Decided to try Middle 8th after reading all the rave reviews--and certainly when we saw the line of people out the door on a Wednesday night, it confirmed how popular this place is.

Decor is nice and the staff were very friendly, and though everything was good none of our six dishes really blew us away--we tried at least two that the forum had recommended. I felt that I had had better meals at other Yunnan restaurants. But the tipping point proved to be the desserts: "coconut milk with fresh fruit" turned out to be a bowl of plain yogurt (the type you can get in any supermarket) with perhaps ten slivers of lemon peel. Nice and refreshing, but it wasn't made of either coconut milk or fresh fruit. Pricing was reasonable though, as the total for six dishes, four desserts, and a bottle of Chilean wine came to 450RMB.

All in all a nice dinner out, and perhaps I went on a mediocre day--but not sure I would necessarily prefer this over Dali or No Name.