I’ve been a member of the Shanghai Dolls for a while now, so as soon as the Dolls introduced the membership card, I got one.  Discounts on waxing and restaurants?  Yes, please.  And since then, the card has served me well, though not as well as it served me on St. Patty’s day. In celebration of St. Patrick’s day, I went to O’Malley’s in the French Concession.  It was just me and a few friends, along with every other expat in Shanghai.  I have never seen O’Malley’s as crowded as it was that night—people were wedged into every corner of the pub, both inside and out.  We could barely move, let alone make it to and from the bar.  But it was a fun night—lots of singing and dancing and drinking green beer—basically, what every St. Paddy’s day is about.   It was still quite cold in Shanghai so I was wearing my winter coat, but after a few minutes of being in the bar I had to take it off, despite the fact that there was no coat check and I didn’t want to hold it.  There was great music on, and I wanted to dance!  And I can’t dance while holding my massive coat; it messes with my moves.  So I tossed my coat under a table near where we were standing, on a pile of other coats and bags.  Pretty soon my handbag joined the pile.  I couldn’t let anything get in the way of me, my green beer, and dancing to the Pogues and U2.

Beautiful and luxe, the semi-hidden (it's on the 2nd floor after stepping through a nondescript entrance and tiny steep staircase - watch your head!), El Coctel is owned by the famous Willy of El Willy restaurant. It's actually relatively empty early in the evening, until about 10 or 11PM when it really fills up (remember to make a reservation or the bouncer at the door will simply refuse you entry).The staff are absolutely top-notch. Fluent in English, polite, extremely attentive, and prompt. One of the best service experiences I've had in Shanghai. I love the eclectic mix of plush couches and ottomans though it was curious they had some sort of Buddhist(?) offering in the middle of the room against the wall.

We were delighted that they served us complimentary filtered water, not boiled tap water, upon us being seated. We were also treated to a little bowl of fluffy popped corn that was slightly salted and slightly sweet. Very tasty and lovely to nibble on with our cocktails.

I've been to Cristal only once before, and clearly they have massively improved this time round in terms of service and quality of food. It's more of a "nice-dining" restaurant. As in, it's not as exorbitantly priced as fine-dining, but certainly not a cheap cafe. It sits nicely in between and is actually really close to where we live, but we hadn't yet found an occasion to go again. Located on the 4th floor of a shopping mall at Nanjing West station, it's easy to miss and relatively unknown unless you've heard about the restaurant and are specifically going there for a meal. What a hidden treasure :) Last weekend 8 of us decided to try out Cristal's Brunch set menu, which at 178 RMB (3-course) or 198 RMB (4-course) turned out to be ONE AMAZING DEAL that had all of us surprised and delighted. The quality of the ingredients was superb, the presentation was fine-dining style, the service was polite and attentive, and the menu actually underplayed the variety and quantity of food that we would be served. It was flat-out impressive and all of us were raving about the value of the brunch. I am most definitely going back and recommending visitors to go there for a relaxed, sunlit weekend brunch.