Saturday 30 July 2011

china i: godly vegetarian [ 功德林素菜馆 ], shanghai

I was excited to discover that there was a vegetarian restaurant in walking distance from our hotel, so the first night, tired and hungry, we went for a bit of a walk. In the end we actually dined at Godly twice.

The first visit, unsure what they did well and too tired to make decisions, we went for the banquet option. The waitstaff decided to modify this for us, so we didn't go exactly for what was on the menu. We ended up with a pick-pick course, with a crab-meat dish, springrolls, mock duck made of tofu skin, and a vinegary vegetable dish. This was followed by some noodles, an onion and gai lan stir-fry thing, and some watermelon and cherry tomatoes to end it all. It was a lot of food, and it was delicious. C found that the crab meat was her favourite. All I was really focused on was the noodles, I'll admit it.

pickpick


On the second visit, the staff were less attentive and amiable but still good (it was very busy). We ordered a tofu and mushroom hotpot (with lots of peas), some different noodles, and a mushroom soup. The soup was super mushroomy, filled with four or five different types of mushrooms. The tofu and mushroom hotpot was also excellent, but it was at this point that we reached our mushroom limit.

Service was fine, fast and easy. The menu is Chinese with English subtitles, except the tea menu, which is all in Chinese; no pictures on either menu. Some of the staff speak English. And it's pretty cheap, the banquet was about 120RMB per person and the second visit came to about 180RMB in total. Tea is about 30-60RMB a pot depending on what you get - they have a lot of tie kwan yin, which is some of my favourite. Credit card is accepted.

Happy Cow says not everything is vegan there, but when I asked they said they don't use eggs or dairy in anything, so I'm not sure.

Godly Vegetarian
445 West Nanjing Road (near North Chengdu Rd)
Jing'an District
Shanghai

Get there on lines eight, two or one of the Metro, stopping at People's Square.

功德林素菜馆(南京路店)
上海
静安区
南京西路445号



Credit card facilities are available

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