Lost Heaven Yunnan Folk Cuisine
38 Gao You Road
Shanghai, China
PRICE: ?????
RATING: ****

Lost Heaven Yunnan Folk Cuisine was the birthday girl’s choice of dinner spot, and I’d heard some pretty good reviews of the place, so was very keen to try it out. Located in the trendy French Concession area, the restaurant is actually a 3-storey Shanghai villa and apparently attracts lots of celebs and the stylish crowd. It’s not hard to see why – trendy and moody, it’s filled with chic Shanghainese and loads of expats.

The interior is gorgeous, with Southeast Asian wooden floors and Yunnanese stone face masks as decor, and minimalist spotlights here and there. It’s dark and moody, but is definitely more of a place to go with mates, than a date restaurant.

So what’s Yunan cuisine like? It’s actually just like Thai food, with perhaps some Vietnamese influence. Nothing too exotic that we couldn’t eat it, but still interesting enough. We ordered up a STORM. Or I should say I did, whoops! I am dangerous when the menu is left in my hands and I’m the one doing the ordering 😉 I basically ordered my way round the menu and we neded up with almost 30 dishes.. for about 18 people 😉

The food was good, but not all-out spectacular. Rather, some were fairly standard (you’d get it at any other place for half the price), whilst others were unique and delicious. They have an extensive menu, so I’d prefer they have a smaller one and focus on making each and every one of their dishes perfect. My favourite, by far, was the whole steamed fish (that came out on a fish-shaped platter) in some soy sauce and a scattering of fried bits on top. The fish was so tender and absolutely divine.

It’s a great place to go with friends, but it’s certainly not cheap – we paid over 200? (USA$29) each which is extraordinarily expensive by China standards. Fantastic, attentive service though – despite how boisterous we were. Even when everyone was causing a ruckus outside whilst waiting for taxis, the staff were really tolerant and polite with our drunken lot of annoying people 😛

And then.. it was off to Velvet Bar! We didn’t stay long and left at about 2am since, incredibly, we had to get up early to spend the day hiking – d’oh!

Lost Heaven – Yunnan Folk Cuisine

Ornate interior

Me with the birthday girl!

Table decor, with random metal thing on top of all our plates

Delicious cocktails galore!

Chris’ 1st drink of the night – a shot which he accidently ordered *ROFL*
(didn’t realise “Kamikaze” on the Drinks menu was actually a shot)

Bellies full of great food and cocktails

Gorgeous girls!

The biggest birthday cake I have ever seen, which also had more
cream than I’ve ever seen 😉

Pondering how we’re all gonna finish the mega cake 😛

Insanely long (and expensive) bill!!

Then it was off to Velvet Bar for more drinks….

Hamming it up for the camera!

The (very lucky) birthday girl gets a kiss from a very sexy man

Now it’s my turn!