Chinese New Year Foods 2019

2019 Chinese New Year is just over. Today is the 10th of January in Chinese calendar. It's time to summarize my eating history over the festival.

On day 5 of CNY, nine of us went to cinema at Time Square and had dinner after. As I said in my last post, I love siu mei, so do many of us. So we had three in a row - roasted pork (char siu), goose and chicken. I must say siu mei is widely available in Hong Kong, but good quality ones are rare, especially char siu. The one here served on hot plate is one of the best among what I have ever had. 

Noodle and Rice are always our favorites.

This fried rice has used dry oyster (which means good business). It is a very popular ingredient during Chinese New Year.

Vegetables are musts as a matter of balance diet. At Chinese New Year, the chef has made use of the salty egg yolk to create a sense of gold and the color was very beautiful. In fact there were also millennium eggs in this dish.

Dinner Venue: Chung's Kitchen, 12/F Time Square, Causeway Bay, Hong Kong

Note: To my surprise, this restaurant does not charge any service fee!

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On the New Year day, my brother took us out for dinner. This was the fish that I want to highlight. I live in Hong Kong, fish dishes are nothing new to me. But I must say this one was very unusual.  It's the tail of a giant grouper. 

Estimated from the size of the tail, I think the whole fish may be over 1 meter long and weighted 15 kg. It was slow cooked with some tofu sheets and roasted pork and served on hot pot. The waiting time was a bit long but we all thought it deserved. There were big lumps of meat which made us fully satisfied. Although there were bones, but they were big and easy to be identified. Even I don't really like fish bones, I love this giant grouper very much.

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We eat a lot of puddings 糕 over Chinese New Year. 糕 sounds like 'growth' and it carries very good and positive meaning and that's why they are so popular during CNY.

Most puddings are sweet but turnip pudding is savory. We make them at home and very often make some extra for our relatives and friends. Below is the home-made turnip pudding gift from my friend. The basic ingredients are generally preserved sausages (lap cheung), preserved meat and dry shrimps. We can add others per our personal tastes. My friend knows that I love abalone, so you can see there was one in the middle, and there were slices of dry scallops as well.

There are different ways to re-heat turnip pudding, steam, pan fry, stir fry or micro wave. But I like none of them. I usually make them at home and eat fresh from the steamer. I must say this is the best way to eat turnip pudding. But this one was from a friend, so I had to re-heat by steaming which is rather environmental and healthy.

Cassian Flower Pudding 桂花糕

This is the sweet pudding which is somehow jelly like and generally served as cold cut. It was the dessert at my year-end family gathering dinner. 

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We also eat a lot of sweet dumplings 湯丸 around Chinese New Year, either home-made or at restaurants. 湯丸 and 團圓 (gathering, everybody meets each other) sound very similar, and this is the reason why they are popular around new year time. 

Here are the two types of sweet dumplings that I had this year. 

擂沙湯丸 is always my favorite. They are served warm with very fine sugary coating. This was from my new-year-eve dinner at New Shanghai Restaurant at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

This is another type of sweet dumpling which I forgot the name. Sweet dumplings are sticky, with or without fillings. This one has some roasted ground peanuts as the coating, also served warm. They were made to order, so there was a little waiting time. This was from the new year evening dinner that my brother bought us.

After Binge Eating...

So what would you do after binge eating? My answer is 'fasting'. 

If you have ever read my post of "Why I Set Up This Food Blog", you will know that I generally eat one meal a day (OMAD). If you do an internet search of OMAD, you will know that it is a very popular eating pattern nowadays.

After the heavy eating days, I went on a 40-hour fast and have successfully completed. I finished dinner at Thursday (Feb 7) night, and resume eating on Saturday (Feb 9) lunch. That way I have had a full day of Friday to let my body and the digestive system a good rest.

Now I feel comfortable. I went on the scale and gained nothing. 

