Knowing a new food place has opened in Crown Perth...will always plant a seed in my brain and I wont rest till Ive been to try the menu items I wanted. (Case in point Merrywell and I am still going because I still have things I want to try on the menu!)
ANYWAY, this post is about Silks Chinese Restaurant which just opened to take Yu's place which is scheduled to shut and make way for another new place (yay!).
Silks is located next to Rockpool and so grand that one can NOT miss it.
The entrance to Silks is painted bright red and has a long catwalk lighted by lanterns. Definitely captured the grandeur of Chinese cuisine, and in this case Cantonese-inspired dishes.
Waiting area and counter, I was there on a Friday afternoon and did not have to make a reservation since it was a table for one.
Love the lantern decor! and the dining hall is WAYYYYY bigger than I imagined it to be.
Paddy Hannan bar sure didn't look this big and this good, so glad they took it over.
Love the Vases display in the middle of the hall.
I was seated at the back of the restaurant and overlooked the entire place.
What a grand view!
Love the setting.
Booths on the side reminded me on Imperial Treasure in Singapore's Marina Bay Sands.
And the lower level with more tables, and the panels slide open to function rooms as well.
The scale of this place is just staggering, and the design is wonderfully themed.
There are two more function rooms at the back and a lovely display and stairs. The brickwork and stairs are also in theme. I like it. I am definitely impressed.
Amuse Bouche of sweetcorn and cucumber roll.
A nice way to kick off my dimsum lunch for sure, and I can hardly wait.
I started with the Pantagonian Toothfish Taro puffs which the person recommended when I asked her.
I am usually not a fan of taro puffs, but the crust is very light and crumbles wonderfully.
The inside is not heavy with taro and the toothfish filling is quite generous.
Next, one of my favourite Chinese dishes - Shanghai Dumplings. This one is loaded with crabmeat...
unfortunately it is not the best I have had but certainly the most expensive. The skin is not delicate enough, there is not enough soup and even so it is not really flavourful. I dont like how there are more meat than crabmeat and overall the balance is not right. I would leave this to go back to Singapore to have.
Certainly does look very prettily presented though. And in all honesty... it is the best shanghai dumplings I have had in Perth. It is the best here thus far but on an international standard, for sure it does not make a dent in the comparisons. It is just not well-balanced and not delicate enough.
I moved on to Red Rice Pasta Roll stuffed with minced prawn and a light layer of chinese dough fritters.
I like the thick sesame sauce for sure. The prawn and dough fritter filling is very well-balanced.
The Red Rice Pasta is really just red-rice cheong fun. The cheong fun is too thick and not rolled out thin enough. So it is abit tougher than the usual dimsum cheong fun should be. It is more chewy and glutinous. Overall, still not a bad item to try!
My tummy space was quickly filling up but I was not leaving without my favourite dimsum item EVER.
The salted egg yolk custard bun, Liu Sha Bao.
I am happy with the fact that it is flowy and is how it should be.
Overall, the flavour of the custard is amazing and quite good. But the bun is too thick and does not balance out well in the end. Not the best liushaobao I have had but by Perth standards, is one of the best.
I decided to go all out and had dessert too.
Ordered the Five-Spiced Pear spring roll with Honeycomb and Honey Ice-cream.
It looks pretty as a picture and what a wonderful end to quite a fabulous meal so far.
Close-up of the Pear filling. The spring roll crunches beautifully and is thin like how it should be. The sugar coating poofs and settles into beautiful star dust as you cut into it. Totally made me smile abit on that.
The five-spiced pear filling is generous and wonderfully balanced. The dessert is light and perfect to end any chinese meal!
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Love the creamy Honey ice-cream and Honeycomb to go with the roll as well. I definitely left the place feeling satisfied.
Service-wise, quite attentive but can do better on filling tea cups. More pro-activeness could be better at clearing plates. Overall, it may be teething problems. Let's give them some time. It already is of quite a good standard anyway in comparison to the other places in Perth. But then the prices are very steep and this meal cost me quite a pretty penny!
Table for One, don't be afraid to treat yourself once in awhile if you have worked very hard.
Can't wait to return and glad to have this just a short distance away.
