After the Japanese and Italian connections back at Nishimura and Rosso, now it’s time for the final specialty restaurant found at Shangri-La Jakarta establishment. The Shang Palace!

Shang Palace sports a classic interior but has not yet followed the footsteps of probably another two five-star hotels who had transformed their Chinese restaurant into a creature of modern beauty. Despite of that fact, I saw numerous of people flocking into Shang Palace be it as a big family, couples, or even a group of friends during my dinner last time. Shang Palace somehow positions itself to be flexible as it caters the lap of luxury courses but also you will find a good time there with your usual stir-fried dishes and a bottle of soda. Why not?

Aside from these facts, the service was supreme and kind of reminds me with my previous encounter with Nishimura for lunch that day, but you may not find the solitude you’ll find at the Japanese compatriot rather than Shang Palace which suits more as a family restaurant with its openness.

But then again, what matters now are the creations of Shang Palace’s prominent chef, Mr Benson Fok. The freshness of the ingredients was so well-assured even from the openers, the beautiful fresh tiger prawns with homemade orange sauce. There’s always a smile on my face whenever I see my wife gets so excited over fresh shrimps, prawns, or even lobsters. Well, we all do love it sincerely right?

Additionally, our openers were made more excited with the companions of the rich minced beef soup with spinach and of course, the delicious and exquisite fish maw soup with the unique cordyceps flower. Unlucky though because I can only find one maw per portion and I literally struggled to find another piece of it amongst the chicken chunks only to see myself sunk in disappointments. I was lucky to be cured in an instant afterwards by the appearance of the majestic Peking duck dishes. First, made into pancakes filled with fresh vegetables and hoisin sauce, and then secondly, the remaining slices were stir-fried with black pepper sauce. It was just amazing!

For the main course, the fried rice with assorted seafood and XO sauce was actually more than enough for me but Shang Palace was more than generous to also introduce me with the melts-in-your-mouth pan-fried wagyu beef tenderloin rolling the juicy enoki mushrooms bathed with nightly beauty of black pepper sauce. Not stopping there, a plate full of homemade bean curd stir-fried with ham, shimeji mushrooms, and dried scallops all over these bootylicious dish.

The wondrous night then ended in a sweet note thanks to the appearance of chilled mango and sago cream that made me chase all over the plate for the sago pearls. However my errand did not stop there as the finale of Chef Fok’s creations of avocado puree topped with coconut ice cream made me to literally again savor the last drop of the wonder fruit on the plate.

Our date night was a success and we head back to the room to enjoy the Jakarta view from the 24th floor contented and fulfilled. What more can you ask from that? Thank you Shang Palace! Our second encounter after the unique Kong’s Cuisine was no less enthralling.

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