Mei Ume at the Four Seasons, Tower Hill

Mei Ume is a Chinese and Japanese restaurant and not, they are at pains to point out, a Chinese-Japanese restaurant. There's no pan-Asian stir-frys, no Sino-Japanese fusion food, no crab & sweetcorn ramen or crispy duck sushi. Instead, Chinese and Japanese dishes sit alongside each other, not in separate sections of the menu but listed within similar categories, so you get, for example, prawn crackers listed right next to edamame beans in the snacks, and "Stir fried lobster tail with ginger and spring onion" next to "Wagyu beef teppanyaki with ponzu and miso dressing" in the Signature section. It's a conceit that still may have purists thinking twice, especially in these days of ultra-regional specialisation in Chinese and Japanese food, and you'd be forgiven for questioning whether the same kitchen could - or even should - be attempting all this at once.

At least, until you eat the food in question, at which point all of these questions of authenticity immediately fade into insignificance. Because whether you stick to the Chinese dishes or order only Japanese, or concoct yourself a weird geographically confused combination of the both (as we ended up doing), you're very likely to enjoy every last bit of your dinner at Mei Ume. The reason is in no small part due to an innovative dual-head-chef system, with one person experienced in the Cantonese traditions, and a sushi master trained in Japan overseeing that side of things. All of the dishes therefore have that all-important chime of authenticity, despite the two cuisines existing on the same menu.

And they've also got themselves a very competent cocktail person, based on these welcome drinks - a Sakura Spritz made with gin, cherry and yuzu juice, and a Geisha Martini, dry and perfumed with an elegent hint of sansho pepper.

It's surely the case that the best way of enjoying sushi - proper, high-end sushi - is to sit down at the bar at somewhere like Cubé or Tetsu and ask for omakase. There's something immediate and charming about having your food prepared in front of your very eyes, and having such control over the experience as a customer - deciding whether to have a second round of sashimi before moving on to the nigiri, for example - is empowering and actually quite thrilling. That said, given the limitations of the standard dining room format at Mei Ume, their sushi offering is astonishingly good. Sashimi of the finest otoro (meat from the belly of the tuna, rich with fat) and blindingly fresh, buttery mackerel were served prettily arranged alongside wonderful soft eel, sea-spritzed uni (sea urchin) and aburi (blowtorched) salmon nigiri, each boasting absolutely unimpeachable, body temperature rice. Only a rather sad pile of fake wasabi - coloured horseradish, as opposed to the real wasabi root which they really should be offering at this price point - let the side down slightly.

We let Mei Ume decide in which order to bring the rather eclectic set of items we'd ordered, and so next to arrive was their signature Peking duck, as deeply bronzed (and no less attractive) as George Hamilton, fanned out beneath a dainty clump of cabbage and herbs. It arrived alongside the familiar array of Peking duck kit - pancakes in a steamer, julienned cucumber and spring onion, hoi sin sauce - but also a bowl of plum jam, which was a nice touch. Really, though, this was all about the duck - and my God, what duck. That gorgeous skin, as delicate as the finest French pastry, rested on a layer of fat which dissolved in the mouth into rich duck soup, and left you to marvel at the texture of the flesh, just blushed pink (though by no means rare - the Chinese seldom serve duck rare), soft and yielding but with just enough of a chew to bring a smile to the face. I made a pancake out of a couple of slices as I was expected to do, but very soon ended up eating the duck on its own, to be able to simply marvel at it without the distraction of vegetables and sauces. I've had a few Peking ducks in my time, but this was an absolute world-beater.

If the rest of the evening paled in comparison somwhat to That Duck, well, that's hardly much of a criticism. Kung Pao chicken had an elegant set of flavours, with sweetness, sourness and chilli heat in perfect balance, and macadamia nuts added a nice bit of crunch. The chicken itself was perhaps very slightly on the dry side, but with so much else to enjoy it didn't matter too much.

Gai lan was perfectly cooked, with a great crunch and seasoned well by a silky ginger sauce. There's only so much to say about a plate of gai lan, but as plates of gai lan go, this was a good one.

And finally green beans with minced pork, the use of Iberico pig adding an extra depth to this classic dish. Very nice indeed, vibrantly flavoured and extremely enjoyable, but to be honest I was still thinking about That Duck.