Hong Kong Food Blog - Chinese New Year 2019

Seafood Christmas Dinner 2017

Have you ever tried Chinese seafood Christmas dinner?  I did it last night, on Christmas Eve 2017.  Dining out on festival day is usually crowded, expensive and low service level. Therefore I tried an opposite way and found it worked well.  I.e. Chinese food for western festival and western food for Chinese festival.  And this was the reason why I had a Chinese seafood Christmas Eve dinner last night.  My strategy proven to work.  The restaurant wasn't crowded at all and the service level was as good as usual.  Unlike some restaurants which only serve expensive festival sets, the restaurant I went last night didn't raise the prices and all usual foods are available.

Dinner for Two - HK$688 - 6 courses + desserts

This looked quite a good deal, so we gave it a try. Everything went well!

Chilled Marinated Fresh Abalone 冰鎮鮑魚

Looked well. Fresh and delicious - a very lovely starter.

Braised Bird's Nest Soup with Seafood 海皇燕窩羹

Very rich in taste. We found a lot of seafood in it. Presentation was also nice. We added some pepper as we wished.

Pan-Fried Japanese Scallop w/ Boletus Mushroom

牛肝菌香煎日本大元貝

The scallop was really giant.  With 5cm diameter after cooking, the original size must be huge. We were served with fork and knife to make eating easier.  However I would like to see more boletus mushroom. 

Deep-Fried Tiger Prawns with Seasame Seed Paste

胡麻醬脆皮大虎蝦球

Every dish was in one-person portion.  Very nicely presented. The prawn was fresh  and al dente.

Braised Wild Mushroom with Abalone Sauce

鮑汁百靈菇

As a balance of diet, some veggies was a must.  With the abalone sauce, the mushroom and the veggie were both very yummy!

Fujian Style Fried Rice with Diced Abalone

福建海鮮炒飯

Fujian fried rice was served with gravy, making it silky smooth for the mouth. Well I particularly like the giant prawn. I didn't expect to find such a giant, fresh and delicious prawn in the rice. Very nicely done!

Dessert Time

Fresh Pomelo and Mango with Sago in Coconut Cream 楊枝金露

The dessert had pomelo, mango and coconut inside, all were my favourite fruits. Served chilled.

Tien Yi Chinese Petit Fours 天一甜品薈萃

I personally liked the brown one which had the taste and feeling of Chinese New Year Pudding. Soft and chewy, not too sweet. Taste was just right.

The entire Seafood Christmas Dinner was just right in terms of quantity, taste and price. Services were also good.  The foods came one after one, we didn't need to wait too long in between dishes.  Waiters were friendly.  The place was nicely decorated with sufficient spaces in between tables which made the eating environment very comfortable.

Dinner for Two - HK$688

Tea - HK$20 per person, 10% service charge

Total bill: HK$800.8 (US$103)

Tien Yi Chinese Restaurant 天一酒家

Level LG1, Pacific Place

Admiralty, Hong Kong

Tel: +852 2918 9889

Hong Kong Food Blog -  Chinese Seafood Christmas Dinner

Private Kitchen Dinner

I haven't had private kitchen dinner for some time. It's becoming very popular nowadays in Hong Kong. Last Tuesday was Dragon Boat Festival, my nephew took us for a private kitchen dinner. The 14 of us had a private room, although relatively small but at least with some privacy.

Private kitchens usually serve unique menus and ours was relatively luxury.

Starter: Smoked Eggs

Everyone of us had a half egg which were served with some fine salt. Looked colourful, a good starter.

Cold Cut: Chilled Abalone

Most of the dishes were served per headcount, so each of us had one abalone.  I had two, because we had a baby in the group, and his father decided to let me eat his. Very chewy, well done!

Steamed Clams, Dual Style: Thai

Clams are generally not my favourite, but the boss's, especially the Thai flavour ones.

Steamed Clams, Dual Style: Wine

So each of us had two clams, one in Thai Tong Yam style and one in Chinese wine.  

Garoupa Dual Style: Stir Fried Meat with Green Beans and Black Truffle

Expensive item! Well, one piece per person?! I did expect a larger portion!

Garoupa Dual Style: Steamed Head and Bones

Golden Pears, made of prawn meat

We thought the pears were dessert, but they were not. The pears were actually deep fried prawn meat, served with avocado sauce. Each of us shared a half pear. Little bit creative, in terms of appearance. Taste? Not bad at all.

