I often like to look up the situation of restaurants I'm heading out to on Google Streetview, just so I know what to expect when I get off the bus and lessen (though not completely mitigate) the chance I might head off in completely the wrong direction. I wouldn't recommend doing this for Xi Home just yet though - Blossom Street until recently was a dark, dodgy alleyway round the back of the old Water Poet pub (RIP) and if you Streetview their address today you may be forgiven you're being sent, Goodfellas-style, to a shakedown joint never to be seen again.
Fortunately, and whatever you think about the flattening of the Water Poet and environs, Xi Home is today part of the swanky new Blossom Yard development, and along with Sri Lankan restaurant Kolamba East is spearheading the what I believe I'm supposed to call "regeneration" of this little area just north of Liverpool Street. And to be fair to the Blossom Yard developers, who could have probably filled the spots very easily with a Gordon Ramsay Street Burger and a Black Sheep Coffee, both Kolamba and Xi Home appear to care about what they're doing, and are doing it very well for not much money.
The problem, such as it is, with Xi Home and many other Chinese restaurants, is that the menu appears to be geared towards groups of 4 up sharing. And there's no problem with this of course - the more of the menu you get to try the better, and there's hardly any finer way to spend time with friends and family than working your way through dumplings and noodles. But with a minimum dumpling order of ten(!), if there's just two of you there's a choice to be made between having quite a lot of the same thing, or over-ordering and taking home leftovers. We chose the latter.
The dumplings, as you might be wondering, were wonderful. Fluffy and soft and piping hot, we went for the Spanish Mackerel variety because I'd never tried them before, but the abalone and even the lobster versions from the 'premium dumplings' section were the same price - about £19 for 10 from memory. There's something particularly addictive about the way that the pastry in well-made dumplings behaves in the mouth, all bouncy and tacky and silky at once, and these were extremely well-made.
Cold shredded chilli chicken was another classic Xi'an (I hope I'm right in saying - I've learned a lot about regional Chinese food over the last few years but I'm definitely still a beginner) dish, with a fantastic balance between poached poultry and earthy chilli heat. Peanuts and spring onions added some crunch, but the star here was the chicken itself, soft but firm, perfectly cooked and nicely presented.
Tempura king prawn with wasabi mayonnaise demonstrated that when Xi Home wanted to go a bit Japanese fusion, they could do it pretty well. The mayonnaise was just the right side of bitter, and the prawns were huge things with an excellent firm bite.
I've been a fan of murgers (it took me four attempts to type that as my computer kept autocorrecting to burger) since I tried the version by Murger HanHan, which now have branches all over the city. This was, I'm almost certain, even better, with an amazing flavour from the soft pork belly filling and the flatbread being just crisp enough on the outside to hold together, and thin enough to not muffle the pork. Really good stuff.
But amazingly my favourite dish wasn't the murger, or even the dumplings, lovely though they both were, but this glorious plate of green beans, dried chilli and ground pork, which despite being arguably one of the least complicated things on the menu, completely charmed with its glossy charred veg, crunchy bits of pig and just the right level (as in, quite a lot) of chilli heat. I'm told this was just as impressive reheated the next day, so it was the dish that gave on giving. A must-order, I'd say.
I hesitate to mention service when I'm on an invite like this, because obviously it's not often representative of what you might find if you just wandered in off the street, but staff were so enthusiastic about the menu they were offering and happy we enjoyed it that it was all rather charming. And I'm sure energy like that can't just be turned on for the press.
Anyway, they had every right to be proud of themselves because Xi Home is a genuinely accomplished and exciting new addition to the food options near Liverpool Street. It's not expensive (price per head would have been about £35 I think with a couple of beers), even less if you went for a less premium dumpling option, and it's now firmly on my recommendation list for this part of town. RIP the Water Poet, long live Xi Home Dumplings Bay.
8/10
I was invited to Xi Home and didn't see a bill.
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