Suzhou Recs?
Taking a day trip to Suzhou during my week stay in Shanghai. Any recommendations for lunch during the day trip?
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Xiao Yang
May 11, 2008 10:19 AM
You'll find Suzhou cuisine a bit on the sweet side. Songhelou, mentioned by another poster, is a historic restaurant that created the notorious "squirrel fish" dish (松鼠桂鱼 - song shu gui yu). Suzhou is also the home of my favorite river eel preparation, the heavenly xiang you shan hu (响油鳝糊).
›1 Reply-
re: Xiao Yang
buttertart
May 12, 2008 09:12 AM
Yes squirrel fish is in my opinion one of the least appealing/successful Suzhou dishes. The food at the Wang Si is much less sweet than that at a lot of places in SZ.
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buttertart
May 5, 2008 09:52 AM
Sorry did not see this until today, hope not too late for your purposes.
Spent 4 days in Suzhou in March, love the city, hope you enjoy it as well.
For Suzhou style food:
The restaurants near Guanqianjie (the main pedestrian mall) are by and large very good. My favorite is the Wang Si - their beggar's chicken (available without special order) is excellent as is their pine nut Dong Po pork shoulder, less cloying than most - and they have a sliced lotus root in tangerine juice appetizer which is one of my favorite things to eat, period - so refreshing (trying to perfect it in NYC, not quite there yet). If this is a consideration, they have an English menu and one of the younger waitresses there is a sweetie. Have had good meals at the Songhelou as well.
For dian xin in an attractive and quiet setting:
Excellent dim sum (dian xin) at the restaurant in the Sheraton Suzhou, all you can eat, RMB 88 pp - everything freshly prepared, the absolute best har gow ever (shrimp and scallop).
