Délice Oriental (黃鶴樓)

Délice Oriental is located two doors from Kazu where its entrance is usually blocked by the notorious long line of Kazu's loyal fans. Each province of China has their own specialty in accordance to the resources available. There are three provinces of China to look out for the spicy food fanatics. Szechuan is known for its spicy, peppery and aromatic flavour. I highly recommend to try out my favourite restaurant - KanBai. Guizhou is recognized for their spicy-sour flavour. It is believed in ancient times that sour ingredients are used to compensate for the lack of salt. To my knowledge, there are no restaurants that serve Guizhou food in Montreal. Finally, Hubei province is known to serve some of the spiciest dishes in China with its abundant varieties of spicy peppers.

Délice Oriental serves prominently Hubei food with a few Szechuan dishes. Despite being uber spicy, the main protein is full of flavours without being masked by the spicy peppers. To culture yourself about a cuisine, it is best to order their classics. One popular item is the duck neck, commonly served as a to-go snack in the streets of Hubei. Chinese claims that this part of the duck is the most flavorful. The neck contains mainly bones with bits of meat. It is meant to be eaten with your hands, pulling the meats off the bones and sucking the flavours out of the bones.

The spicy shrimps are served whole, engulfed in a pool of thick aromatic spicy sweet sauce. It's another dish that will get your hands dirty and sucking the flavours out of the shells. I recommend pouring some sauce over rice because the sweet, spicy shrimp flavour is simple addictive. It is like a whole meal by itself.

Hubei is known for its flourishing fish industry. One can find seawater fishes featured on many menus across the province. At Délice Oriental, a popular dish that every table orders is the fish cooked over a charcoal pot. Butterflied whole fish cooked in a chili broth with 5 varieties of spicy peppers. Underneath the fish, you'll find some little treasures - cloud ear mushrooms, cucumbers, bean sprouts and nappa cabbage to help tune down the spicy level.

This is my first experience with Hubei food, it was quite an experience. I was sweating and blowing my nose throughout the whole meal. While eating the duck necks, I felt my ears burning which never happened to me. The food has great flavours despite being spicy. But the dishes are a bit too overpriced. Highly recommended for the spicy fanatics!