Review | Dragon Gate Beijing Private Kitchen review: friendly staff, tasty dishes, but forget the Peking duck

In retrospect, we shouldn’t have assumed the duck would be a speciality at Dragon Gate Beijing Private Kitchen in Causeway Bay; after all, not every restaurant in Beijing serves Peking duck.

The restaurant is charmingly decorated, with paintings and murals on the walls, and mismatched, colourful crockery. The servers were friendly and when we realised we ordered too much, they cancelled two dishes without complaint.

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The restaurant serves dishes from Beijing, Shanghai and Sichuan, with a chef’s hat indicating the specialities.

From the appetiser selection we liked the shredded organic chicken with crystal flour noodles (HK$88) and spiced beef shank (HK$98). The former had soft curls of wide mung bean noodles in a rich sesame sauce, with batons of cucumber for crunch.

The beef shank was very tender and moist, and the sauce – while not spicy – brought out the flavour of the meat.

We disliked the crispy fried eel (HK$138) which was too thick and hard, and so sticky it was difficult to separate the pieces. Midway through the meal we tried eating more of the dish, but the eel was stuck fast to the plate.

Deep-fried mutton with Beijing spiced powder (HK$228) had tender meat and a thin, crisp crust. Poached Ping Yuen chicken (HK$268 for half, HK$488 whole) was light and delicate, and more Cantonese in style.