At the table In, out, only a bowl of noodles to shout about

Look, restaurant critics get special treatment, so you probably won't get a beer spilt over you here.

- DAVID ELLIS RESTAURANT CRITIC

But I can’t guarantee it; it didn’t seem entirely out of keeping. Perhaps it’s just a thing they do? Chinatown once had a reputation for some of this stuff, Wong Kei making its name on a folklore of vaudeville grouchiness that, if it ever existed, has long been given up.

Song He Lou is subtler than chasing poor tippers out with knives, or chastising those on the tap water. But it’s not exactly a barrel of laughs. This is service built around an ideal of efficiency over indulgence. The menu is a lurid picture book, so no mistakes can be made with orders that are encouraged as swiftly as possible. Payment is taken up front. The food arrives while the echo of the card machine still trembles against the plain walls, staff determinedly cramming big plates on tiny grey tables.