Mood

Energy

Listening to: Beautiful - 倉木麻衣

Wow, I am actually writing backwards. A week ago, I went to this western restaurant with my friends to celebrate the birthday of one of them. This was not my first time here but second time, and I remember it was pretty nice on my first visit. We didn't eat much but everything was nice.

First we had some bread, like typical western course. The bread was crispy outside but it was a little too...how do you say, too chewy. It is a bit hard to swallow...

Then the pizza arrived. It was a Traditional Italian Pizza with spicy sausage, pineapple and tomato as toppings. However, I have no idea how traditional it was, and I will know later since I am going to Italy soon, haha!

We also ordered some escargots and fettuccine with black truffle and mushroom slices. Both of them were nice though not special or wowing.

We also ordered a dish of steak but we were too hungry it seemed like, and we just swallowed it when it arrived before we realized I needed to shoot a picture of it...anyway, we also had some drinks. I got a champagne cocktail while our pretty lady friend got a Snowball herself.

Overall the food was good and nice, and the price was not too unaffordable. The quality was above average and the service was good. However, there was nothing special in the menu, as you could find similar food in other restaurants. It will be better, I think, if they have something special, or invent something so that you can only eat here. That would give a stronger impression.

Still not a bad choice at all for some western food, especially for those who are too bored by the food from Fat Angelo or Dan Ryan's.

Keywords: unit 798 causeway bay western food pasta pizza

I have no idea why the owner of this restaurant named it "Sportful Garden Restaurant". Maybe it was supposed to be "thoughtful"? I don't know, but this Chinese restaurant, even with a strange name, is quite famous in the town.

Having 8 branches all over the island and Kowloon sides, the restaurant is famous for some high-quality cuisines, which are mainly Guangdong food. There are some fusion dishes as well, but that is not surprising since Hong Kong is an international city with so many cultures mixed together like a dish of fried rice. Anyway, tonight we went there to celebrate my mum's birthday, and it was a pretty nice dinner set. Let's zoom in!

The dinner started with the shark fin soup with crab meat and fish maw slices (花膠). Unlike those in other restaurants, this soup was filled with shark fins and was actually a bit "fishy". I guess that proved it was real shark fins, right?

Then it was a combo set, with abalone and duck foot (鴨掌; shouldn't be duck web 蹼, which refers to the membrane not the whole foot).

Then we had some vegetable. What do you think it is? It is called "tung hau" (茼蒿). It has no English name but a Latin name called Chrysanthemum coronarium. It tastes like amaranth (or pigweed 莧菜) with a strong and strange smell. Yes, from the name you can see that it is a kind of chrysanthemum and you cannot imagine that it tastes like this.

Following the green dish we had the Swiss wing with glutinous rice filling. Of course, as you know that Swiss wings have nothing to do with Switzerland. This dish looks very delicious, and it was actually quite filling. The BBQ eel slices also came. They were very crispy and the taste was very good, but I think they were a bit overcooked.

The final dish in our main course was the tiger pawn. It was quite big and very juicy.

There was no rice for me this time, and I thought I would get hungry soon since I am the kind of people who need to have rice for every meal. But it looked like I didn't need more since the meal was pretty rich in flavour and that made you stop eating anything more. However, despite the fullness ,the dessert was a nice finale for the meal. It was the coconut cake with bird nest.

It was a great dinner but to me everything is a bit too rich for me. It seems to be a kind of once-in-a-while thing instead of an every-day meal. Anyway, if anyone wants to have some nice and decent Guangdong food, this will be one of your options.

Keywords: chinese restaurant sportful

Yes, I was trying to say quench your thirst, but it is a play on words. Today I finally got the beautiful Angel's Cake from Maxim bakery, and it is actually just a honey crunch angel food cake. A crunch cake is only a simple cake with cream outside, served with caramel crunch. An angel food cake is a kind of cake with a hole in the middle, which was said to be the food for angels due to its light color.

And I think that is beautiful isn't it? It is so yummy that I cannot stop eating it till all the crunch melts in my mouth! Okay, the crunch cannot really melt, but it is delicious!

Me and my girlfriend went to Starbucks at least once a month and we ordered this every time when it was available in the beginning of the year. It was very good too. My best experience with crunch cake was at Sevva. One slice of that crunch cake was quite big and also pretty expensive, costing HK$166 which is more than enough to buy the cake in the images above!

Anyway, if you have a chance, try it! It is light and simple, but delicious enough to make you dream of it every night! Haha!

Mood

Energy

Some people was asking, hey, what are you eating lately? Did you swallow any good food?

Actually, you don't need to go to all the high-class restaurant for good food. You can do it at home! I am lucky that I have a very good chef, who is my beloved mum. She does really good dishes and she can make that dish again after trying it from the restaurants! Tonight, we had an amazing dinner, and let me show you what we have:

The main course is the soy-sauced baby pigeons. It is a very common dish in Hong Kong, and they taste delicious! They are served with soy sauce and usually sliced into four parts for easy eating.

