Simon's Peking Duck — Restaurant in Melbourne

Simon’s Peking Duck at Box Hill South Review on 12/1/2021

With a name like Simon’s Peking Duck, combining the enthusiasm and excitement of my friend who invited my wife and I to join him for a Peking Duck lunch, I do have some expectation of the venue and the standard of the meal served.

On the window is an enlargement of an article, written in 2013, about how the Peking duck is prepared, roasted and served. I find one phrase rather amusing, “…the main act – golden, crisp skinned swatches of duck cooked in a process too convoluted to describe here, …”. Hey, Dude, I have never seen any roast duck skin colour golden, but more like caramel burgundy.

In the middle of the front window facing the Middleborough Road is a stack of chairs on display. My expectation of this restaurant’s management takes a dive. How can such prime position be wasted with such eyesore? It can be used to display photos of the Peking Duck banquet, or famous patrons who have dined here. Alternatively, a television screen can be installed and run a slide show to promote the business.

The interior is far from my imagination; it is dated, not one with the ambience of classic Chinese style interior decoration that matches the name of the restaurant. Right at the end of the dining area is the drink bar. The centre is occupied by two empty long tables. Indeed the restaurant is empty, with only another table occupied in the right corner.

My friend also invited three other friends, whom I have never met. Two are dinki-di Aussies, and we strike up conversation as though we have known for years.

It does not take long before the first course of 4-course Peking duck meal is served, comprising Peking duck, pancake, Hoisin sauce, julienne cucumber and strips of spring onions are served.

The chef comes to demonstrate his skill in tossing a piece of pancake to each of our plate. He spreads the surface of a piece of pancake with some Hoisin sauce, then places on top of it a piece of cucumber, spring onion and duck meat. The pancake is wrapped into parcel with one open end. To my disappointment, he only does a piece as an example, instead of wrapping a piece for each of us.

My wife and I had Peking ducks in China and Hong Kong restaurants several times. At the one of the Quanjude Peking duck restaurant, I had an opportunity to select an uncooked duck to be roasted in the kitchen. On each occasion the whole roast Peking duck was presented to our table. Either the chef or a waiter would demonstrate their showmanship by expertly carve beautiful portions of meat from the duck. The aromatic roasted skin was divine. I am salivating even as I am writing this.

A Peking duck can carve into 80 to 120 very thin slices, each containing both meat and skin. It looks like the chef at Simon’s Peking Duck has a lot more years to improve the art of carving. As can be seen from one of my photos, the piece of duck meat I used in the pancake wrap is a huge chunk.

The duck skin is very crispy, but the taste of the meat is rather bland. Generally speaking, Peking duck is not marinated as heavily as normal Cantonese roast duck.

Like what I have blogged in many other occasions, I like my food to be presented correctly using plates of correct size, shape and colour. For a restaurant that serves such a unique item, surely they should invest in some bigger plates so that the duck meat can be arranged in a more artistic manner. It is also important to make sure that no crockery is chipped or cracked.

The two other courses are fried flat rice noodles or “Hor Fun” with duck meat and mushroom, and fried bean shoots with duck meaat. For the fried noodles, it lacks the “Wok Hei”, that complex charred aroma produced under conditions of intense heat.

The fourth course is the Peking duck broth / soup. I love soups, in fact, any soup. The Peking duck bones and any duck meat left after being used in the last two courses, are boiled with Tofu, and mushrooms to produce a fairly concentrated broth. I doubt MSG is needed to enhance...

I have been having Peking Duck in this place for many years and it has been my go to choice for authentic Peking Duck.

Recently I travelled to Beijing thanks to VISA free and tried some Peking Duck in China. This place has done a great job to localize the dish.

Instead of slicing ducks into as many as 108 thin pieces where skin, fat and meat are all present in each piece in China, this place serves duck in exactly 15 chunks easily to be picked up fork or chopsticks. It allows such efficiency that you only need to wait 20 mins for your duck.

Instead of being roasted with special wood in an oven in authentic Chinese way, the ducks here go through very authentic British cooking mechanics like fish and chips. The duck seems to be deep fried to ensure that it is cooked throughout. It definitely adds on the fattiness to help go through cold winter.

You are given eactly 15 pieces of pancake, spring onion and cucumber. You dont need to spend extra dollars to have more onion as this is how you are expected to eat their dish. Of course in China, these condiments are free as they have more farmlands.

The service in this restaurant is also very efficient and good. They always return your call to book and ensure that you would come. When ducks are served with all dishes, other dishes are all stacked on top of duck meat. Dont worry, ducks are deep fried so the meat has a high temperature layer protecting them from whatever at bottom of other dishes. Waiter or waitress are very serious without smiles as they take their job seriously especially when helping new diners how to wrap the duck with their hands. Of course I am a pro and never needed them to touch my food now.

Because I am not able to travel to China so often for Peking Duck, I would still come to this restaurant as my go to choice of Peking Duck, localised and improved! Keep up...

Disgusted! I don't care how nice your food is, if you treat your customers the way we were treated you will lose client forever! Don't forget that Old Kingdom is just as nice if not better duck with owners and staff who actually car about your dining experience. Especially when they know it's a 'special occasion' like MY MUM's BIRTHDAY! We only go to Simons because it's closer to where we live than OLD KINGDOM and the owner at Simon's has always been super sweet. Such a shame his staff will keep making him lose customers. Came with a big group and although we prebooked how many ducks we wanted, they took ages to bring out one plate at a time and then we were waiting 15 minutes between finishing one piece of duck each. They make us wait for the food and then rush us through eating. When we finished, I asked for the plates to be cleared and paper to be changed and they refused. They wanted us to have my mum's Birthday cake on top of the bits of duck bones, hoi sin sauce and dirty tissues. So I offered to pay for the paper and straight away they changed it. What a joke! Charged me $2 for two sheets of fish and chips paper. To top this off, after rushing us through singing happy birthday to mum, while we were eating our cake, threw the bill on our table as if to say, please get out so we can give your table to the ' non existent customer not waiting' at the door. We've been coming for years but definitely will not come again. My poor mum has had the worst...