Over on Wukang Lu behind Grains café, FarWest, yet another new concept from Franck Pecol (Franck, Rachel's, Farine), has soft-opened and is swirling delicious crêpes and galettes. In true French style, the waiters are decked out in striped shirts and there’s cider aplenty (starting from 40RMB for a glass of demi-sec cider from Normandy).
From early samples, we can strongly recommend the Complète Classique galette (buckwheat crêpe at 75RMB), which comes gloriously packed with ham, gooey melted cheese and an egg. Simple and delicious.
For those more sweet-inclined, the Tout Caramel wheat crêpe (75RMB, pictured above) will probably appeal. Drizzled with salted caramel sauce and topped with caramel ice cream and three mountains of whipped cream, it's sure to induce a blissful food coma.
Further north on the corner of Anfu Lu, a cosy little café from the team behind Gemma has opened. Named Piccolo, the appropriately small space is offering coffee (from 15RMB for an espresso), cocktails (from 35RMB for an Aperol Spritz), pasta (from 45RMB), and a selection of panini (from 50RMB for bolognese filling).
Speaking of cafés, over on Fumin Lu, a new and incredibly chic coffee haunt called FUMI coffee has started brewing in the space that housed Bell Bar II for a short while. The clean and modern design boasts a feature wall of stove top espresso makers. Coffees are reasonably priced, with a piccolo latte at 25RMB and a house blend drip at 35RMB. In the minimalist space, there’s also a cake cabinet by the counter that’s hard to ignore. Try the moist and not-too-sweet carrot cake for 35RMB.
Over on Wuyuan Lu, just round the corner from Lolo Love Vintage, a small, bright white space selling a range of tasty flavoured plum liqueurs is in soft opening. Despite the name, Rakia Bar is technically a shop (i.e. there are licensing issues), but they're happy to let you sample their wares for free, before you inevitably cave and take home one of their pretty bottles of booze (from 260RMB). There are plans to roll out more offerings in the near future, with a coffee machine on the counter for those who don't want to get too tipsy before lunch.
The folks at Swiss Butchery have launched an online store, jumping into the growing market of grocery delivery services in Shanghai. To celebrate the launch, they’re offering free delivery (Pudong and Puxi) until this Friday (18 March). Any order processed before 6pm will arrive on the same day between 7-9pm - pretty efficient - and payment can be made with cash on delivery or via WeChat. Visit www.swissbutchery.com to order.
To go with your steak, there’s a new online wine delivery app in town called Tippler. Launched by Ode to Wine (one of the biggest wine importers in China), you’ll now have another source in addition to Bottles XO for getting quality wine delivered to your door in under an hour. Arriving in a cute vintage box (although with a two bottle minimum per order), delivery is available from midday-9pm (for now). Visit www.tippler.com.cn to order.
And on the subject of good value delivery, Table Life is going bananas for oysters right now. Their current offer includes Irish oysters and Gallagher special oysters (both priced at 198RMB for a half dozen) and all orders currently come with a free shucking knife and lemon. Order before 2pm on a Monday and you'll get fresh oysters delivered to your door that Friday, Saturday or Sunday - perfect for brunch at home.
One of our fave bar/lounges, The Nest has launched a Grey Goose inspired weekend brunch on Sundays (11.30am-4pm), and the good news is, it’s delicious. Priced at 198RMB per person for three dishes plus a welcome drink, it's not bad value either. The menu is short but to the point, separated into six categories.
Highlights from a recent visit include The Nest Nordic Benedict with a 65 degree egg served with house cold-smoked Norwegian salmon and a fluffy Hollandaise sauce. Elsewhere on the menu, there are a half dozen French oysters, juicy cod fishcakes and a fresh lemony curly kale Caesar salad.
And if things are starting to look a little healthy, you can finish with the nutty warm chocolate brownie (pictured above) - a super squishy and melty chocolate chip brownie with pecans and walnuts, topped with a quenelle of condensed milk ice-cream. Oh em gee, yas!
And finally, some sad news - Morton’s free-flow steak sandwich deal at their iapm branch is done, gone, all over. Although the IFC branch will continue (for now) this cracking dinner-substitute that allows youto get sozzled on MORtini’s, for Puxi-residents the Morton’s happy hour commute just got a little bit longer.