When it comes to yum cha in Sydney, a lot of people will immediately think of the Chinatown. While there are a number of good yum cha places there, a number of them, in my opinion are quite overpriced for what they are serving. One might be surprised that sometimes a great yum cha place could be just around the corner in their suburb.
Golden Unicorn on Maroubra Road near the junction of Maroubra Road and Anzac Parade in Maroubra is one of them.
Golden Unicorn is a small upstairs yum cha place that if you don’t pay attention to it, you will just miss it when you walk or drive by. The space is not huge, and certainly nothing compared to the RSL clubs and Chinatown establishments, but the quality of the food is what it counts. Before I go on, I must reiterate that the space is upstairs, and the staircase is a long a steep one. Unfortunately, there is no lift access to the space, so if you are not suitable to climb stairs, this place will definitely be a no go for you. I guess sometimes it is hard to have every facility when you need to squeeze everything into an upstairs space in an old building.
Food wise, in my opinion, is the main point of view difference between Golden Unicorn and other establishments. For me I appreciate that they are not just selling token items on a token menu. They do not stereotype your general yum cha experience. Of course, they have token items like prawn dumplings and spring rolls, but if you just stick to these items, you are missing out a lot of what Golden Unicorn can offer. The good thing for me is that it offers a pretty authentic yum cha experience that you can get in places like Hong Kong. They are very creative and daring in their menu, so customers like me, who is looking for a serious variety of items will not be disappointed.
One might wonder what kind of creative and daring items on their menu? For example, you don’t usually see beef tendon or beef tripe in a lot of yum cha places in town. They simply are not items regular local customers or tourists would order. However, these are just matter of facts items on the trolleys that were pushed around in the space. If you look at their yum cha menu, you will see a ridiculous number of varieties on offer. Of course, sometimes items are dictated by seasonal ingredients available, but checking out what’s in the trolley became something of a joy to do at Golden Unicorn, and I didn’t always feel that way with a lot of places.
As with most people, I have my personal favourites at the Golden Unicorn. One of them being their sticky rice in lotus leaf (we call them Pearly Chicken in Cantonese). In a lot of places, the end products are either too much sticky rice, too much salted eggs with too little chicken. However, at Golden Unicorn, the balance was just right. And the fact that the sticky rice emits the fragrance of the lotus leaf that wraps around it, you know that they are good quality ingredients. The Scallop Dim Sim (Scallop Shiumai in Cantonese…I still find it weird to just call them dim sim…in fact the correct pronunciation for it is ‘dim sum’) is another of my favourite. It is always a joy to see that big piece of scallop sitting right on top of a bed of meaty shiumai. I also love their Stuffed Eggplant and Bean Curd. They are eggplants and bean curd steamed to perfection with a well-seasoned and properly done piece of fish mince lying on top of them. Together with that yummy glass sauce (that’s how I called it locally so I don’t know how to translate it but basically a simple seasoned transparent sauce) every bite was a burst of flavour and texture.
Some of the items are unique to Golden Unicorn. For example, their famous Black Gold Liquid Sand Bun is one of my friend’s favourite. They are sesame-based buns with a seasoned liquid yoke that when you open it, the yoke just flows out naturally. If you bite into it, you can feel the warm (sometimes hot so recommend be careful with this one) lively core relentlessly conquering your taste buds. As previously mentioned in my The Sweet Spot article, I am not a big fan of desserts, but this is a must have item on my friend’s list whenever we visited there.
For me Golden Unicorn might not be the biggest and easiest place to go for yum cha, but I will go back there again and again as long as I can make my way up those stairs.
You can find out more about them on their website too.
