Lifestyle: Restaurant Review – Chung Ying Central, Birmingham

CHUNG Ying is something of a staple in Birmingham’s Chinatown – serving high quality Cantonese cuisine there since 1981 – so you would think it would have a half decent chance of making a success of its new venture, Chung Ying Central at 126 Colmore Row.

Others have failed at the same site at the Victoria Square end of Birmingham’s main business thoroughfare, however. Caffe Uno was there for quite a while before departing and most recently Indian restaurant Saffron – an Oldbury eatery with a big reputation – came and went in a very short space of time.

It’s early days for Chung Ying Central, which only opened just before Christmas, but in this location it will need to attract business punters to fill the seats of what is a cavernous restaurant. In the past the pinstriped brigade has proved reluctant to leave its traditional bars and restaurants on the roads behind Colmore Row and off Newhall Street.

Sensibly owner James Wong is basing Chung Ying’s lunchtime offering around dim sum – Chinese tapas if you’ll excuse the cross cultural reference – and the ability to select from a number of smaller sharing plates would seem to be ideal for quick and easy business lunches.

And of course its appeal should be enhanced by the fact that the business district isn’t exactly overflowing with Chinese restaurants.

On our visit – admittedly on a Monday lunchtime – the place was pretty quiet with perhaps half a dozen tables occupied by the time we left.

The window tables are a great people watching spot and we settled down with a Tsingtao beer and a mineral water to keep an eye on the passers-by while perusing the menus.

The express lunch menu suggests any six dim sum or soup dishes for £20 and while there are other options, such as creating your own dish by choosing from a selection of bases, meats and sauces, this is the offer we chose.

We plumped for beef with ginger and spring onion, crispy curried spring rolls, cuttlefish cake, won ton, shredded squid and char siu buns.

The food arrived quickly and it was evident straight away that we had ordered plenty even for two people with industrial-sized appetites.

Everything was good but our favourites were the curried spring rolls, the squid and the cuttlefish cake which I had always ignored on Chinese menus until persuaded to try it recently and which has now become my new favourite thing.

I still can’t get my head around won ton. It’s like eating the bits of crispy pastry that have been left behind when the more interesting filling has been consumed.

Perhaps it’s me. 

With the drinks the bill came to £26 which is good value for food of this quality on this side of town.

I really hope Chung Ying Central succeeds because it is a much welcome – and necessary – addition to the business district’s dining portfolio.

I think the owners are going to have to work hard to build custom – especially at lunchtimes – through loyalty offers, mass marketing of the Colmore Business District, special events and the like.

But as nearby Fumo – San Carlo’s ‘Italian tapas’ offshoot – has proved, excellent food in bite-sized portions can attract a following.

It may even get a few business types to cross the lunchtime Rubicon that is Colmore Row.