Fired up for common food

Hunan is one of my favourite restaurants in London: overseen by the irrepressible Mr Peng, it's a place of pilgrimage for Sinophiles. Your token glance at the menu is scorned as dish after dish of intriguing food arrives: maybe pigeon broth; maybe liquoricey, long-cooked beef; maybe camphor and tea-smoked duck. Every Chinese I try, no matter how splendid, I end up sighing: "Not a patch on Hunan.

So news of a restaurant where the chef served time in Hunan's kitchen had me rushing off to deepest Fulham, where, lurking at the rear of Taiwan Village's menu, you'll find a homage to Mr Peng's leave-it-to-me ethos. The tastes here are the fiery triumvirate of Hunanese, Szechuan and Taiwanese.

We asked specifically for Szechuan spiciness: our hostess - who was as good-humoured as her accent was impenetrable - delivered a seemingly endless array of improbably named, chilli-hot dishes.

Imperial Jewels brought chopped, spiced prawns with wrappers of iceberg lettuce; Tiger's Whiskers were soy-rich shards of pork. Tender, smoky squid came with Chinese mushrooms. "What's this called?" I asked. "It's Common Food," laughed the hostess.

Ah, I see. Even the familiar was interesting, like a superb crispy duck's curious, elasticky homemade pancakes. And, at £21 a head for this bounty, it's a giveaway. Not as good as Hunan, though.

Taiwan Village
Lillie Road, London, SW6 1UD