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Live seafood tanks are back, but does this restaurant fill the hole left by Golden Century?

The Golden Century is over – enter the era of the Royal Palace Seafood Restaurant, which is bringing back live seafood tanks, huge banquet tables, two levels of dining, and, yes, even pipis in XO sauce.

Terry Durack
Terry Durack

The live seafood tanks are glowing again with lobster, crab and coral trout.
1 / 7The live seafood tanks are glowing again with lobster, crab and coral trout.Edwina Pickles
Pipis in XO sauce with fried vermicelli: the noodles loosen and soften, forming a dish in their own right.
2 / 7Pipis in XO sauce with fried vermicelli: the noodles loosen and soften, forming a dish in their own right.Edwina Pickles
The ma po tofu has a good chilli bite and balance of tofu to pork, although the pork feels over-tenderised.
3 / 7The ma po tofu has a good chilli bite and balance of tofu to pork, although the pork feels over-tenderised.Edwina Pickles
Yum cha is packed with diners who look as if they have been there for years.
4 / 7Yum cha is packed with diners who look as if they have been there for years. Edwina Pickles
Light and fluffy prawn scrambled eggs is studded with almost translucent steamed prawns.
5 / 7Light and fluffy prawn scrambled eggs is studded with almost translucent steamed prawns.Edwina Pickles
Neatly chopped poached free-range chicken with ginger and shallot.
6 / 7Neatly chopped poached free-range chicken with ginger and shallot.Edwina Pickles
Plump, extra-large steamed oysters with ginger and spring onion.
7 / 7Plump, extra-large steamed oysters with ginger and spring onion.Edwina Pickles

Good Food hat15/20

Chinese$$

Ever since the venerable Golden Century closed in 2021, there’s been a great big hole in Chinatown and the wider Sydney dining landscape. Its closure signalled the end of a long, proud line of Cantonese seafood restaurants lined with fish tanks and overrun with dim sum trolleys; of round banquet tables so broad you couldn’t reach the soy sauce bottle; and of menus so long they would stretch from here to China.

It signalled the end, too, of generations of families coming together for celebrations that perpetuated their culture and heritage, keeping it alive for generations to come.

Pipis in XO sauce with fried vermicelli.
Pipis in XO sauce with fried vermicelli.Edwina Pickles
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For all those reasons, and about 8888 more, it’s great to be able to welcome the Royal Palace to Chinatown. Seating 400 diners over two levels, it’s the new public-facing restaurant from Ms Sun Wei, who founded the private-room Royal Pavilion in Sussex Street in 2017.

While Golden Century’s Eric, Linda and Billy Wong are busy at their Star and Darling Quarter restaurants, Royal Palace’s ever-present restaurant manager, John Poh, and many of the staff will be familiar to long-time Chinatown devotees.

But first, let’s shout from the rooftops. The tanks are back! The tanks are back! Those dark, sadly shuttered windows are glowing again with tanks of lobster, crab and coral trout. Even better, Golden Century’s two dining levels have been refitted and refurbished; polished, painted and table-clothed. It’s looking spiffy.

Yum cha trolleys deliver the goods.
Yum cha trolleys deliver the goods.Edwina Pickles

I’ve inadvertently stumbled across a soft opening period before the official launch, so instead of testing the kitchen too strongly, I keep the order modest. Prawn scrambled eggs are light and fluffy and studded with almost translucent steamed prawns ($48), and gai laan ($29) is bright green and crunchy. Poached free-range chicken ($40) is neatly chopped and the colour of rice wine. It feels unnecessarily chilled, but this is comfort food that presses the buttons of nostalgia for so many.

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Next stop, yum cha, where the focus on seafood plays out across a terrific variety of dim sum, delivered by trolleys and trays every day of the week. Needless to say, the space is packed wall-to-wall with diners who look as if they have been there for years. Har gau prawn dumplings, siu mai, and cheung fun rice roll: all good. Pai gwut – chunky, sweet pork studded with black beans – very good. Durian puffs, fun. Pork and century egg congee, great, the rice broken down into something gentle and creamy.

The ground-floor dining room opens next, and I’m back for the extra-large, plumped-up, steamed oysters with ginger and spring onion ($14 each), and the dish most synonymous with this site: pipis in XO sauce. The waiter goes to the bank of 24 tanks, deftly scoops out half a kilogram of pipis, shakes off the water, weighs them, and brings them over.

Prawn scrambled eggs.
Prawn scrambled eggs.Edwina Pickles

Market price is $138 a kilogram, so my half-kilo is $69. It doesn’t look like a lot, so I add fried vermicelli ($25) as well. When it all comes back in one big dish, the shells just steamed open, and the sauce coating the wedges of crisp fried noodles, it’s more than enough.

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The warm kick of chilli, crunch of spring onion, complexity of the dark, rich, sauce and all 21 pipis (yes, I counted them) combine in a very celebratory way, and the noodles loosen and soften into a dish in their own right. A follow-up ma po tofu ($48) has a good chilli bite and balance of tofu to pork, although the pork feels over-tenderised.

By the end of August, Royal Palace will be trading until 3am from Thursdays to Saturdays, with the congee menu kicking in after 10pm. There’s still some refining to be done, but the bones are there. Tables need to be angled so that your legs don’t make bruising contact with the steel bars underneath, perhaps, but I wouldn’t change much else. It’s making a lot of people very happy just by being here.

The low-down

Vibe: The classic Canto dining palace is back

Go-to dish: Pipis with XO sauce and vermicelli (market price)

Drinks: Tsingtao beer, a mix of new- and old-world wines, plus specialty teas

Cost: About $200 for two, plus drinks

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Terry DurackTerry Durack is the chief restaurant critic for The Sydney Morning Herald and Good Food.

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Original URL: https://www.smh.com.au/goodfood/sydney-eating-out/spiffy-400-seat-cantonese-dining-palace-brings-new-life-to-iconic-chinatown-site-20230817-p5dx7d.html