Day 2: The Bund外滩, Yu Yuan豫园 & Tian Zi Fang田子坊

We walked to The Bund in the morning. We loved the colonial and european-styled architecture so much we could not get enough of them.

A drinks-selling car

We didn't believe my father when he said that public toilets were aplenty on the streets. He conveniently pointed out one that was just across the road, but no one had the courage to enter it to explore its level of cleanliness. It looked cute though.

My Crocs shoes were killing me after a day of walking. I bought a pair of RMB 10 (S$2) Kappa imitation slippers at this shop, which served me well throughout my stay in China. It even went to The Great Wall with me!

We walked past Nanjing Road and took a cab from there to the much-raved Jia Jia Tang Bao (佳家汤包）

We reached at about 11.20am. No queue, but all tables were taken.

Dish names hung as tags behind the cashier's

Each time I entered an eatery or restaurant, I asked them the same question,"What is the specialty here? (这里什么好吃？）" The cashier would tell me and I would place my order after some deliberation. And payment is made before you get your seat or table (for eateries).

Tang Bao with shrimp and pork filling 虾仁鲜肉汤包 (RMB 10.5)

Tang Bao with crab paste and pork filling 蟹粉鲜肉汤包 (RMB 22.5)

They are basically xiao long bao （小笼包）with different fillings. My parents and I didn't manage to taste any shrimp in our dumplings but Coco showed us a morsel of shrimp inside hers to 'prove' that it was indeed with shrimp fillings.

My father thought the crab paste smell was too strong for the one with crab paste. My mother felt that the variety was distinctive. Both sets of tang bao had different flavour.

Coco enjoyed the tang bao most.

To be fair, I am never a fan of xiao long bao. I didn't think they were fantastic after reading the raved reviews and tasting them. However, the other xiao long bao or tang bao that we tasted in our following days in Shanghai did show that these dumplings were comparatively good. Perhaps that is why they rate well with the internet users - by virtue of being compared to really inferior ones.

I'll be curt: Singapore has better ones. I will give them credit for being so awfully cheap and passable in taste.

The kitchen is just next to the cashier's, with a few young girls preparing the dumplings.

The place is tiny. We were asked to share a table with a couple. We switched tables the moment we saw an empty one, fast.

It is a no-signboard eatery.

We strolled across the street, literally, to the next famed eatery - Xiao Yang Sheng Jian (小杨生煎）

How to buy the sheng jian bao (生煎包）:
1) Place order and make payment at the cashier's (on the left)
2) Take your receipt and go to the cook frying the dumplings (on the right)
3) Collect your dumplings and go find a seat in the shop

Fortunately, this shop is bigger than Jia Jia Tang Bao. We had the luxury of choice of tables. But I read online that these two shops require you to queue. We went at about 12pm on a Tuesday. Lots of seats were available.

It is basically fried version of tang bao. The skin is dry but the filling is not. There is pork broth (look at Coco's tiny saucer) in the sheng jian bao.

It comes in fours. I ordered 8. Very cheap as well. It was RMB 5.5 for four.

It also has a connecting kitchen that allows patrons to view the making process of sheng jian bao

 We went Yu Yuan 豫园 after our brunch.

Yu Yuan, from my understanding prior to the trip, was a garden built during the Ming Dynasty. However, the Shanghainese associate the term 'Yu Yuan' with 'Yu Yuan Shopping Area' (豫园商场）. When I asked the cab driver to take us to Yu Yuan, he drove us to the Shopping Area. When I asked him where Yu Yuan was, he replied,"This is Yu Yuan! (这就是豫园啊！）"

I asked around to have one or two more "这就是豫园" and finally, to my relief, one lady understood what I was asking and she replied that the actual garden was in the Shopping Area.

 So we entered the Shopping Area

 The famous Nan Xiang Xiao Long Bao （南翔）

We didn't give it a try because I had read from reviews that it was no longer 'good'. My fourth sister affirmed that fact by saying that she felt like vomitting eating the pork-filled dumpling.

 

 Mao was waving his hand in the clock

 The humble entrance of the Garden.

RMB 40 per pax. Children above 1.3m pay full price.

