We went to Little Hong Kong at Wheelton and had a banquet fit for a Chinese Emperor

Stick to those two options and you’re guaranteed good karma.

However, there are times when the rest of us start to crave something else – an Italian or a Chinese perhaps?

So after the kind of in-depth negotiation usually required only when considering how to end a five-year rail dispute, we finally ended up at Little Hong Kong above the Dressers Arms at Wheelton.

It had been a good few years since we had been here – before the fire which destroyed the premises and it was rebuilt, so it would be interesting to see if the food was still as good.

We arrived on a hot summer’s evening, with the pub and its beer garden packed with people enjoying a pint in the sun – something so scarce it seemed to have brought most of the local population out.

Upstairs, the restaurant was thankfully less busy and the air conditioning was just the thing to take the edge off the heat.

We ordered a couple of drinks as we perused the menu, trying to decide whether to go for one of the three banquets on offer or to make our own.

In the end we went for the mid-range Dragon Banquet, at £35 a head, which began with a plate of mixed starters, including ribs, chop suey rolls, chicken satay, salt and pepper chicken wings and crispy seaweed. It was a tasty, if safe start, and the chicken wings were a particular hit. The critic across the table would have preferred ‘stickier’ ribs, but still licked his fingers afterwards!

Then it was on to the highlight of any Chinese banquet – the crispy duck. This was shredded for us at the table and left along with six pancakes, hoi sin sauce, spring onions and cucumber, for us to create our own pancake rolls of crispy deliciousness.

They were excellent and even though we had three each, we could probably have forced a few more down as they were so good.

Our waitress offered us a small wait before the main dishes, which was gratefully accepted and we enjoyed another drink as we digested the duck and awaited the final course of our banquet.

After the five minutes requested, out came a sizzling plate of Cantonese beef for me and a chicken curry for husband Bob (even here he couldn’t resist a curry!)

The meals came with a huge bowl of fried rice to share and we had ordered a portion of plain noodles too – you can’t have a Chinese meal without noodles, can you?

In retrospect, we may have over-catered slightly, but I definitely didn’t regret those noodles, they were excellent.

We shared the beef and chicken and used most of the rice to mop up most of the sticky Cantonese and curry sauces....although we couldn’t quite manage to finish the lot.

We left after paying the bill of £85 feeling pretty full and in my case at least, very happy to have enjoyed a delicious Chinese meal.

There was a begrudging admittance from the other side of the table that it had been good to try something different and that it had been a pretty good banquet....I bet we’re off for a curry next week though!

Gillian Parkinson

Little Hong Kong,

First Floor Dressers Arms,

Wheelton,

Chorley.

PR6 8HD

Littlehongkong.co.uk