As should be apparent by now, judging solely by the quality of the food offered, there is very little to criticise about Mei Ume. Hopping between Japanese and Chinese food from one course to the next has the potential to turn into a car crash, but by virtue of everything being done to such a high standard, and with each cuisine treated with such skill and respect, it all comes together marvellously. Service is attentive and knowledgable, and it's a beautiful room to enjoy it all in - the hotel (the Four Seasons) is the ex headquarters of the Port of London Authority, and is all high ceilings and Beaux Arts architectural flourishes, accented with Japanese and Chinese murals and details.

But there is the little matter of the cost. I was invited to Mei Ume, and though I'm sure I'd have appreciated the food just as much if I was covering it myself, the bill in question would have come to £261.56 (assuming 12.5% service) for two, not an every day expense. But you know what, £130 per person for a table in a five star hotel, plenty of booze, some of the finest sushi in town and the best Peking duck in the whole bloody world (probably) is most certainly not an unreasonable amount of money, and if you were in the mood (and budget) for a celebration, I imagine this would suit pretty well. Plus, they do a Saturday lunch menu for £25 which includes a glass of sparkling sake, and though it doesn't feature any of the pricier bits of sushi, you do get some salmon & avocado hosomaki (with that same fantastic rice) and some dim sum, so you can experience the whole Chinese-Japanese dichotomy in the same lovely surroundings for the price of an IMAX cinema ticket.

Not a fusion restaurant, then, but really two restaurants from two different corners of the world that happen to occupy the same few hundred square feet of hotel, Mei Ume is somehow not the confusion the concept threatens to be, but is in fact a remarkably versatile operation. You could settle in for a Cantonese feast, construct yourself an omakase-style sushi experience, spend a week's wages on dinner or lunch on a budget, and whatever you end up with is likely to be at least worth the money you pay for it. Which is by no means a given in five star London hotels, let me tell you. I would happily go back, and pay. Anything to have another go at That Duck.

8/10

I was invited to Mei Ume and didn't pay

Shikumen, Shepherd's Bush

I often think the most difficult thing to do in the world of restaurants is occupy the middle ground. If you're either a no-holds-barred Mayfair fine dining palace of splurge, or alternatively an ultra-low-budget dining hall in the New Cross, your audiences know exactly what to expect (and what they might expect to pay) and you've got no further explaining to do. But a mid-range restaurant will have to persuade a more moneyed clientele that the dip in prices and décor is still made up for in competent food, and that the budget diner will find enough above their usual spend per head to consider the odd indulgence.

It's a balancing act, one fraught with danger, but get it right and your middle-ground restaurant stands a chance of beating both the high- and low- end joints at their own game. And here to make the case for friendly, dependable mid-range Chinese is Shikumen in Shepherd's Bush, where you'll spend neither a pittance or an arm and a leg but stand a very good chance of coming away with one of the most rewarding Cantonese dining experiences in town.

The devil, as ever, is in the detail. Har gau were sticky and plump, with plenty of prawn filling and piping hot. Dipped in the house flaked chilli oil or hot sauce (both are great) this was top dumpling work.

Turnip puffs were an interesting delicate cone shape (and therefore less overwhelmingly carb-y than they can be)...

...cheung fun were excellent, both the crunchy dough stick variety and the prawn and bean curd, both of which impressed in different ways with their textures and strong flavours. I'm yet to discover a way of eating these slippery little fellas with chopsticks that doesn't involve abject humiliation on my part, but fortunately thanks to my friend being half an hour late and it being towards the end of service, not many people were around to witness it.

Oddly the only element of the dim sum that didn't completely win us over were the Xiao Long Bao. They were admittedly cleverly and precisely made little things, with a good amount of soupy filling and delicate casings, but the flavours veered between self-consciously wacky - cheese, or squid ink - and ever-so-slightly-too-plain pork. Still worth ordering, but not quite up to the level of the Din Tai Fung crab & pork.

But hold your presses everyone, because Shikumen are about far more than dim sum. I've been lucky enough to have fairly high-end roast Peking duck at various places in town - Hutong's was good though I've not been for years, as was Gold Mine in Bayswater. But this here was on another level - skin so light and delicately treated it just dissolved in the mouth, and neat slices of tender flesh that had a awe-inspiring balance of fresh game and soft fat. It was utterly lovely, so much so that rather than assembling the flesh inside steamed pancakes and dressing with hoi sin like we were supposed to, I ended up just eating the meat by itself, revelling in the complexity of taste and texture. If there's a better roast duck in London I'll be very surprised.

The joy of the duck didn't end with the pancake course, either, or the first few slices of golden skin dipped in sugar. After we'd had our fill of the former, two bowls of opaque duck soup were brought out, studded with spring onions and thickened with soy milk, which drew yet another bewilderingly complex set of flavours and textures from the bird. If you should ever go to Shikumen - and you very much should - to leave without ordering the duck would be a mistake on the level of going to Flatiron and ordering a salad.

