10 questions with Michael Peng

Michael Peng is the owner of Hunan, the Chinese restaurant his parents founded in Pimlico in 1982. Over the decades, Hunan has earned a stellar reputation among industry insiders for it’s distinctive ‘Leave It To Us’ menu — a concept that pre-dates today’s tasting menus by several decades — as well as for it’s exceptional wine list, featuring rare and notable bottles with generous gentle mark-ups.

You can now find Hunan on the CODE app at 30% off food.

What’s the most underrated dish on your menu?

One dish that’s often overlooked is our venison with black pepper. The venison comes from a small private estate in Oxfordshire; we know the guy who shoots them for us. The deer live very happy lives foraging and grazing all year round. It’s fallow haunch with our own black pepper sauce, made from scratch, and stir-fried with a bit of ginger. Because it’s in a hot wok, you’ve got the wok hei, and the flavour of the whole dish comes together. It’s very simple, just three or four ingredients, so it doesn’t get as much love as others but it tastes amazing.

Where do you go after hours?

Kebab Kid [in Fulham]. It’s an old school kebab place. I think it’s been going for over 40 years. They make their own kebabs every day. Jamie Oliver raves about it. It’s all handmade; it doesn’t taste like your usual kebab. It’s not oily, it’s not greasy. It’s busy at night, there’s a massive queue there of black cab drivers and people falling out of bars. You always meet interesting people when you’re queuing up. I think they’re open until 2am. If it’s later, then I”ll go to Old Town 97 in Chinatown; it’s been there for a while. They have a dish called LSE Rice that’s not on the menu. It’s spicy; it’s really heavy; it’s something you’d have at three in the morning after a heavy night. I don’t go as much as I used to.

What’s your secret London tip?

I go to Richmond Park, if the weather’s nice, for an early morning walk or run around the perimeter of Richmond Park, starting at Roehampton Gate. You can park your car there. I go in the morning, sometimes I bring the dog, and go round anti-clockwise – I’m a bit OCD with my behaviour – then we go to Petersham Nurseries after for coffee or a little breakfast sometimes. We get there just before it opens because it gets crazy afterwards. We’re the first table in.

What’s the best thing you can do in London with £20?

Chapati & Karak in Knightsbridge. I just love going there. You get this little sweet chapati that they make fresh to order – you’ve got to wait 10, 15 minutes, you can see the man making it in the back – you get this sweet karak chai, or you can get another version with egg. The other one is Cher Thai in Clapham, they do a river prawn glass noodle, which is £21, so just over, and then Crisp. It’s about £18  for one of their pies. But it’s quite difficult to get a table there.

Where do you go when you want to splurge?

I’ve got a list of restaurants that I want to go to that I haven’t been to. Top of the list is Row on 5. Going to Paris on Eurostar, that’s a great splurge..

Which CODE offers are you going to be snapping up?

Khao Sō-I. I’ve heard good things about it.

What’s your favourite thing to cook at home?

We’ve got a Big Green Egg and just like a nice thick piece of dry-aged rib-eye on the Big Green Egg, that’s what I like to do.

Which element of your job do you like most and like least?

I like meeting guests and I like the buzz of a busy service, with everyone all working together, it’s really satisfying. The challenge of everything coming together. What I like least I suppose is rude customers for starters, but that happens less and less these days, and the run-up to service, because there’s always so many things that can go wrong, like the dishwasher breaking.

What are your favourite and least favourite ingredients?

My least favourite ingredient is green pepper. I just don’t see the point of it. It’s not that I don’t like it, it just doesn’t harmonise with anything, unlike red pepper. I’d rather have a padrón pepper. Favourite ingredient, I don’t get it a lot, but I love uni when it’s really fresh.

When you’re not working in a restaurant or eating in a restaurant, where will we find you?

Either walking the dog or at home watching the football with a glass of wine, plate of cheese. That’s me. I’m happy. The simple pleasures.