Similar to the fate of the Fire Palace, Yulou East has now become a store "exclusively for outsiders". Even the well-known food critic Dong Keping wrote in his drinking notes that "several times I went to Changsha and proposed to go to Yuloudong several times, but I was stopped by local friends with disdain", and from the perspective of the composition of customers in the store, tour groups are indeed the main group here. Although the status is embarrassing, if you want to taste the authentic Changsha official cuisine, this is also a choice.
Yulou East Restaurant was built in 1904, and since 1920, Tan Xiting, known as the "first chef in Hunan", has been in charge, and has become famous. Before 2003, Yuloudong has been state-owned, not only ranked among the four major Changsha Chinese time-honored brands, but also the only "National Special Restaurant" and "National Top Ten Restaurants" in Hunan Province. At the same time, Yuloudong is also recognized in the industry as the "Hunan cuisine Whampoa Military Academy", Xu Juyun, Huang Bangwei, Shu Jiaqing, Zhou Diwu, Zhang Zhihong and other famous chefs of Hunan cuisine have been in charge of teaching skills here.
The cuisine of Yuloudong not only has the characteristics of local cuisine, but also retains the characteristics of official cuisine in taste. The origin of "spicy chicken soup soaked in belly, making people remember Yuloudong for a long time" can no longer be verified, but these two representative dishes have been retained. The spicy chicken is similar to the Dong'an chicken, with tender chicken as the main ingredient, stir-fried with bright red pickled pepper, the chicken is golden and charred, full of sour and spicy. When cooking, the soup is used to burst (bubble) the soup into the tip of the pork belly in a very short time, so that the tip of the belly is instantly crispy and tender, and the time control needs to be extremely accurate. In addition, hair shutters, sauce elbows, clear soup chai duck, water fish stewed mutton, etc. are also classic Hunan dishes with light salt and less spicy.
Yulou East has many tour groups dining all year round, and the atmosphere is quite noisy, so it is recommended to book a private room in advance for a more comfortable service experience.