Then we have some oysters. They are small oysters from Japan, but they have very strong flavour. You can even taste a bit of sea water too!

I added a bit more food to the meal. I bought these two from the supermarket, which are the Japanese-style eel with BBQ sauce and salmon sashimi. They are very nice side dishes!

So you can see, good food can also be prepared at home, and it needs only a bit more work. Yes, I am lucky because I am not the one cooking, but I am learning! It is actually fun to work in the kitchen, learning about the food and how to turn them into delicacies. By the way, I haven't made a cake for a long time! I guess I should try again this weekend!

Mood

Energy

Last night we went to this sushi shop, which got famous when it was still in Yuen Long, the far-away-from-city-center new town. Now it started to grow and opened a few new branches, and we finally came to this new one in TST.

It was actually a special day for my best friend, and I didn't want to ruin his birthday dinner. Unfortunately I saw some negative comments on the web on this restaurant, and that killed a little bit of my appetite. Thank God it was more about services, and then I was prepared. Let's go to the sushi!

The famous sushi here is the long sushi, invented by the owner of this restaurant. They made this up because they thought they could wrap the whole rice with just one single sashimi, and enjoy the whole taste of the fish on it.

The sushi was okay, not to the level that I could scream. The fish was also fresh, but not incredible fresh. The experience of being long? Just so-so. It sounds a bit better if you can eat it in another way: cut the fish at the top to half, then eat it as one sushi with one sashimi. After all, most of the people don't have such a big mouth to swallow the entire thing.

I personally like the smoked eel most, but the salmon was not bad. Still, everything was typical in taste, not enough to stimulate my taste buds to the climax.

We also ordered two hand rolls, one is the roll with deep-fried oyster, one with foie gras and sea urchin sashimi on top.

I ate the latter one (focused one in the image), and the taste was funny. The foie gras was good and the urchin was okay, but then they were mixed together, the combination tasted funny in the mouth. Not bad, just funny. At least, the foie gras was really fried and hot. I would throw up if both toppings were raw. Just too weird, right?

Then two hot dishes arrived. First one is the small beef sashimi, and the second one is baked mushroom with butter.

The first one was not good at all. I guess it was too raw that it was too hard to chew and swallow. The taste was not bad but when it felt like chewing gum after some time in the mouth, you just wouldn't like it. The mushroom was okay, just a bit too salty to me.

Overall, the meal was average, and I didn't see why there were long queues before. One can find much better sushi in the town! Perhaps it is the price, since we just ended up HK$200 per person. If you need some casual Japanese food without much expectation, this may be a choice for you. Interesting enough, there are other things in the menu which are completely non-Japanese: cappuccino puddings, lamp chops...guess if you have a friend who hate Japanese food, he can still order something in here, haha!

Keywords: kam tin japanese food sushi sashimi hand roll

Mood

Energy

Listening to: Kay!

Yes, this is Kay's first concert, first personal concert, which was held on 8th May night at the Hong Kong Coliseum. Thanks to my colleague who helped grab tickets for me, and our seats were pretty good, nearly centered to the stage!

Kay was the one who brought me back to Hong Kong music like 4 years ago. At that time, I was still discriminating against most of the Hong Kong pop songs and only listened to English ones. Later, I came across her new album (her second album) from my friend, and it was so good! Then, I bought back all her albums and loved them so much. Of course I didn't yet turn my head completely to Hong Kong pop, but I was all for Kay's lovely songs and her beautiful voice.

Kay entered the field of pop singers all by her own talents, unlike many other singers. Therefore, there is no doubt that she can sing very well. I admire her and her talents, and also her style and attitudes towards life and music. Her songs are not just about love, but many other things: Hong Kong lifestyle, about TV shows, about daily life like life on the train, about reactions against the tabloids...the variety has a huge range indeed. That's how special she is!

Alright, I know that you cannot wait more for my photos, and here they come!

For the first time we saw Kay dancing on the stage! The stage was monotonic but it was nicely designed. I don't buy the ideas of some of her clothes as they don't really fit somehow, but all I really care is her singing. She didn't really stop except during some short breaks when she took to change her clothes. That's what a singer should be! The three-hour concert was very good and I enjoyed it so much. Now I am heading for another little personal Kay concert: open iTunes and start playing all the Kay songs all over again!

Keywords: kay tse concert gig hong kong coliseum

Mood

Energy

Listening to: Club Lounge - Various

Right at the time I knew my best friend Alonzo was back from Japan, I immediately grabbed him for a quick lunch. He is a charming guy and we have so much fun and laughter together. We went to this Vietnamese restaurant hidden away from the busy center of Causeway Bay. Alonzo led me to here after walking along some narrow alleys and strange catchwater.

