Chinese Gourmet, 60 Skylines Village, London E14 9TS

Chinese Gourmet: It's under no obligation to be this good

“Did you see my face just then?” a weird question coming from my friend Josh; a 7ft architect who is, by definition, unable to go unnoticed. “I saw a guy in a Patagonia gilet and just thought, ‘Grow up mate’. Obviously, I didn’t say that to him – but he definitely knew I was thinking it”.

As you might’ve guessed, we’re in Canary Wharf; the result of architects who grew up interpreting The Jetsons as a tangible future, before finally getting their chance to give it a bash in the 80s. Jabbing a finger at every building, Josh explains how each one is a dated embarrassment to the craft, neatly underpinning the fact that, just around the corner, is a dinky little restaurant that takes pride in its own.

Thought to have been where colossal git, Henry VIII kept his hunting hounds, the Isle of Dogs is home to Chinese Gourmet just south of Canary Wharf. Located in ‘Skylines Village’ – a name seemingly lifted from Sonic The Hedgehog – it’s the definition of a ‘shoebox restaurant’, complete with one bench and table outside and a strip of astroturf to indicate when it’s summer. But telling people that your favourite restaurant is in this neck of the woods is like saying it’s in Gatwick or Didcot Parkway. They pull a face, instinctively assuming that they’ve misheard, but, in a way, they’re not far off.

At a glance, with its bright yellow not-quite-Comic-Sans font, it triggers the same familiarity as those places in train stations like Upper Crust or the most egregious of all, West Cornwall Pasty. In stark contrast, authenticity isn’t feigned here, but practised; with lunchtimes in particular seeing a queue snake out the door, with delivery drivers in constant orbit.

See it. Say it. Sort of.

Chinese Gourmet is a timbered Alamo, surrounded by surgically contrived assets posing as restaurants, designed to capitalise on expense accounts and poorly-planned stag dos. Like the bleak feeding holes in airports and train stations, restaurants here are neither compelled nor necessarily expected to be any good whatsoever and this complacency is palpably baked-in. But in a move of textbook business acumen, Chinese Gourmet have exploited this weakspot – something made even more impressive given that it feels unintentional.

Taut enough to slingshotThe Borrowers, the Xi’an Biang Biang noodles are from the ‘signature’ part of the menu. Hand-pulled, they’re cut in a way that suggests time is of the essence, tapering in ways that range from barely noticeable, to completely wild. The Sichuan chilli oil delivers on its hypoesthesia, coating chunks of fat-caped beef, braised into shreddable submission alongside a supple pile of pak choi.

The sweet potato noodle hot and sour soup with beef is a lava lamp swirl of chilli oil. A clear view of the golden broth beneath is made visible only by the damming effect of a whole bok choi. Plumb its depths and you’ll find a generous spool of translucent bungee cords with a slipperiness matched only by their satisfying chew. Despite the heat and sourness being largely subdued, the slices of beef lurking about seem to have been stored in stock, each piece imbued with a deep umami thud.

Delicious Brains

Brains vac-packed in silk, the prawn wontons come speeding toward our table, their route traced by a trail of steam. A Pantone chart of Hell, the Sichuan sauce darkens into a silt of chilli flakes, garlic and balsamic the balance of which is so enticingly moreish, that I clasp my hands beneath the table in thanks.

“Glosstown” gawps Josh, with a face like a Moomin. It’s the Gong Bao chicken; a muddle of chicken thigh chunklets, fat spring onion bulbs, peanuts and ellipses of dried chilli, all sheened in this caramel varnish. It also highlights our elementary mistake in failing to order rice. On the plus side, the fridge here is packed with imports that illustrate how the sugar tax is an attack on our civil rights. However, justice, thy name is Master Kong’s sour plum tea.

Glosstown, Glossop, Glosscester,

This one goes out to my dietician

On the subject of greens and in the interests of health, get the morning glory (stop) and, despite being asked to choose between either chilli or garlic, get both – they do not skimp. Thoroughly seasoned, the squelching chlorophyllic crunch makes for a clean break between slurps and shovelling.

Getting up from our table, Josh’s face is contorted, attempting to reconcile not only what’s just happened, but mainly where. To be fair, to leave Canary Wharf and not feel dissatisfied in some way is a typically alien concept; ask any punter or even HSBC.

Yet another prime example of why I popped the question to her shirtless, on a hillside in San Sebastián as if possessed by arch-bellend Putin himself, it’s The Editor who spotted Chinese Gourmet* on her screeching commute back to Lewisham one night. Anyway, with that imagery sweating away in your mind, I implore you to go if you’ve not been already, in which case apologies for the 4-minute statement of the obvious.

*An honourable mention should go to the most zen voice in food writing, Isaac Rangaswami for also recommending Chinese Gourmet, who has made it quite clear that we’re not to be wed. At all. Ever.