Shu

Review

The Buddha's shoe

Photo: Heribert Corn Sorry for the bad title. In this case, of course, Shu has nothing to do with footwear, but rather with the name of an ancient empire in what is now Sichuan province, which brings us to the topic. Chen Jianyong's family comes from this region, which is considered to be the granary of China and also the home of the most popular Chinese cuisine in China, and it is the same with Wang Yaxiong. Three years ago, Chen and his wife Yi Cheng opened the magnificent Yong Streetfood on Rechte Wienzeile, while Wang has spent the last four years cooking at the Sichuan restaurant (see opposite). And because Sichuan cuisine has inevitably moved away from its origins with its popularity, explains Chen Jianyong, the two young men felt the time had come to go back to the roots a little. Chen explains that it is not so important to her what a dish is made of, but rather how it tastes. And the taste also needs to be considered in a differentiated way, because according to the Sichuan concept, only a third of it consists of aroma, the second third is the spiciness and the third third is the "numbing". But that doesn't have to worry you now. The two of them took over the bike warehouse that was abandoned a few months ago and turned the rear showroom for gorgeous new road bikes into a kitchen. Which essentially delivers four categories of food: starters/appetizers, "Secrets" aka dumplings, rice and noodle dishes and a few main courses. You should try as much of the starters as is available: The minced pork on poached egg was unfortunately discontinued after just one week because it was quite complex to make and quite filling, which is a shame, and the prawn and pork balls with toast coating were not available at the moment (€ 6.80). But the Shanghai ribs, chopped into bite-sized pieces and fried with caramelized vinegar sauce, were very good (€ 5.80), as were the cumin potatoes, fortunately, because these fried miniature potatoes with cumin, Szechuan pepper and spring onions were pretty much the best potatoes I've had in a long time (€ 3.60).
The dumplings were also great Chinese cinema, pork-filled, wafer-thin chao shou, for example, in a sour, clear radish and pepperoni broth, amazing (4 pcs. € 3.80), or the thicker jiaozi in chili oil, just as spicy as they are good (4 pcs. € 4.80). I also tried the cauliflower pot, but it was so spicy that my body said "tilt". It's a shame that there are no more bicycles and no more Passalacqua espresso, but it's good that there's a spicy Chinese instead. Summary: The former bicycle warehouse now serves Sichuan-style spicy food: spicy starters, spicy dumplings and spicy main courses. Shu 4th, Operngasse 28 Tel. 0664/595 72 31 Mon-Sun 11.30-15, 17.30-22 h

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