Apium

After inquiring about the black bean noodles I ordered them despite the slightly sketchy response I received when I inquired if they were similar to jjajang myun (turns out they weren’t, at all. Not even remotely.)
The sloppy mess of noodles in a gravy-​like sauce that arrived left me wishing I’d gone with a better option. Perhaps a soup? Or a dry noodle?
It’s a little dark inside, a salient detail as I write this in the depth of the dark winter.
In sum, I’d rather not have another lunch here.

I’d always walked by this place and kind of put off the act of actually trying it out! Well, today was the day and I’m really glad I did…
To be honest, I don’t have a great story to tell about my lunch here, but I was so happy with the food and the service (the latter being oftentimes rather spotty in Chinese establishments) that I will give it 4 Stars!
I had the Chicken-​Noodle-​Soup, and boy was this a huge portion: the chicken strips were fried in bread-​crumbs, wich I really liked. There were plenty of egg noodles to chew on, but I kind of wished they had spiced it up with more vegetables. The broth (the heart of such a dish) was tasty — I spiced it up some chili-​sauce though.
All in all, the service was quick and friendly. I recommend going before the lunch rush though — noonish would be a good time.

Is this a Chinese restaurant? The listing here tells me that but i always thought that it was Malaysian. But anyway … its difficult to tell here … they sell everything.
I will always remember Apium as it was the restaurant where i had lunch on my first day at work in London.
The place serves decent lunch … you can take a pick between a variety of rice and gravies, (curry chicken, sichuan chicken, curry lamb and duck being very popular) and noodles. They make some good ho-​fun.
I have come here for dinner a couple of times. It seems creepy that the place where you will find people waiting to be served at lunchtime, is so empty in the evenings. A number of my friends who came with me for dinner here were disappointed (to be fair to Apium, my friends had just spent more than an hour waiting for me at a graveyard: p) by the quality of the vegetarian food.
Apium is unique for one thing. It doesn’t even claim to be good :) They had a review stuck to the wall which said that the place was so-​so. Reading the review, you wouldn’t think much of this place.
If you work near Barbican, i would strongly recommend Apium for a working lunch … nothing more.