Fei Jai

PROFILED BY DE GROOTS MEDIA
Fei Jai successfully melds family-style Chinese dishes with a sophisticated city vibe – think refreshing, fruity cocktails, light Cantonese food and an all-black dining room that spills out onto the footpath for a seamless indoors-to-outdoors ambience.

The lovely Nicole Galloway and partner Peter Lew (relative of Melbourne restaurateur Gilbert Lau, who opened the acclaimed Flower Drum and Lau’s Family Kitchen) manage the floor with ease, chatting throughout the night with amiable regulars. Easy-to-share entrées take the form of an oh-so light omelette filled with juicy chunks of blue swimmer crab; rich lamb mince spring rolls studded with vegetables, served with a salty-sweet plum dipping sauce; and char siew pancakes. Fei Jai’s take on the usual Peking duck version is a DIY affair, served with soft steamed pancakes and tasty barbecued pork. The Spiced Pear Martini spiked with fragrant nutmeg is a perfectly sweet accompaniment to savoury offerings on the plate. For main, make sure to order enough rice to soak up the deliciously gloopy, egg white-rich chilli sauce that cloaks a pile of plump prawns. Finish off with a bowl of sago pudding with nutty coconut milk and fresh passionfruit pulp. It’s an ice-cold, tropical summer treat and certainly large enough to share between two.

This sumptuous feast came in at less than $50 per person, including cocktails – a price tag hard to beat for such generous portion sizes. Fei Jai definitely hits the mark for culinary yin and yang – a must-try blend of Sydney slick and quality Cantonese meals, perfectly located downwind of the famed Coke sign for some post-meal partying.

Alecia Wood