So, for excellent dim sum and a truly world class roast duck, paying £45 a head including service and a couple of beers sounds like something approaching a bargain. If treading the middle ground of any particular cuisine's offering is difficult - and it undoubtedly is - it only means that when it does go right, it goes very right and we end up blessed with an operation like Shikumen who can hardly be faulted at all, treated either as an occasional special occasion or your new neighbourhood go-to Cantonese diner. But however you choose to approach Shikumen, I hope you enjoy it every bit as much as I did. Oh, and order the duck.

8/10

We were invited to Shikumen and though this time we did SEE the bill, we didn't pay it.

Duck Duck Goose, Brixton

Beware of irony. That's my advice for restaurateurs. Your white-hot idea for a 70s dinner party popup with Babycham to start, or searing "take" on corned beef hash and apple crumble school dinners may have you and your friends splitting their sides, but that joke will never translate to the plate. Food is never funny - surprising and delightful, at its best, yes - but never funny. The only fun anyone's ever going to get from "funny" food is reading about the whole car crash afterwards. And for that, I'll point you towards Marina O'Loughlin's evisceration of Gregg Wallace's catastrophic nostalgia-fest Gregg's Table (RIP), where it turned out that - shockingly - paying restaurant prices for boiled beef and carrots or "canned" fruit salad with Carnation is rather more hilarious in concept than in reality. Beware of irony.

Duck Duck Goose just about avoids the worst pitfalls of the "ironic restaurant" thanks to much of the menu being at least somewhat edible, but the worrying spectre of someone's smirking "take" on high street Cantonese hangs over much of proceedings. I worry, for example, about a dish described as "prawn toast revisited". If I was going to give the DDG guys the benefit of the doubt, I'd say they had simply taken a staple of deep-fried takeaway starters and attempted to upgrade it with proper fresh seafood and cheffy presentation. Fair enough. But then why do I get the impression the dish is more parody than tribute - greasy and thick, with a clumsy tamarind and mayonnaise dressing and mound of annoying unseasoned frisée lettuce dumped on top? I'd almost prefer the time-honoured original.

A trio of condiments further confused matters. A homemade (presumably) "take" (there's that word again) on plum sauce was fine - sweet with a certain tartness - yet hardly much of an improvement over anything out of a bottle. Pickles were little more than cubes of mystery veg in chilli-spiked syrup - again slightly too sweet for my tastes. And miso mustard was fine, but, well, not very Chinese.

All of which would have been fine if the main event - the Duck Duck (no Goose, which is Saturdays only) - had enough to recommend it. Unfortunately (for DDG), good Cantonese roast duck is not a rarity in London, and so a good number of people sitting down to this under-rendered pile of Donald, with its grey flesh and chewy skin, will be thinking about the superlative examples at places such as Gold Mine in Bayswater, where furthermore the bill (no pun intended) will be half the price. Cubes of pork belly alternated between "dry" and "OK", as did char siu, and soaked in the sweet soy dressing it was all faintly enjoyable, but the disparity between the ungainly technique and presentation and the eye-watering price point (£31) was jarring.

As if that wasn't enough, eating someone's ironic idea of Chinese food at Duck Duck Goose also involves suffering under some of the most excruciatingly affected "service" I've ever encountered. Our waiter had the weirdest manner, cracking strange self-conscious jokes with every dish brought, offering dreadful puns and grinning through awkward buffoonery between times, that it became something approaching mild torture. We ended up dreading every encounter, shrinking further into our chairs as yet another embarrassing-uncle-at-a-wedding witticism was offered, so much that the evening ended up an exercise in avoiding any interaction at all. Perhaps we would have stayed for dessert if the idea of ordering it wasn't so terrifying. But then again, perhaps not.

Because even without the gurning service, I don't think I would ever be in danger of going back to Duck Duck Goose. It's not that any of the food was terrible, it's just that it doesn't seem to answer any questions that Londoners could conceivably be asking. If you want duck done well on a budget, there's Gold Mine or Four Seasons or Royal China or a number of other spots in town. If you want Chinese-flavoured street food then get yourself to Kerb and try Sheng High or one of the little noodle stalls in Chinatown. If you do really want to pay over the odds for reimagined, knowing "takes" on traditional Cantonese fare then... well, then there's Duck Duck Goose. But I can't for the life of me imagine why you would.

5/10