KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 7 — I was a fan of Restaurant Sangong in Bukit Jalil when I first visited about two years ago, tucking into their braised pork rice, springy duck egg noodles, and stir-fried baby chives with minced pork and century egg with gleeful abandon. 

It closed in August this year, and I felt a twinge of guilt for having only been back once since I wrote about it. 

So, upon hearing that its chef Derrik Ang and his partners were starting a new project, I made it a point to visit sooner rather than later.

GONGSI, the new restaurant, soft-launched on November 1, trading Bukit Jalil for Bukit Bintang. 

Flanked by cocktail bar Pahit on one side and contemporary Nyonya restaurant Bōl on the other, it sits along the quietly hip row of Jalan Sin Chew Kee, one of the last vestiges of colonial architecture in a Kuala Lumpur increasingly made up of steel and glass. 

The restaurant opens with an al fresco semi-circular bar at the front, ideal for solo guests looking to pop in for a drink and a snack on a clear night. 

Inside, small tables fill the main dining room, which leads to the back, where counter seating faces the kitchen beside a staircase. 

Up front, an ornate table for eight sits behind a beaded curtain in an elaborate red section designed to look 60 years out of place, dressed with vases, crystals, and enveloped by a glass block wall that bulges out from the building’s facade.

Describing itself as serving “urban Chinese food and wine”, GONGSI is part of a new wave of modern restaurant-cum-bars with clear Chinese inflexions emerging in the Klang Valley, like sits, which also wouldn’t look out of place in major cities like Beijing or Shenzhen, or, in this case, Taipei. 

While I hesitate to call the dishes at this kind of restaurant more “refined”, they are clearly conceived and presented with wine and cocktails in mind. Maybe “dainty” is the word?

The menu leans heavily on Ang’s time in Taiwan, with classic dishes like oyster omelette and braised pork rice peppered throughout. 

But some, like an appetiser of Shaoxing wine chicken liver pâté with sourdough (RM29), draw instead from his time at Le Cordon Bleu. 

The pâté had a light, almost whipped texture rather than the usual smooth, spreadable consistency, and it suited the sourdough, which was cut into thick batons for dipping. 

The sweetness from the Shaoxing wine, used in place of brandy or cognac, didn’t quite carry through as the sourdough’s tang pulled it off course. 

Ang hinted at using youtiao in the future, which I think would work far better.

The next two bites were much better: a simple pegaga salad (RM27) loaded with hunks of pork and dressed with fried shallots, garlic oil and lime, and a deep-fried pomfret (RM33), shatteringly crisp and easy to eat, bones and all, with a squeeze of lime and a drizzle of sweet soy caramel. 

Some Sangong favourites make a return, including the remarkable stir-fried baby chives with century egg (RM33) and the stir-fried bitter gourd with salted egg (RM33). 

The former is creamy and savoury, threaded with garlicky punches of chive, while the latter is a deft balance of bitter and salty notes, with crispy nuggets of youtiao adding much-needed texture. 

Braised pork rice (RM33) also makes a return, served in a pot ostensibly to create a crispy layer at the bottom. There was no such layer, but the pot still held some of the most tender, fatty and luscious braised pork rice around, so there was little to complain about.

A riff on the Taiwanese classic lamb and water spinach stir-fry with shacha sauce, the grilled lamb chops with shacha sauce (RM63) see tender pieces of lamb grilled with the savoury condiment (that was originally adapted from Malaysian satay sauce), and served with slices of raw garlic, shallot, and holy basil. 

On its own, the lamb is slightly sweet but unremarkable — but when eaten with the pungent sting of garlic, or shallots, and the peppery hit of holy basil? It’s like fireworks in the mouth.

But perhaps the most impressive dish, and the one that best captures all the influences at play here, is the san bei ji (RM39). 

A marriage of Ang’s time in Taiwan and his classical French training, this take on three cups chicken features a grilled chicken roulade glazed with a “three cups” reduction of soy, sesame and basil, and finished with crispy basil leaves. 

It’s a masterful interpretation of the popular comfort classic, taking something that usually comes piping hot in a claypot and eaten with rice and turning it into a composed bite with a thick, glistening glaze. 

The traditional preparation is defined by the sharp, minty edge of the basil; here, Ang exercises restraint to account for the absence of rice that would normally temper it.

Desserts aren’t on the menu yet, but if the crème brûlée from Sangong makes a return, it’s the obvious choice. 

The nine cocktails make for fun reading, with names like Moon, cough it out! (gin, ginger, lemon and honey, RM33) and Pu er gone wild (rum, pu er and pineapple, RM33). 

For something exceedingly light and refreshing, Soju, are you okay? (RM23) is a simple mix of soju, cucumber slices and soda water, finished with a candied raspberry or tanghulu for a touch of sweetness.

GONGSI 共肆

11, Jalan Sin Chew Kee, 

Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur.

Open Tuesday to Sunday, 5.30-10pm

Tel: ‪012-206 5655

Facebook: Gongsi

Instagram: @gongsi_11

* This is an independent review where the writer paid for the meal.

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* Follow Ethan Lau on Instagram @eatenlau for more musings on food and self-deprecating attempts at humour.