1805 Chinese Restaurant

Unit 1 West Coast, Beacon Road, Bournemouth, BH2 5ER. Tel: 01202 557 807.

Oh how we have missed out Sunday dim sum fix. We've been travelling to Southampton to Shanghai 1814 of late. I don't know what the thing is with the 1800's dates, but I guess I need to look into it for cultural reference.

Just for clarity, they don't only just do dim sum but also do normal British Chinese cuisine, but it is the dim sum that I am most interested in. What is dim sum? It is a part of Cantonese cuisine based around small plates of bite sized food for sharing. Could be steamed dumplings, fried parcels, cold marinated items, roast meats and so on. I hesitate to use the Spanish "tap...." word.

This is the site of the old Ocean Palace restaurant, before it got bulldozed to make way for two big blocks of apartments. The ground floor remained empty for a while but then I picked up on rumours from Facebook and finally saw the banners outside the place saying dim sum coming soon.

We waited till my cousin visited before we went along on Saturday afternoon in July 2018 to try it out.

Dim Sum dishes - chickens feet, noodles

(Top row: minced meat croquettes, marinated chickens feet, beef ho fun noodles. Bottom row: cuttlefish cakes, steamed chickens feet, prawn dumplings.)

First impressions, the place is very upmarket. Decor is really nice and they have left plenty of room between the tables. There is also a private dining area towards the back. A lot of money has gone into this.

It needs to be upmarket in that location and should do very well out of it, what with normal trade and the conference delegate trade.

Steamed Chinese dim sum - tripe, siu mai, spare ribs

(Top row: three roast meats, char siu cheung fun, tofu rolls. Bottom row: steamed tripe, pork and prawn dumplings, steamed beef balls.)

The food is very well made, very fine cooking.

Given the location, it is more than what you would pay for similar food elsewhere but I say that not as a detraction, just an observation.

The only one thing that I picked up on was the roast duck. I prefer crispy skin and bone in. Anyway, nothing was left behind and there were five of us for that quick lunchtime snack.

A table full of lunchtime dim sum dishes