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Slow down and have fun on WestBrook street
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Slow down and have fun on WestBrook street Commercial areas in Hangzhou’s newly developed uptown area have been built with distinctive features and amenities that encourage visitors and locals to slow down and have a good time.
Good examples are easy to find — Qiaoxi Historical Block, Guashan Bar Street, fashion hub Grand Canal Tiandi, and the Xixi Relaxed-life Block.
Not far from the Xixi block, the entertainment-heavy WestBrook Commercial Street has started to draw attention since over half its stores have opened.
Surrounded by Xixi Wetland, WestBrook Commercial Street is situated among abundant plant life and water, and houses star hotels, restaurants, cafes, bars, youth hostels, a cinema and a museum.
Shanghai Daily makes a slow-paced visit and discovers three good places to kill time. Cloud Water International Youth Hostel/Shenma Garden Restaurant
Cloud Water International Youth Hostel makes it clear from the start that it is a place for fun.
There is a game console, pool table, mahjong room and foosball in its Shenma Garden Restaurant, available and free to all customers, either from the youth hostel on the fourth floor or from the restaurant on the third floor.
The hostel provides a bed for 60 yuan (US$9.79) as well as rooms from 168 yuan to 388 yuan decorated by 20 designers in 20 distinct styles, including “dream,” “tea,” “rain forest,” “books” and “jade.”
The “rain forest” room features a tent-covered bed, the “jade” room has Chinese painted porcelains, and the “dream” room has floral curtains and bed clothes. All rooms have bath fixtures.
The restaurant’s decor is also “diverse.” Seating areas are decorated in Thai, Japanese, southern Chinese, cowboy and Mediterranean Sea styles, and its large menu provides Chinese, Cantonese, Thai, Japanese, Western and grilled cuisines. The chef recommends the Cantonese.
The sofas are colorful, as are pillows on the sofas and trash cans beside them. The dominant color is a green-blue hue that covers ceilings, pillars, tables, curtains and window frames.
The “fun” restaurant also has a reading area, and in the middle of the room, people can sit at a bar counter and watch the cooks at work.
Address: No. 21, WestBrook Commercial Street
Tel: (0571) 5812-1388 Chez Shibata
Chez Shibata, the famed luxury Japanese patisserie/chocolatier started by master chef and founder Takeshi Shibata, opened in Hangzhou some two weeks ago on the first floor of Grandma’s Kitchen. (The restaurant is still under construction.)
Offering a selection of 10 exquisite cakes and pastries in the new branch, the Japanese-French fusion bakery specializes in confectionery dressed up with fancy garnishes.
Heart-shaped cakes, big macaroons and fancy pastries heavy with vanilla cream are typical of this trendy patisserie.
The signature La Venus, an extra rich chocolate mousse cake sprayed with red cocoa powder, uses premium French 72 percent-cacao dark chocolate around a cube of vanilla Bavarian cream and a scattering of crispy chocolate pearls and marinated cherries.
The best seller is the Žclair au caramel beurre salŽ, an elongated puff pastry filled with caramel cream, brushed with a caramel glaze, and topped with three pieces of Philippe Olivier butter and a sprinkle of Maldon sea salt.
Though there are few seats, the newly opened store sells out the treat almost everyday. “Some customers like to buy a dozen to take away,” says store chef Jason Zhang.
More drinks, which will also be “nicely decorated and dressed,” are to be on the menu soon, says Zhang.
Chez Shibata now owns three outlets in Japan, three in Hong Kong, and one in Shanghai (on Ziyun Road), and one in Hangzhou.
Address: No. 20-2, WestBrook Commercial Street
Tel: (0571) 8102-2890 Mangos Restaurant/Bar
Mutton is a speciality of Mangos, and they promise the meat has only a minimum of mutton’s normally strong smell. The mutton chops and legs are bought from the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, where the restaurant says the sheep were range-fed on grass.
A special recipe keeps the meat’s flavor fresh — cooks brush seasoning directly onto the meat while grilling instead of marinating them.
You’ll need reservations for the grill. Besides roasted mutton chops and legs, the menu provides just a few vegetables.
Mangos primarily is a bar open from 5pm to midnight, a quiet, Western-style bar specializing at cocktails reasonably priced at 25 yuan to 50 yuan. Other wines and beers also are reasonably priced as well.
A vocalist or a band performs starting at 8:30pm from Tuesday to Sunday, while the bar has a music theme, with walls of vinyl records and CDs, images of skulls wearing headsets, and guitars and ukuleles.
Address: No. 12-18, WestBrook Commercial Street
Tel: (0571) 8742-5612
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