This week, we're launching Gothamist's travel content, Gothamist Getaways. Four times a year, we'll have a week of posts featuring looks at travel, food, products and tips, near and far, for making your trips more pleasurable. So enjoy and let us know if you have any hints for us—email [email protected].
At the food desk of Shanghaiist, Gothamist's Easternmost outpost, Benjamin Cost has logged thousands of hours scouring everywhere from white linen establishments to trash-strewn alleys for Shanghai's most mouth-watering eats. Here are his top picks.
JIA JIA TANG BAO: Xiaolongbao, soup dumplings stuffed with various fillings, are to Shanghai what bagels are to NY. And the best restaurant is Jia Jia Tang Bao, no more than a dusty rat-hole near People's Square. Inside, squat ladies craft these delicate parcels at breakneck pace, like oompa loompas doing origami on speed.
Two dollars gets you a dozen of the pork variety, and six lands you 12 pork and hairy crab ones - best ordered during hairy crab season in late fall. To eat, place the dumpling in a spoon, nip a hole in the side, and drain some of the juice. This'll prevent you from scalding yourself/looking like a Gothamite out of water. Then slurp out the soup and chomp the meatball. Get there before 8 to beat the rush. Even if you do, finding a seat is a game of musical chairs.
90 Huanghe Lu, near Fengyang Lu (黄河路90号, 近凤阳路). (0)21-6327-6878. Hours: 6:30am-10pm.
TONGCHUAN FISH MARKET: Ever wander through an aquarium wishing you could eat some of the critters? That's basically the Tongchuan Fish market, Shanghai's seafood wholesaler. Choose from a Blue Planet Special's worth of creatures from googly-eyed grouper to phallic geoduck clams, all marked down to around half of what you'd spend downtown. Shlep them to a nearby restaurant, and have them prepared any way you choose. No chef wizardry, frozen filets, cheese crusts, just you and some sparklingly fresh seafood. What's not to like?
Tongchuan Road, near Lanxi Road (铜川路, 近兰溪路) // Closest Metro Stop: Zhenru (真如) Line 11
DUAN'S CRAYFISH: Come July, heaps of Christmas-red crawdads litter every street corner. They're a Shanghai specialty, the hairy crabs of summer, and a familiar treat for U.S. crawfish boil aficionados. Except here, your traditional corn, sausage, and lemon make way for chili, cumin, cinnamon, and more. The plumpest specimens are found at Duan's Xiaolongxia, a local favorite. You choose your crayfish, then it's onto an outdoor stove, where the maître d jostles them about and bombards with spices until they turn from glossy purple to crimson. They're then dumped in metal tub to serve. Make sure to suck the heads, which are like chitinous tumblers filled with tomalley and spice cocktails.
107 Changhua Lu, near Anyuan Lu (昌化路107号, 近安远路). Hours: 4pm-4am daily.
JESSE RESTAURANT
: While little more than a two cramped stories, the original Jesse Restaurant has been hailed by many as the best Shanghai restaurant in town. All the home-style classics are in top form here, but we especially like their potato broth with crabmeat and red-cooked pork cubes. The key is the braise, which along with the holy trinity of soy sauce, rice wine, and rock sugar, harbors a special ingredient: dried cuttlefish.
If you're in the mood for something brawnier, head up the pork shoulder (hong shao tipang), a Flintstonian hunk of bone-in pork swaddled in fat and lubricated with the aforementioned braise. You must reserve this a day in advance. Even then, they're often out of it when you arrive (Seinfeld's immortal line "anybody can take reservations" jumps to mind).
Same goes for their trademark dish, a cod head that from what we gather, is steamed, flash-fried, and roasted in a tangle of spring onions. Hard to say for sure, Shanghai chefs guard their secrets well. It looks like a cod wearing a hula skirt, but tastes like heaven with almond-y flesh that tumbles off the bone. As you'd expect, waits for Jesse are notoriously long - a week's not unheard of. There is one loophole. Show up at 5-5:30pm before the guests arrive, and you can probably wolf down some red-cooked pork cubes and crabmeat soup before they boot you.
41 Tianping Lu, near Huaihai Xi Lu (天平路41号, 近淮海西路). Tel: (0)21-6282-9260.
FU1015: Ranked number 26 on Diners Club International's countdown of "Asia's 50 Best Restaurants," of 2014, Chef Tony Lo's upscale Shanghainese spot is one of China's finest restaurants. Fu's set in one of Shanghai's stately historic villas, and the food's as lavish as the decor. Menus are prearranged for guests and featured home-style classics like old Shanghai smoked fish mixed with plenty of exotica - braised sea cucumber, abalone etc. Think Jesse with bling. We especially like the especially hedonistic hairy crabmeat on toast, which they lather on there like tuna fish. And yeah, you'll be paying an arm and a leg; minimum 800RMB per person. It's worth every penny.
1015 Yuyuan Road, near Jiangsu Road (愚园路1015号, 近江苏路). Tel: (0)21-5237-9778. Hours: 11am-2pm lunch, 5:30pm-11am dinner.
