Cheng Long Hang (成隆行蟹王府), Shanghai
I was visiting China early Dec 2025 and made a stop at Shanghai. A friend made my dinner plan for me. This was a very nice restaurant close to The Bund (外滩). Unlike many European high-end restaurants, Chinese prefer a la carte to set menus. Here my friend ordered the plates for us.
Since the menu is in Chinese, I offered my amateur translate, which matches the order of pictures at the end of this blog:
清炒蟹粉 Stir-fried Crab Roe
王府拌素 ‘Wangfu’ salad
蟹粉小笼包 Crab Roe ‘Xiao Long Bao’ (Soup Dumplings)
蟹膏银皮 Crab Paste & Starch Noodles
秃黄油捞饭 Crab Roe & Rice
麻婆蟹粉豆腐 Crab Roe & ‘Mapo’ Tofu
蟹柳芦笋 Crab Meat and Asparagus
Clearly the main theme was Crab roe and paste, especially fresh water crab. I should explain here as crab roe is the egg and sexual organ of a female crab while crab paste is the equivalent part for male., which are both creamy and full of umami. This is similar to sea urchin.
The first dish we both like was actually the salad, made from Celery as the base and purple cabbage as the top, which overall presented as a lotus flower. There was pretty much no seasoning but a splash of vinegar and light soy sauce. My friend and I both enjoyed this salad because the rest dishes are all in rich crab flavour and this bitter and fresh vegetable salad balanced out the richness of crab.
王府拌素 ‘Wangfu’ salad
After ‘Xiao Long Bao’ (soup dumplings), we got a large bowl (for share) of ‘Crab Paste & Starch Noodles’. The crab paste had slightly lighter taste but slightly more jelly texture than crab roe, which worked well with eh starch noodle (I think made from bean starch) that almost had no taste but provided solid and slippery texture. The entire dish was between solid and soup in a nice way. I could still taste different ingredients very well, but I also do not need to chew much but simply ’drink‘ all flavours. The paired apple, soaked in passion fruit juice, freshened my palate after the heavy crab paste flavour. This was a very nice thought from the chef to not overwhelm mouth with crab flavour.
蟹膏银皮 Crab Paste & Starch Noodles
The highlight of the dinner was ‘Crab Roe & Rice’. The waitress mentioned that it was the reason of their one Michelin star. It was a very small set of rice and soup. The waitress presented the set in a nice tray (left picture) and mixed the crab roe with the rice afterwards. The rice itself was soft and slight sticky and absorbed the umami flavour crab roe and salty flavour from soy sauce easily. The crab roe provided mostly flavour but also some pasty texture, similar to a fully boiled egg yolk. Despite the small portion, it was very joyful. Last, similar to previous ‘Crab Paste & Starch Noodles’, the soup or broth cleaned up the palate and balanced out the extremely rich and greasy experience from the rice bowl.
秃黄油捞饭 Crab Roe & Rice
This was a very surprising dinner, because I was joined and taken cared of by my friend and all I needed to do was to eat and enjoy. He certainly knew how to treat me :). Fresh water or river crab is a very characteristic and autumn seasonal ingredient in this region. I think it was a great representation of cuisine in Shanghai and the region around. In short, I will recommend and certainly will try again if I visit Shanghai again.
🐼 Score: 4/5
