A Lovely Friday Lunch at Chi Kitchen in Debenhams

I’m not sure when Nick and I last had the chance to enjoy a meal out without the girls. I don’t remember, so probably a long time ago! We managed to put aside a lunch time to meet up for a long Friday lunch. We don’t do this very often so a 2 hour lunch on a Friday was actually perfect to do! We met at Chi Kitchen in Central London. It is located on the ground floor of Debenhams, Oxford Street. We had the most delicious meal and we couldn’t be happier!

Chi Kitchen is a contemporary pan-Asian restaurant which means that they serve different cuisines. The word Chi means energy in Chinese. They not only provide good food but also good energy. The Chinese symbol “火” means Fire. The word Chi and the symbol together work well as fire can be converted into energy.

The interior design of the restaurant is inspired by the five elements: fire, water, wood, earth and metal. Their creative menu offers colourful, tasty and exotic food. Influenced by Thai, Chinese, Malaysian, Japanese, Vietnamese and Korean food, Chi Kitchen takes diners on a truly unique culinary journey through South East Asia. They also have a champagne bar which is very welcoming.

It was nice to be able to taste a little bit of everything. I love Asian food so I was looking forward to tasting their dishes. When I arrived at Bond Street Tube Station (nearest tube station to Debenhams), I looked up to see the Debenhams sign so I knew I wasn’t far. The restaurant is at the back of the ground floor or you could do what I did, which was to reach it using the side entrance from the street that runs parallel.

It is strange to go for lunch with your husband in Debenhams. You wouldn’t expect a restaurant like this here as you normally would find a cafe in a Department store. So I was impressed to find this high-quality restaurant there.

When I arrived Nick was already there. The decor of the restaurant was elegant and modern. The whole atmosphere was really nice. I felt very cosy and welcome. They have put a lot of thought into it. I was pleased to find sockets next to the wall where you were able to charge your mobile or any other device. They also had USB sockets which I thought was fantastic. Another thing that I thought was fantastic is that they had free wifi. For us bloggers, you cannot believe how useful this is. I was already excited about this lunch and I had not even seen the menu, LOL!

The lady who helped us was actually the dessert chef. It was nice to have someone who knew the menu well. She was very friendly and suggested a lot of different dishes to try. I was grateful for that!

STARTERS

Dim Sum Platter – £11.95

I love to pick from a selection, so I enjoyed the starters the most. I absolutely love dim sum and sushi rolls so as soon as I saw they had a great selection I knew I was going to order that. I went for the Dim Sum Platter which consisted of 5 pieces of dim sum including prawn dumpling, prawn and chive dumpling, chicken and prawn siu mai, mixed seafood dumpling and wagyu beef siu mai. The platter was presented in a bamboo steamer.

Wagyu Beef Siu Mai – £12.95

Nick isn’t a big fan of prawns so he ordered Wagyu Beed Siu Mai, also from the Dim Sum starters, just for him. It consisted of 3 pieces and they also came in a bamboo steamer. The presentation was fab.

Dragon Prawn Tempura – £9.95

I love sushi rolls. I don’t eat it all the time so when I have the opportunity I am very happy to do so. I knew they would have a great selection so I ordered the Dragon Prawn Tempura. OMG, this starter was amazing! Even Nick who doesn’t eat prawn ate a couple of rolls and he actually liked it a lot. This starter also had a WOW factor in terms of presentation. The rolls were arranged in the shape of a dragon. Then, to kind of make the dragon ‘come alive’ they poured dry ice over the dish to make a kind of smoke. I was feeling that we were flying or something. It looked like the dragon, or at least our food was appearing from the clouds! I really don’t know how to explain the feeling but it was super cool. And of course this was perfect for an Instagram story.

The plate was quite big so I would definitely recommend you to share this dish with someone else. Thankfully Nick was keen to try it otherwise I wouldn’t be able to eat it all.

Roasted Wagyu Beef Puffs – £8.50

This was a recommendation. I asked what starter I should try and this was what our waitress suggested. I’m so glad she recommended it because it was delicious. You get 2 pieces so we had one each. It is honey glazed roasted Wagyu beef puffs with sesame seeds. I highly recommend you this starter.

MAIN – SIGNATURE DISHES

I thought we ordered a lot of starters and was worried I wouldn’t have enough space for the main meal so I ordered a small dish instead. Nick however, somehow ordered 2 main dishes just for himself! He tried to say that he meant to change his order rather than ordering two mains, but I think he was just very greedy that day, LOL!

Kung Po Chicken – £10.95

He ordered this dish with a portion of egg fried rice as a side. This dish is a spicy stir-fried Chinese dish made with peanuts, vegetables and chili peppers with chicken.

Nick really enjoyed this dish. It’s a well known dish he’s familiar with and he really liked this interpretation. He said it was spicy as expected but very tasty.

Sambal Chicken – £10.95

This is a classic Malaysian Sambal chilli with stir fried chicken. Apparently, Nick mentioned that this wasn’t as spicy as he was expecting, but he liked it regardless and said that the whole combination worked very well.

As you can see he had 2 meals with egg fried rice. He ate it all! I was very impressed as I didn’t think he would be able to eat 2 meals but he did and he loved them both.

Sweet and Sour Chicken – £10.95

One of my favourite Chinese dishes is sweat and sour chicken. I always like to order this when we have a chinese takeaway. I really wanted to try this at Chi Kitchen so ordered it.

It was really tasty and the chicken was crispy. I loved the texture of the food and combining it with the egg fried rice which I ordered too was perfect! I was feeling full and I really wanted to try their desserts so I left a little bit. I didn’t eat as much of the rice so I took it home where I enjoyed it even better!

DESSERT

I was looking forward to trying their desserts, that is why I did’t finish my main meal. I  wanted to leave a little bit of room for the sweet! 😉

I thought Nick would probably say no to a dessert but he surprised me saying yes. I suggested ordering different ones to share and try. We went for the chocolate sphere and the caramel cheesecake.

Chocolate Sphere – £7.50

The chocolate sphere is a must because not only does it taste fantastic but the whole presentation is entertaining too. It was another WOW factor moment at Chi Kitchen. They melted down the chocolate with hot caramel sauce in front of our eyes! It was so cool!

I have not seen something quite like this before and I absolutely loved it! The whole presentation was fantastic. And the best part was that it tasted really nice. I tried a little bit but Nick pretty much ate it all, LOL!

Caramel Cheesecake – £5.95

The other dessert we ordered was the caramel cheesecake which was a recipe by our waitress, who I already mentioned was also the dessert chef! How cool is that? I only managed to try a little bit but I asked her to please wrap it for me so I could take it home and try it in a different moment when I was less full. And that was the best decision ever because when I tried it at home it was delicious!

OUR THOUGHTS

Chi Kitchen was a great restaurant to have some lunch. It worked out great to meet there and we managed to have a little bit of time for ourselves enjoying delicious food. It was a delightful surprise and we were both very impressed with the food, the service and the staff that were super friendly! I felt like I was at home! Very comfortable.

We will definitely recommend this restaurant to family and friends. They had a fab variety of flavours. It is definitely worth paying a visit.

Have you been to Chi Kitchen before? Do you like pan-Asian food? What would be your favourite dish? Which of the dishes we chose have caught your attention?

*Disclosure: We were invited to Chi Kitchen to enjoy a meal with a guest for the purpose of this review. All opinions and thoughts are my own.

Thanks for stopping by,

Love you all ❤️

Franca  💋

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