Jesse Restaurant 老吉士 (Shanghai, CHINA) ★★★★★

We were that close to walking out of the door without even trying one single dish here at Jesse (or Jishi) when we found out that they have messed up our reservation. But we were persistent and after sending out our best negotiator, we finally got ourselves a table after a long long wait.

You should have probably heard it by now - there's an "old" Jesse and a new one as well as Xintiandi. But if you are looking for a hearty and authentic Shanghaiese cuisine, then the old Jesse at Tian Ping Road is where you want to be.

Tucked away at a quiet neighbourhood in Xujaihui, the Original (Old) Jesse might not garner the same attention as its sibling at Xintiandi but the food here is certainly to die for.



After a hardworking day at the Shanghai World Expo, everyone was so beat up to a point where we could easily fall asleep on these wooden chairs, that despite sitting elbow-to-elbow together. But when our first dish arrived, everyone were lighting up like little kids seeing candies. 

Jishi's salted chicken, 7/10
Most often when we were having Shanghaiese food, we would start things off with a dish of drunken chicken prized for the nice wine flavor. But this time we decided to change things around a bit and picked Jishi's salted chicken.

For whatever reason, the chicken in Shanghai has always tasted better. Perhaps it's free-range chicken.



Braised wheat bean (Ko-Fu), 10/10
I always like this particular starter but this one tasted sooooo much better. The bean curds served as small sponges here and after absorbing the signature sauce and mixing well with different types of mushrooms, the result......wow!



Bean curd roll in a chicken broth, 5/10
This was a dish recommended by the manager here. Told us it's quite popular here but we found it to be just average.

Stir Fried Long Beans, 9/10

Another common dish in the Shanghai cuisine, it couldn't get any perfecter than this!



Stir fried river shrimps, 9/10
Don't know how they managed to find such small river shrimps and even managed to remove the shells neatly one by one. Those were very sweet and tasty.



Jishi's signature fried rice, 10/10
Talked about saving the best for last, the signature fried rice certainly left a long lasting impression on us. Yes it was a little oily but it was just too delicious to turn away from.

It felt a lot like having glutinous rice too.

Food Rating: 7.7/10
Price: ￥￥￥

Address: 41 Tian Ping Road, Shanghai, China

Closest Metro Station: None

T: + 82 21 6282-9260