Magic Wok

Friendly, proficient staff, fair prices and a massive choice of Cantonese food - including some dishes rarely found on an English-language menu in London - are major draws to this Queensway old-stager.

The decor is not, unless you're partial to worn brown carpets, yellowing ceiling tiles and a general paucity of space. Try to get a table in the more roomy back area, which is cheered up by traditional Chinese paintings of flowers and peacocks, or perhaps the smaller but brighter first-floor room.

We were crammed in by the front counter, with our elbows tucked in. The menu soon distracted us from such minor discomforts: we were wowed by salted fish with chicken and aubergine (one of several enticing hotpots); stewed trotter; and stir-fried goose webs with dried lip mew and sea cucumber.

Beef brisket and noodle soup was a splendid bowlful of tender meat, greenery and plentiful noodles in a cockle-warming stock - a meal in itself for £6.50. We also sampled a more mundane dish of mixed seafood (plump prawns, curly squid, limp sliced scallops) with gai lan (chinese broccoli) in a gingery sauce.

Tourists mix with multifarious regulars (some Chinese, some not, some young, others not) to produce a happy throng.