The little shop, called Locomotive Contemporary Vietnamese Cuisine, can only hold 40 people at most, but it is not very cramped as they also have big sofas and pocket seating. Looking at the menu, it was not very cheap at all, and so we tried one or two plates and tried to see how worthy the food could be.

First it was the rice paper rolls, which had pork, spring onion and some other mixes inside. It was not bad, especially when you eat it with a sweet sauce that comes with it.

Then my main course came. It was another "pho" like the previous blog you saw, with all the beef stuff inside. The main feature of this pho is its size! It is just HUGE! I can nearly put my head into the bowl!

I read a lot of negative comments on this restaurant in Openrice.com, the website that most of the HK people go to and leave comments. However, while it is not a very high-class or famous eating place, it is not bad to me. The food was tasty while the side dishes were nicely prepared too. I can only say that the Internet has a lot of people who don't really know how to eat but how to type only. So most of those comments could just be disregarded.

Anyway, if you are around in that corner of the city and looking for some big bowls with good flavour, I think this is not a bad choice at all. If you don't mind walking more and paying more, I of course would recommend you to just visit the core of Causeway Bay where you can find a lot more decent restaurants!

My lunch didn't end with a nice cup of coffee. It was too hot outside and so I got this new product from Starbucks : Blackberry Mocha Frappuccino. Not very special to me but at least keep me cool!

Keywords: vietnamese food pho noodle rice paper starbucks

Mood

Energy

I was always planning a dinner with my family at the beginning of the year but it was postponed several times for different reasons. Finally, our family dinner became true and I chose the newly open BLT Steak as the venue.

The opening of this New York based steak house marks the arrival of the French chef Laurent Tourondel and brings up some French-style American dishes and all-round finesse. The restaurant is designed by the architect Hernan Zanghellini, who created a cozy and casual dining space. As HKClubbing.com talks about this new restaurant, "A native of France with the passion and skill of a classically French-trained chef and the sensibility and style of a metropolitan restaurateur, Laurent Tourondel has successfully infiltrated the rarified world of New York restaurants and the American dining landscape, much to the delight of critics and diners alike.

"Bistro Laurent Tourondel takes the steakhouse concept to a new level by artfully combining the highest quality ingredients with the precision only the finest chefs can wield. “I created BLT Steak as a modern steakhouse – one that focuses on the best product and the most exact techniques. That is the key for me, to keep it simple and wonderful” states Chef Tourondel."

The restaurant only provides the best prime steak from US and grain-fed Australian Angus beef, while you can also select from a wide range of burgers, salads and side dishes. You can also find a long wine list too, though most of them may look young to those who knows wine well.

Before our main courses came, we had these huge popovers. They are breads with cheese on top and puff inside, which are very interesting!

We also had a little dish of salmon served with olive oil.

The food came really fast, and the two rib eyes already arrived before we finished the popovers. First is the Australian rib eye, and then the 14oz American rib eye.

I must say the meat was of high quality. My first reaction was that the charcoal smell was very strong! It was all over the two steaks. The outside was very crispy, but the inside was very soft and tender. American rib eye had  finer texture while the Australian rib eye seemed to have less fat. I guess I like the American one more.

My favourite dish was actually this spicy BBQ corn! It was so delicious with all the molten butter on top...wow! We also had some Fava beans though I wasn't very fond of it.

The another main course came and it was the rosemary chicken served in a big pot. It tasted like spring chickens and was not really special. Still, the meat was soft and good, and the sauce went well with the chicken too.

The dessert came right after our main dishes, and the first one is the Crêpe Soufflé which looked like a huge fat pancake. It was served with passion fruit sauce, and you know what? It tasted so good!

The surface was very crispy because of a thin layer of caramel, and the inside was very soft like custard. It was not sweet at all and thus tasted very good with sweet and sour passion fruit sauce. Definitely a very good dessert after all the heavy meat dishes. We also had a Pineapple Soup with White Chocolate ice-cream. I am never a fan of white chocolate but this was not bad at all. it tasted more like vanilla which went well with the pineapple sauce and fruits at the bottom of the big bowl.

You also have some madeleine cakes too for your coffee, if any. Not bad not bad!

Me and my sister ordered two cocktails. The red one is mine, which is called 57th Street Manhattan, while the yellow one is Mango Margarita. Both were pretty strong. Mine just tasted like the alcohol for cleaning wounds! Thank God I could take it without problem but that was like all up to my limit already!

It was a really great dinner. Everything was very well prepared and cooked. The steak was extremely good to me, and I would say it was right after Ruth Chris from my experience. (yet I will go to Lawry's and Intercontinental Steak House for a complete comparison!). The side dishes were nice as complimentary and the desserts surprised me a lot! The service, unlike some of the people wrote online, was not bad. I asked about recommendations and explanation of the steak types, and they were happy to answer us. The manager was helpful as well!

The whole dinner was not very expensive, less than HK0 per head this time. I am sure that I will come back again, and that you will like this place too!

Keywords: steak beef new york BLT