I’ve known about places like Ba Shu and Ba Shan for a while now, but I’ve never been able to convince myself to go in and eat. So on a quiet Tuesday night, I venture with a couple of my visiting friends in search for food.

I’ve always had the belief that food, especially chinese food, should not be over a certain price. We use the same ingredients, the same spices and the same seasoning, but the only difference is the way we prepare and cook them. This why I’m always weary of visiting the more pricier establishments.

But on this occasion the choice was not mine to make and we were soon being shown to our seats on the first floor. It was silence as we browsed through the menu, this was no ordinary chinese restaurant. Roast duck, roast pork and chinese bbq pork was nowhere to be seen and I was beginning to fear the worse. We tentatively selected 5 dishes, 3 meat and 2 vegetable, along with rice for 5 and waited for around 10 mins (good timings, especially for a chinese).

I was surprised. The food was good… Very good. The twice cooked pork may have looked a little like bacon, but the flavour of pork and Szechuan spice was wonderful. The chicken pot was succulent and the chicken with mixed peas and sweetcorn dish was so clean that you could taste every flavour. The biggest surprise for me was the vegetables. A simple bok choi and garlic was excellently cooked, with a flavour of garlic that ran all the way through the crunchy yet soft leaves. And finally the green beans in a spicy Szechuan sauce, again the flavour was not just coated on the outside but ran through with every bite. VERY surprising indeed.

For the price of the dishes (between £9-£16 per dish), I would say they were a little on the small size. I was seriously eating conservatively here, but it also allowed me to fully appreciate the range of flavours. I wouldn’t make it a regular outing, but every now and again when I feel my palate dulling from the oil riddled ducks and porks of Chinatown, I may walk that extra 50 yards and pay that extra £20 for the Szechuan delight that is Ba Shan.