the nose, and maybe a little bit of pear thanks to the minerals.

2015 Résonance Pinot Noir Résonance Vineyard - drank about 30 minutes after decanting. Nose showed smoke, leather, vanilla, black cherries. After a few more minutes there was smoke on the nose, too. Reasonably soft on the palate after 10 years. Second pour was another 20 minutes later, and was now less sweet on the nose. Body also got a bit bigger.

It's been a long day, and time to get better acquainted with our hotel bed. Very happy to have caught up with Sporty Cousin tonight, and look forward to seeing him again for lunch tomorrow.