Colourful Yunnan — Restaurant in Melbourne

We recently dined at this Yunnan cuisine restaurant in Melbourne. Our party of two adults and one child ordered four hot dishes and one cold dish. Overall, the experience was mixed. Since it was the weekend, we also had to pay a Sunday surcharge. It's worth noting that the restaurant doesn't provide free takeaway boxes, which might be inconvenient for those who like to take leftovers home.

First, we ordered the Zhang Zhong Bao (crispy chicken cartilage), but this dish was quite disappointing. After finishing the dish, we realized that there were only ten pieces of actual cartilage, with the rest being just regular chicken meat. This felt like poor value for money, and the dish might as well be renamed "Spicy Chicken" instead.

On the positive side, the Sour Soup Beef was a standout dish, easily the best of the meal. The broth was flavorful, and the beef slices were tender and well-seasoned, with a perfect balance of sour and spicy notes that made it very appetizing. The Shredded Chicken with Yunnan Spices was also a hit, with tender chicken and well-balanced seasoning, making it a dish we'd happily order again.

The Wa Ethnic Stir-fried Garlic Scapes with Cured Pork was a bit more complex. At first, the dish was intriguing, with the fermented black beans giving it a strong, pungent flavor that was oddly appealing. However, as we ate more, the dish became too dry and overly salty, which might not be to everyone's taste.

Finally, the Stir-fried Pork Intestines had a good flavor, with the intestines being clean and cooked just right, but it was a bit too greasy, which made it heavy towards the end.

Overall, Peacock's Yunnan cuisine has some highlights, particularly the Sour Soup Beef and the Shredded Chicken, but there were also some disappointments. Given the additional weekend surcharge and the lack of free takeaway boxes, the value for money feels somewhat lacking. If you're a fan of Yunnan cuisine, it's still worth a visit, but you might want to choose your...

The Hawthorn restaurant is a modern beautiful restaurant from the outside, but is a little plainer on the inside. We had been to the Carlton restaurant for a number of years but it is only doing take away at the moment. The Carlton restaurant is very plain and looks like a student frequented place to eat with no frills and basic furniture. The Hawthorn restaurant is a little more upmarket with some hints of luxury. The menu is revamped with great photos and descriptions of how the dishes fit into the Yunnan food culture. We saw a few dishes which we would like to explore further. The prices have also risen substantially and the bowls of cross bridge noodles are now in the $30s. Perhaps there are other options which we didn't see which would be in the mid teens ($15?), but we didn't see any. We tried the deep fried intestines in chilli and got a dish that only I could eat (and only after the Szechuan pepper had numbed my mouth). Should have gone for the preserved veg version. We tried the cold chicken salad with strips of shredded chicken and bean shoots which was nice. We also had the cumin lamb which was quite hot as well. The lamb pieces were encrusted with a lot of cumin powder, almost like a batter but with cumin instead of flour. I found the food well cooked (on the very spicy side) and the kids enjoyed the cross bridge noodles but we ended taking most of the lamb home. Two dishes, a bowl of noodles and a bowl of rice came to...

Despite it’s charming exterior, delicious aromas, and well-intentioned staff, the Colourful Yunnan falls exceptionally short of a positive culinary experience. Our food and drinks were delivered just over two hours following ordering, and once the food arrived staff was not in any way proactive with respect to clearing dishes, going as far as asking us to move dirty dishes to the side ourselves. In favour of serving private rooms our drinks were left on a table within eye sight in the distance for 20 minutes before we decided to get them ourselves. Further, this restaurant has no practices through which to inform customers as whether any dishes are suitable for Coeliacs, although they do cater well for other allergies. The food itself was sadly average, although this assessment was perhaps coloured by the fact that it arrived so late the entire experience had lost any pleasure. The staff was barely accommodating, giving a mere 5% discount for their general ineptitude and lack of care. Perhaps this was just a bad day, but for a first outing following a state wide lockdown, it felt like a punishment more...