The Garden was quaint and pretty, but it bore resemblance to the Lim Family Garden in Taipei, except that it was smaller. We spent about an hour in there.

 Blossoms of beautiful hydrangeas

 A parting shot before I departed 

If I have an advice to offer for this Yu Yuan trip, that is never to eat at the food court.
In Coco's very word,"All these ought to be thrown into the rubbish bin!"
We agreed.

We went to Tian Zi Fang, a place many reviewers gave thumbs up for. 

It consists of many tiny shops that sells quirky and cute stuff, things that are not commonly seen in the shopping centres. This also means that the things are often not practical and may not be useful. It was fine for window-shopping, but it was quite a waste of time for my father who found no use and no pleasure in the stuff sold.

All I bought from here was a dice similar to the one found in Yu Yuan for my nephew.

A man doing finger-painting 

The purses had funny phrases on them. This one says,"There's no money (in here)." - a phrase from a folk tale about a man who buried his money underground and stuck a sign on it reading "There's no money in here" in a feeble attempt to ward off possible thieves.

More cute purses. I'd have bought them if not for the impractical size. 

The MRT trains were filled with people. We were literally pushed into the train during peak hours. It was really 'sardine-packed' - a phrase we loosely use in Singapore but is awfully, practically real in Shanghai.

For dinner, we went to Lan Xin Can Ting (蘭心餐厅）to try out the "authentic Shanghainese cuisine" so recommended by one of the forummers.

Like most eateries we saw, it was very tiny.

We reached the place at 7pm and waited for about 30 minutes for a table, with one person in the queue before us. It was not easy to find. It was along a small street and the Shanghai map that I had did not show the street. When I enquired from the locals at Nanjing Road East MRT Station, most told me that it did not exist,"没有进贤路，只有泰贤路！(There's only Tai Xian Road, no Jin Xian Road!")

I was beginning to doubt my research when a nice local overheard the conversation and told us that we could walk there since taking a cab at that hour was not likely.

We walked for a street or so, and I managed to flag down a cab after a few failed attempts. And I was glad I did. The walk was impossible!

Fish 鲳鱼

 Braised pork 外婆红烧肉

 Duck cooked in soy sauce 酱鸭

 Eel cooked in soy sauce 鳝丝

 Winter melon soup 冬瓜汤

Verdict:

Allow me to say this: despite the kind-hearted recommendation, the person who recommended this place for dinner ought to be shot!

In my mother's word,"If I'd cooked like this back home, you (the whole family) would have scolded me no end!"

With the exception of the winter melon soup, the rest of the dishes tasted exactly the same - cooked with dark soy sauce. I think I also can cook and make a business out of it if this is 'good'.

Shanghainese food are known to be salty and sweet. If this is representative of Shanghainese food, then we had enough of it - all within one meal!

But like most eateries, the meal was cheap: RMB 188.

Will I go back if I ever return to Shanghai? Hell no!

We took a cab back to The Bund to admire the night scene. It was plain beautiful.

The Oriental Pearl Tower was situated across The Bund, divided by the Huang Pu River.

My pictures do not do justice to the Shanghai night scene. It was more beautiful than Hong Kong's in our opinion.

"Eh, we also have this in Singapore leh!" Also a monument to commemorate the dead - who sacrificed themselves for The Revolution.

Our hotel is just at the end of this Wai Bai Du Bridge (外白渡桥） 

Addresses:

Jia Jia Tang Bao (佳家汤包）

No. 90, Huang He Lu, Huang Pu

90 号，黄河路，黄浦区

XiaoYang Sheng Jian (小杨生煎)

54 - 60, Wujiang Road, near Nanjing Road West

54 - 60 号，吴江路，近南京西路

Lan Xin Can Ting (蘭心餐厅）

130 Jinxian Lu, near Maoming Lu

130 号，进贤路，近茂名路

Hours: Daily. Lunch 11am - 2pm, Dinner 4.30pm - 10pm

Tian Zi Fang (田子坊）

Lane 210, Taikang Lu, near Sinan Lu

泰康路 210弄，近思南路

Metro: Dapuqiao (打浦桥）Exit 1