You would be excused for walking straight past this restaurant and not even batting an eyelid, for its exterior is, shall we say, uninviting. Eat is located in a popular student hub on Nanxiu Cun, right off of the Shanghai Lu and Hankou Xi Lu intersection.
Nestled upstairs and next door to Pause Cafe is Eat; the exterior is not worthy of mention, yet, quite surprisingly the place stretches far and wide enough to easily accommodate 50 diners.
We came for brunch one fine Sunday morning this past summer and agree that this place is the perfect mid morning/lunch meeting place. Sunlight beamed down through the bay windows, while dried flowers omitted a rather subtle potpourri scent.
The restaurant’s cozy vintage style has guests feeling relaxed and invites couples to settle in for long visits; on its rather extensive menu, the restaurant offers a selection of Western and Asian dishes.
Don’t expect greatness from the food at Eat; some dishes are winners, some aren’t. We sampled the salmon eggs benedict and a full English breakfast together with two pots of tea. While there was nothing to complain about with the Eggs Benedict, the full English was a little sad and of poor quality.
I also needed to ask for milk to have with my English tea, to which the waitress replied, “There is no milk… in the whole restaurant”. After finally receiving a small pot of milk for my tea, all was forgiven because, after all, this is an affordable Western restaurant run by Chinese locals, who are absolutely doing their best.
The irony is that our complaints falling on deaf ears only served to heighten that which we most loved about Eat; we were literally the only foreigners in an otherwise packed restaurant. At 10:30am on a Sunday morning, the restaurant was full of locals; some students, some Weibo posers, some business people and some couples. Clearly a popular place.
We loved the atmosphere of Eat and on that note alone, we will be back. Thumbs up.
Eat is located at 21 Nanxiu Cun 南秀村21号 (600 metres from exit 2 at Yunnan Lu station on Metro Line 4 距地铁4号线云南路站2号口600米) Tel 86643277.
