Cristal

That was the restaurant we went to last night with a biz partner from
CA, California that is.

It is just a stone throw away from our apartment. Less than 5-minute
walk. Here's a picture of the restaurant terrance. I would never
know it exists if I weren't aware of the signage and the advertising.
Cristal serves Mediterranean food. Good portion and price is right
(compared to other same class Western restaurant in town). There is a
5-course vegetarian menu for RMB 298. I was impressed. I had a
stuffed baby squids as a starter. Nice... stuffed with veggies. Then
my Cod as the main course. Good chunk of Cod cooked just right with
spinach, asparagus, green peas and some foam at the base. Not salty.
And my tongue did not taste like MSG this morning.

From the picture, the background apartment is part of the restaurant
complex. That is the Crystal Pavilion I was looking to buy into. Too
expensive. Next to the restaurant, on the same level, is the swimming
pool for the Crystal Pavilion club house. Guess the developer spares
no expense. The pool is nice! Open air and every night, club workers
put panes of glass back to close up the pool for indoor swimming. Wow.

The restaurant was very quiet last night. Quiet as in able to talk,
not noisy. We were in the heart of Nanjing Road but the noise were
all on the ground floor. The wind was cool, almost to the point of
chilly last night. But once we got down to the main floor, wind
stopped, stuffy and noisy. This place seems to be an oasis. Last
night the four of use spent a total of RMB 989. That was pretty much
half a month wage to an average worker. But if we were to head over
closer to the Bund and across the river, price would have gone up,
double the amount we paid. Actually I still couldn't get use of the
amount as generally, at our regular vegetarian restaurant, we paid
about RMB 105 for four to five dishes depending how exotic we wanted.