Yuet Ben, Upper Duke Street, reviewed

Do you remember 1968? No, me neither.

Intergenerational strife. Signs put up on the streets. Flared trousers. Ring a bell.

A lot has changed since Yuet Ben opened at the end of the decade. But some things have remained very much the same.

Sitting at the top of Duke Street, a large Chinese gate looms over the road, and the building itself is quite unassuming. You can turn a corner off the main track and miss it entirely. What a shame that would be.

Inside, Yuet Ben is comfortingly from another era; cute decorative pineapples, paper tablecloths, your own arch towards the bar and behind the kitchen. Just for decoration, since you’re here and what you’ve heard so much about is the food.

When I look up a restaurant online, which I don’t too For the most part, one thing stood out when eager regulars talked about this longtime institution. The same keywords burst out of the screen; crispy duck, crispy duck, crispy duck.

Okay, quarter crispy duck with pancakes and taste buds it is (£12.90).

I don’t often order it as an appetizer because I’m afraid it will greedily eat the lion’s share of my appetite, but I couldn’t help it now, could I?

This was a wise move. It arrived with no pomp and circumstance, just simply laid out ready for assembly, which is always part of the fun.

The duck was plentiful and seasoned with opaque but endlessly addictive flavors that felt like five spice. Partly crunchy, partly juicy. A winner who deserves the praise he keeps getting.

You could sit and put them together all night if you didn’t have anything to wear afterwards, so the joy is in taking simple, well-prepared ingredients and seeing what they produce. Of course you know what it produces; that unmistakable taste of a crispy duck pancake. But better.

I only finished eating it because I didn’t want to ruin my Entree appetite and took the rest home because it’s just too good not to finish at some point in the evening. They taste just as good from the couch.

The mains on the menu are refreshingly light, without pages and pages of confusing combinations, endless permutations of entrees that can lead to you not being entirely sure what you’ve ended up with. Here it was simple.

Not in the mood for the likes of black bean or sweet and sour, I went for savory (yes, satay peanut sauce, the spelling just keeps you on your toes). I chose pork with salt sauce (€10.90).

Chicken seems to have a monopoly on satay, but pork is much more interesting. The beautiful sweet undertone of the sauce and its signature and distinctly salty belly combine so well with the meat, which is sweet in its own way like few others.

It didn’t so much coat the pork as smother it, and in a most pleasing way, and the peppers, which I can often give or take, brought their own mild sweetness. None of this had that saccharine, punishing taste, but a subtle and repeatable dish.

The egg fried rice (£3.90) was as it should be – plenty of egg, peas and spring onions and soya-dyed rice, it makes you realize what you’re getting off the supermarket shelf, which isn’t much. It could be a light lunch in itself if you’re frugal. But then, when everything else on the menu is reasonably priced, I don’t know why you would.

Not just in Liverpool, but especially here, Chinese food is insanely popular and for good reason. But over the years, there have been plenty of opportunities to chase trends, whether it’s the menu, the decor, or all of the above.

Here, among the chatter of regulars telling their owners about their day, their vacation, or where they’re going on vacation, obscure 70s soul that sounds like Ann Peebles slips out of the speakers. It may have been playing for decades, but nothing feels dull. It’s not from “another time”, it’s somehow out of time. When the front door light sign glows, it’s here whenever you need it.

Yuet Ben, never change.

Yuet Ben1 Upper Duke St, Liverpool L1 9DU