Pomelo Peel with Goose Feet

These two veggie dishes were quiet normal however with relatively expensive ingredients such as bamboo pith. Pomelo peels were cheap however took a lot of time and effort to make it taste good. So both dishes were well done!

Assorted Veggie with Bamboo Pith

Signature Dish: Sweet and Sour Pork, chilled version

Quite amazing, in terms of appearance!

Signature Dish: Sweet and Sour Pork, chilled version

After the decorative ice craft was removed, we had to dig into the ice cubes to look for our sweet and sour pork.  However we could have more than one fruit if we want. It was my first time having sweet and sour pork chilled version. Quite creative, but again, one piece per person was not quite enough.

Roast Chicken with Tea Leaves

Didn't look good, but tasted good. The tea leaves' black color wasn't attractive, but the chicken was very delicious with crispy skin and juicy meat.

Steamed Sticky Rice with Crab

I am not skillful in eating crabs at all, every time it hurts the mouth, so I decided to go without it. The crab juices sipped into the sticky rice, making my plain rice very yummy.

Lee House Restaurant

303 Hennessy Road, Wanchai, Hong Kong

12-Course Dinner for 14

$?? - My nephew's treat

I've checked other set menus of HK$6,900 for 12 persons, and found ours to be more luxury, with tea and service charge, total bill may go close to HK$10,000.

Hong Kong Food Blog - Private Kitchen Dinner

Mid Autumn Festival Seafood Dinner

Mid Autumn Festival is approaching.  Due to various reasons, our family had an early bird festival dinner gathering. Being tired of set menus, we decided to go a la carte.  I suggested the 'star' restaurant that I went few months ago.  Its name is Star and its quality is also star-grade.  Although we shared the bill, I volunteered to sponsor seafoods, which all of us enjoy.

Prawns Baked in Broth 上湯焗海中蝦

Sea Garoupa (dual style) - Stir Fried Meat with Vegetables

大海班(花鬼) 兩味- 西蘭花炒球

This was the giant fish that I sponsored.  It was over 3 kilo costed HK$2,800 (contributing almost half of the entire bill).  In Hong Kong, value of a fish is primarily decided by the type of the fish and whether it is manually feed or free range from the sea.  This one was fresh from the sea and rather a rare breed, hence expensive.  I need to pre-order it.  Restaurant manager showed me a video of the swimming fish on the dinner afternoon for my approval before he actually sent the fish to the kitchen.

Professional eaters can always tell the difference between manually feed and free range sea fishes.  Nevertheless, my fish had everyone's thumb up!

Sea Garoupa (dual style) - Steamed Head and Bone

大海班(花鬼) 兩味- 蒸頭腩

After eating the meat, head and bone were never wasted. They were turned into another dish.  Ohh, the silky smooth fish skin was so yummy and al dente! Although we had to deal with the bones, we all appreciated the authenticity of simplicity.  Both dishes (stir fried and steamed) applied the most simple Cantonese cooking method to the highest standard and fully reflected the freshness of the fish.

Cantonese Old Fire Soup - Almond, Pig's Lung, Fish Maw, Chicken, Pork...

杏汁花膠豬肺湯

Very rich fragrance of almond.  The soup's main ingredient is pig's lung and almond, accompanied with plenty of delicious ingredients such as chicken, pork, fish maw...and so on.  After the soup was being served, the waiter brought to the table a dish of ingredients like the size of a small hill.  We all enjoyed choosing and picking whatever we loved. After all, the small hill only reduced about 20% in size.  Lucky that I was prepared.  I brought a big plastic box and took some left-over home.  Believe it or not, the 2nd-hand soup that I cooked with these same ingredients were equally yummy as what we had at the restaurant.  Finally I pulled the pork and made into porridge.  Thought next time I should bring two more boxes.

Sweet and Sour Pork with Pineapple 菠蘿生炒骨

This is a signature dish of the restaurant - almost appears on every table. I generally do not enjoy sweet and sour food, but this one is exception. Very yummy! I like the pineapples in particular.

