Sydney's suburbs provide unusually rich pickings for intrepid foodies keen on traipsing away from the CBD and New Shanghai is no exception. The breadth of the menu can be a little daunting with a huge array of food to choose from so my companion and I asked the waiter to bring us a selection of dishes regular New Shanghai customers loved. He promised and certainly delivered as we were brought twelve dishes. 

For pork diehards, the panfried pork dumplings were pure pleasure – thick doughy batter and moist, tender pork suspended in a gorgeous consommé. What makes this dish is the way you eat it. Firstly take a little bite and suck out the consommé. Once you drain that, you ever so classily gobble the dumpling down in one go. 

If you're keen on seafood, a good bet is the crab wonton soup – a thick broth filled with a mixture of sweet and peppery flavours makes for a flavoursome combination.

And for the vegetarians, you absolutely without question must try the stir-fried eggplant in garlic sauce.

This dish was sensational – the taste of it akin to a mixture of honey chicken and beef in black-bean sauce but obviously without the chicken or the beef. Sounds strange for vegetables I know but the flavours exploded on the palate and it was my favourite dish.