If you can drag yourself over Magdalen Bridge and past the roundabout (that for most students marks the limit of the Oxford bubble), Cowley and its surrounding area offers many worthwhile alternatives to the chain restaurants that dominate the centre of town. On quiet St Clements Street, a warm glow welcomes guests from behind an unobtrusive facade – Pan Pan restaurant promises a casual and comfortable dining experience.
As a chronically indecisive person, especially when it comes to food (as my friends can well attest – sorry!), the idea of ‘small-plates’ dining has always appealed to me. Can’t pick one thing? Try a bit of everything! Pan Pan’s menu comprises a variety of small Pan-Asian dishes, as well as larger plates, covering diverse cuisines with Japanese, Thai, and Korean street-food styles.
Tapas-style dining has soared in popularity over the last decade or so, with businesses rushing to hop on the trend. This has, unfortunately, enabled exploitation: eschewing the spirit of the small-plates experience, many restaurants hike up their prices and reduce portion sizes, which is a nasty financial sting in place of a digestif. The small dishes at Pan Pan were a little on the expensive side, but the quality made each dish ultimately worthwhile.
Pan Pan has cultivated a cosy and intimate dining ambience, while avoiding a claustrophobic intensity. The modern decor – illuminated with warm tones, and punctuated with booth-style seating, as well as tables – fosters a casual atmosphere, appropriate to the menu’s homage to street-food culture.
Between the four of us, we ordered six small plates, and one large dish. There is a solid range of vegetarian options, with notable transparency regarding the use of fish sauce (not always a given). The service was friendly and very efficient, with less than ten minutes of waiting time. To drink, we ordered Thai milk tea; while it was somewhat overpriced, it was thankfully not too sweet, as is often the case, so it ended up being a surprisingly appropriate companion to the food.
The Japanese seaweed salad was perfect; the addition of carrot and sesame really elevated the dish to make it flavoursome, light, and refreshing. The crispy calamari and the crispy prawn gyoza dumplings (somewhat off-puttingly titled ‘Crispy Dump’) had a really great texture that lived up to its name, and the sauces that came with them accompanied each dish skillfully. Although we were skeptical at first of the Roti Canai, which seemed incongruous in the company of predominantly Korean, Thai, and Japanese style dishes, the accompanying curried sauce was more Thai inspired in place of the usual daal, so that it married well with the other dishes. The Sichimi Tofu was a highlight, coated in crispy flavour with a delicately soft interior, which would have marketed the protein often unjustly typecast as flavourless to the most ardent carnivore. The bao bun was big enough to split into four, but I could have eaten my body weight in that pillowy dough. It was perfectly offset with chilli mayo, and a crunchy vegetable croquette. Hungry as we were, we also ordered the Spicy Tofu Bibimbap to share. The generous portion size at a reasonable price was a welcome change from the small plates, and the dish was packed with an enticing and well-balanced variety of ingredients.
Eclecticism in restaurants is often a point of weakness, however. As much as I enjoyed my meal at Pan Pan, the broad-brush approach, attempting to encompass such differing cuisines in one menu, felt almost hurried. Each individual dish seemed authentic and well-rounded – they resisted the fallacy of fusion food, that detrimental attempt to be quirky. Yet there was not much chance to fully appreciate one particular flavour profile when all of them were subsumed within a whirlwind tour of ‘Asian’ food. The attempt to comprehend the entirety of a vast continent within a two page menu was admirable, but inevitably, fell short. The menu maintained cohesiveness, but only just.
The atmosphere of the restaurant was what stood out to me the most; its casual style seemed designed to encourage sociable dining. As a venue, it’s not exactly suited to a date, but it was the perfect excuse for a much-needed start of term catch up between friends.
What we ordered: Japanese Seaweed Salad (£5.90), Crispy Calamari (£8.50), Crispy Dumplings (£6.20), Roti Canai (£4.90), Sichimi Tofu (£6.90), Bao (£5.50), Spicy Tofu Bibimbap (£11.90), Thai milk tea (£4.90).
