BOKCHOY TANG
Federation Square
Melbourne

This is more about a location and one dish than a restaurant.

Recently I went to a cocktail party for the Seven Network which was held at Federation Square in the heart of the Melbourne CBD.

All the new Seven heavies (all ex-Nine heavies) were there like David Leckie and Peter Meakin.

The occasion was the launch of the Seven News 24-7 electronic tickertape board on top of the famous Young & Jackson’s Hotel on the corner of Swanston and Flinders Streets.

It reminded me of the flickering Reuters news which flashed around the sides of the Allied Chemical Tower in Times Square in New York in the 1960s.

The Seven electronics will, I believe, become as much a part of Melbourne and Fed Square as Reuters did in Times Square.

The mental flashback to the Sixties and Seventies was replicated when I went to dinner after the Channel Seven function.

Continuing my love affair with Fed Square I went to Bokchoy Tang and that’s where my Seventies and Times Square memories kicked in.

I was living in New York when the first Schezuan and Hunan Chinese restaurants opened there. I was there for those first fiery chilli days when the food was so spicy that sweat poured off your forehead and your mouth filled with uncontrollable saliva.

It was peasant food but it was wonderful. Miles away from the usual, mild, Cantonese offerings that Australians always thought was “ Chinese food”.

Bokchoy Tang is such a place. They serve noodle dishes and dumpling dishes and steamed bread. There is very little rice because in far northern China it is too cold to grow rice.

At Bokchoy Tang they serve a great Szechuan pepper dry chilli chicken dish but that is not the one that won me.

Go to Bokchoy Tang for this dish alone: Sweet sour fish fillets.

Sounds simple. Probably is. But it is stunning.

The fish they served me was Blue Eye. They were fillets marinated in rice wine and then pan fried with sweet tomato sauce. To jazz it up they added black vinegar and served it on a bed of lightly roasted green capsicum.

It was an exquisite dish. Some will find it too sweet. But not this food puppy.

I told you I was reviewing a dish not a restaurant. Go to Bokchoy Tang and have this. You will not regret it.

And check out the electronic news stuff for Channel Seven on top of Young and Jackson’s on your way out.