Dragon Court at the SkyCity Casino bills itself as fine dining Asian Fusion, which in lamens terms means I'm gonna charge you a lot of money for Darwinised Chinese food. Let's see if get's the taste buds excited then shall we?

There's four of us at dinner tonight, so we start with a few entrees. We decided to get the tasting plate ($20), which worked out to $5 per item on the plate. The spring rolls I'm pretty sure came straight from a packet and probably the tempura prawn too. If I'm paying a lot of money for my food I'd expect it to be hand made at least. The pandan chicken tasted more like a fried red curry paste with no pandan flavour present. The san choy bow was ok though. As a starter the dubiously priced tasting plate was certainly not the best way to start.

Next up are Peking pancakes ($13). Can't go wrong with these things really, and these weren't too bad, but some crispy duck skin would make it even better.

The final entree is a big Shanghai meatball ($12), just one but. It's got a bit of spice to it was nice and juicy. For mains we get:

• Buddha's Delight - braised bean curd with Chinese mushroom, carrot, bamboo shoot, broccoli, vermicelli and fungus ($28)
• Hakka pork belly - steamed pork belly with salty turnip ($26)
• Crispy spicy duck with sweet and sour sauce ($25)
• Stir fried scallops and snow peas with XO sauce ($34)

The Hakka pork belly was super tender and the sauce was great, although the turnip wasn't really there.

The duck wasn't exactly crispy, it was just deep fried in batter, which is probably the first time I've had duck that way before. Kinda weird, possibly blasphemous, but not too bad.

The scallops were huge and juicy with nice heat in the XO sauce. They were all good tasting dishes, but nothing you couldn't get from your suburban Chinese restaurant/takeaway (Hingston, Ming Court, Diamond Kitchen et al) for a lot cheaper and probably tastier. But of course, the main reason you're going to go to Dragon Court is for the surroundings. Supposedly. The tables are too close together and therefore cramped and the air con could be colder, but it's well staffed, quiet and the decor and table settings are quite nice. The manager also walks around in a black suit looking official and a little menacingt, I'm sure he's doing a great job though. It's fancy, but not as good as the other restaurants at SkyCity. I thought these guys had renovations done recently, but it I reckon it still looks the same as before. Unless you've got money to burn, I don't really recommend Dragon Court if you're after great Chinese food. Only go if you want to be fancy and even then Noodle House Mitchell would be a better option.