Panda Panda, the trendy Chinese restaurant a stone's throw from Belleville

Just a stone's throw from Belleville, let us introduce you to a brand new Chinese restaurant. At the helm are Lucas & André, two friends desperate to find the true flavors of China in Paris. Together, they have set themselves the challenge of introducing Parisian palates to modernized Hong Kong and Taiwanese-inspired cuisine.

Here, everything is homemade, from bao buns to ravioli, using fresh ingredients. From the dining room, you can watch as the chefs dexterously prepare the dishes, which arrive quickly and all at once on the tables, Chinese-style.

Ravioli lovers will be delighted to find on the menu XiaoLong Bao (8€), the famous ravioli filled with a hot broth, to be eaten using a technique that the owner is happy to teach you. They're homemade and, frankly, tasty.

Panda Panda also offers shrimp wonton (8€) and delicious Gua Bao (7€) in veggie or braised pork belly versions . The latter won over our stomachs!

But the two Panda Panda partners are keen to reveal other well-kept secrets of Chinese gastronomy to gourmets . Alongside the ravioli, the menu features a dozen or so dishes for sharing, for greater conviviality, which change with the seasons.

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Melt-in-the-mouth eggplant and green beans Hong Shao style (7€), stir-fried Chow Fun noodles with beef 'Hong Kong style' (10€), crispy asparagus and shiitake mushrooms with a runny organic egg (10€).... Everything is prepared in a wok, to bring out the full flavors of each dish.

After some discussion, we opted for the sweet & sour lacquered duck (12€), to be rolled in rice cakes, and the Black Tiger shrimp fritters, sautéed with garlic and Kampot pepper (12€). Two perfectly spiced dishes that we devoured to the last crumb.

As sides, we tried the stir-fried rice with shrimp, beans, egg, shiitake and spring onion (generous; €5) and the mum's salad (€7), a fresh delight, with mango, cucumber, carrot, sucrine, mung vermicelli, Lao sauce and wonton crisps.

Don't leave without trying one of Panda Panda's desserts: sweet bao! Choose from the astonishing Liu Sha Bao (5€) with its heart of egg cream, or the choco-hazelnut bao (5€).

Panda Panda offers unpretentious but tasty and good food, all at very reasonable prices. A spot that's sure to win you over!