g
Browsing Tag

Dynasty Chinese restaurant

Cotswolds

Easter Comes Early

I was sure Saturday evening’s expedition to Toffdom’s Rural Headquarters, the Hunt Ball, was going to spoon feed me material for my next blog post. Surely it would be chock-a-block with eccentrics and their accompanying outlandish behavior, which I’ve grown to know and love in my year in the Cotswolds. I was wrong. The most outrageous thing I witnessed all night was a drunken nineteen year old who sucked face with her paramour on the dance floor for three consecutive songs. As husband is fond of saying, youth are so boring. We were home in bed by 1:30AM.

Well rested and hangover free, we made it to church the next morning for the first time this year. We were greeted by the usual suspects, six elderly ladies and one fifty-something man who surely attends in part out of civic duty to the golden girls of his village. The upside of a measly church population is everyone gets a job. Jean says Mattins, the lady who drives her Nissan Micra like a bat out of hell for the one block between her cottage and the church reads the Old Testament verse, the lady with the Danish accent the New Testament, the gent takes the offering and rings the bells, and Dorothy, in her orange pea coat, recites the Collect. This last one is my favourite. Dorothy’s prayer reads like an uber letter to Santa Claus, her requests ranging from a pony (“good health for the Queen”) to a trip to the moon (“peace on earth in our time, Lord”). I say this not to poke fun at her earnest and child-like approach, but rather in humble admiration of a person who has managed to retain these qualities after eighty years.

I on the other hand am totally godless. That’s the only way I can explain why Jean’s Lenten sermon made me think of the saga of our local Chinese takeaway, Dynasty. Jean was preaching about when Jesus had to prepare the disciples for the fact he was going to die. They responded with the textbook five stages of grief — denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance — not unlike my fellow villagers and I when faced with the recent shuttering of Dynasty. But then, last Thursday night, we had a bit of an early Easter miracle here in the Cotswolds. Husband, playing the unlikely herald, burst through the backdoor of the cottage asking if I wanted to hear some “fantastic news.” He was so jubilant I was sure that Inspector Closseau, his workplace nemesis, had been fired. But no, he brought good tidings that that the Dynasty woks are firing once again like a phoenix risen from the ashes. Just like that, Kung Pao Chicken Friday nights are back! I suspect Jean would fail to appreciate my loose interpretation of Easter theology, but it is nearly spring and I’ll take my themes of rebirth and renewal where I can find them.

Cotswolds

R.I.P.: The Day the Chinese Food Died

It was a Sunday night in early January when I called Dynasty Cantonese Cuisine, the Chinese takeaway housed in a little freestanding stone building in our market square. The phone rang and rang. No answer. They must be too busy to pick up. I persuaded husband to bundle up and accompany me on the block long walk to place our order in person. This is when we first noticed the sign:

We are closed until further notice. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.
–the Management

How disappointing. There was no food — well no food we wanted to eat — in the fridge, which led to the usual range of accusations from husband about my deficiencies as a wife, including my lack of ambition in the domestic art of grocery shopping. We retreated into the comforts of a new season of American Idol and cheese toast, my trusty standby dinner.

Another week passed and the sign remained. Theories abounded. “They’re just on holiday. They went away last year this time for a few weeks. They’ll be back.” Or, “Probably just some trouble with Immigration. They’ll be back.” Every theory ended with “They’ll be back.” I was skeptical. If the owners were going on vacation why not just say so? Vacations end on a date, not “until further notice.” The sign was ominous.

January came to a close and the Chinese failed to open. Panic started to spread in the village. People who had been known to snobbishly refer to Dynasty as “Die Nasty” looked thin and stricken. Toff and townie alike mourned the loss of barbequed spare ribs and chips on demand (French fries being a legitimate rice substitute in England).

There was a brief period last year when I swore off the Chinese. I found that a bottle of Gamay finished off with a 10PM meal of prawn toast, veggie chow mein, and Kung Pao chicken invariably resulted in me waking with a start at 2am, eyes wide and heart pounding, fuelled by the sugar and sodium bomb my body was attempting to digest. But by and large the Chinese holds a special place in my heart. It’s been with us since the beginning of our Cotswold adventure when we used to stop off in the village on Friday nights en route to our rented cottage in G.P. We’d natter over a glass in the wine bar with R. the barman while waiting for our takeaway feast to be readied. And it’s rescued us on occasion over the past year when guests have come to visit and somehow the dinner reservation was missed because another bottle of Prosecco at the wine bar seemed like a good idea. It’s even been the epicentre of village intrigue and scandal, including the tale of the local aristocrat who attempted to get a meal gratis and a rumored drug bust.

The charm of Dynasty was its anti-charm. It was a brusque, efficient, cash-only kind of place manned by a steely faced, thirty-something, presumably married Malaysian couple. The wife, a slight woman forever in an oversized t-shirt and baseball cap, ran front of house from behind a tall counter. Decoration was sparse, consisting of some peeling wall paper dotted with gold Chinese characters, an oversized calendar, and a shelf displaying soda cans on offer. Was there also a large waving ceramic cat on the counter or am I imagining that? Her husband fired the food in the kitchen behind, which was separated by a doorway that was hung with a plastic shower curtain liner cut in half. That day’s Sun newspaper was always on the front counter to provide entertainment while waiting for your food, which was just as well since conversation with the woman was hard work. Once, feeling chatty after a few glasses of wine, I thought I’d managed to forge a bond by coaxing out of her that she was from Kuala Lumpur, a city where I had also briefly lived years ago. After that I was convinced she had started to give me free prawn crackers until I realized everyone who spent £15 or more got them.

Now February is drawing to a close, the ominous sign remains affixed to the window, and the door locked. Around the village the mourning process is moving from denial to acceptance. Goodbye Dynasty. You fed us well. You will be missed.