Nanjing Impressions Restaurant 南京大牌檔 at Plaza Singapura

Nanjing Impressions Restaurant 南京大牌檔 at Plaza Singapura is certainly impressive. When we walked into the restaurant, we half expected a sword-wielding Zhang Ziyi to glide gracefully into the dining hall. The nice food, interesting decor and the mental image of the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon star evoked by the atmospheric restaurant made our lunch at Nanjing Impressions a delightful experience.

Award Winning Restaurant

Nanjing Impressions Restaurant (南京大牌檔 Nánjīng dàpái dàng) was founded in China in 1994 and now has many outlets. The cuisine of Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu province, is famous for its “small eats” or streetside snacks – hence the name 南京大牌檔 Nánjīng dàpái dàng or Nanjing Streetside Stalls. Nanjing Impressions Restaurant has won many awards and has been listed recently as one of the “Top 10 dinner brands in China”.

Nanjing Impressions Restaurant at Plaza Singapura is designed to give patrons a feeling of dining in old Nanjing. There is a doorman donning traditional Chinese costume to welcome patorns. The dining hall has decorated archways, aged wooden pillars and paper lanterns hung across the ceiling. There are counters decked out to look like old street stalls and a small stage for traditional Chinese music performance. It looks more authentic as a traditional Chinese tea house than some sets of historical period dramas on TV.

Nanjing Impressions Restaurant Menu

The restaurant specialises in Nanjing dishes, a sub-category of Huaiyang cuisine, one of the Four Great Traditions in Chinese Cuisine. Nanjing Impressions offers many duck-based specialties, like the Duck Meat Dumplings and Salted Duck, and other signature dishes such as Sesame-scented Beancurd Julienne, Sweet Vinegar Tangy Pork Ribs and Poached “Lion’s Head” Meatball. Diners order by ticking items from a menu chit. Below are pictures of some of the menu items and the menu chit.

Lunch at Nanjing Impressions

We visited Nanjing Impressions at Plaza Singapura recently when one of us needed a diet of semi soft food. We ordered Tender Tofu in Shrimp Sauce ($6.80), Shrimp Roe Custard with Scallions ($4.80) and Traditional Brown Sugar Rice Cakes ($4.80). Steamed rice was $0.80 per bowl. Service charge and GST would be added to the bill.

The food was served pretty promptly. The Tender Tofu in Shrimp Sauce came in a shallow black pot on a wooden stand. It looked plain and bland but the taste was interesting. The sweet savoury shrimp sauce had full intense flavours. The dish was enjoyable on its own and also went well with plain steamed rice.

The Shrimp Roe Custard with Scallions looked royal and intriguing. The steamed savoury egg custard had great texture and was tasty. It was silky smooth, light and easy to eat. The various ingredients combined well to produce a simple but delicious dish.

The Traditional Brown Sugar Rice Cakes was slightly sweet and could be enjoyed as a dessert. The texture was similar to that of fluffy mantous and, like mantous, could be enjoyed with the savoury dishes.

We tried the cold Sour Plum with Hawthorn Juice ($3.50). There was a nice combination of sweet and sour taste. It was a refreshing and thirst quenching drink.

An Impressive Experience

We liked what we tried at Nanjing Impressions and we thought the prices were very reasonable. We would certainly want to return to try other items on their extensive menu. It was a simple light lunch – but the nice food and interesting ambience made it an impressive experience…and was that Zhang Ziyi in one of the booths?

Ratings:
Food: 4
Service: 3
Value: 4
Atmosphere: 4
Overall Rating: 4 TOPs  

Nanjing Impressions
68 Orchard Road
#04-46-51, Plaza Singapura
Singapore 238839

Tel:+65 6352 7877

Opening Hours: 11am – 10pm

Nearby MRT Station : Dhoby Ghaut

The Ordinary Patrons
a Singapore food blog by ordinary people looking for places to eat