Lotus Stewed with Pork Belly 蓮藕炆腩仔

It is quite a home-style dish.  It won't appear in any set menu.  It was only because we went on a ala carte that we can enjoy this yummy hot pot.  Although we can make it at home, but the taste here is outstandingly good.

Pan Fried Salty Chicken 輝哥煎咸雞

This recipe is invented by the chef master. There are many ways of cooking chicken, but stir fried is really new and unique.  All of us prefer this to steaming or deep frying.  Again, another signature that appears on almost every table.

Assorted Mushroom with Tofu 珍菌脆豆付

If you tried this dish the first time, you would want it the second time and so on. The restaurant has a quota to sell each night.  If you don't pre-order, there is no chance that you can enjoy this signature dish.  The two tofu in the size of a thick toast is filled with assorted mushrooms, served with delicious gravy.  The manager said due to the complicated cooking procedures, they can only sell six dishes every night.

Steamed Dry and Fresh Vegetable with Minced Pork 梅菜肉鬆蒸菜心

As I said, we were tired of the vegetables on the traditional set menus.  The manager recommended this, quite a fresh combination - dry and fresh vegetables steamed together with minced pork.  The salty dry veggie added extra fragrance and the dish itself was not oily at all, yummy and healthy!

Free Dessert

HK$6,514 (US$835) all inclusive for 16 persons.

We were offered the largest table good for 16 persons and we had a semi private dinning area as well.  All of us were extremely happy with the quality and quantity of the foods. After all, the waiters were friendly and provided very good services. 

Sing Kee Seafood Restaurant

3/F, The Phoenix, 23 Luard Road, Wanchai

Hong Kong

+852 2528-9028

Hong Kong Food Blog - Mid Autumn Seafood Dinner

Chinese New Year Foods 2016

Today is Chinese New Year Eve - Year of the Monkey is approaching in minutes. I have collected some photos of the foods that Hong Kong Chinese usually eat, especially Cantonese.

There are some foods that we eat during Chinese New Year.  I've grouped them into three categories.  

New Year Eve - jiaozi and dumplings.

New Year Dim Sums

2nd Day of New Year - vegetables.  In Cantonese, vegetables sounds like '開齊' which means 'a good start'.  So lunch of the second day of New Year generally has a dish of assorted veggies.  Chickens and fishes are highly popular among Chinese families during New Year.  

Enjoy this Chinese New Year Food video!

Happy New Year of the Monkey - 2016!

Hong Kong Food Blog - Chinese New Year Foods

Christmas Eve Lunch

Christmas Eve lunch is not always possible for me. Although people enjoy eating at festival seasons, but eating at high season may not be an enjoyable experience.  First, restaurants are full of people, you are running short of the normal service standard.  Second, restaurants are full of people, your are running short of a decent eating environment.  Third, restaurants set prices abnormally high as they have too many customers.  The list goes on.  After all, I still want to enjoy a Christmas Eve lunch, because our company offers a holiday today.  In fact, the entire company closes between 24th December to 3rd January.  We get 12 days off without applying our own annual leave.


Anyway, let's get back to today's Christmas Eve lunch. To avoid peak hour, we arrived at the restaurant at 11.45am, making us the first customer there.  It is a 6-course lunch, ranging from HK$328 to 368 depending on the main course.


White wine - there are red/white wine and orange juice for us to choose.  Since we chose fish as our main course, so we go with white wine.

Menu - Well it looks attractive and reasonably priced.  But...

Lobster Bisque - it was fresh chestnuts cream soup on the menu, but we were asked to choose between lobster bisque or cream soup of any kind.  Why?  The waiter said the chef had no time to prepare the chestnuts soup. However, I must say this lobster bisque was indeed very delicious!

Smoked Turkey and Baked York Ham - The waiter said 'no turkey'.  We then said this is not a Christmas menu, we better go elsewhere or choose some other regular set.  Well, the Christmas menu costs over HK$328 per person, other sets cost less than HK$100 - the waiter had a quick chat with the chef and come back saying 'yes, we can serve turkey'.  After all, we got our lovely turkey and ham with salad.

Fresh Fillet of Garoupa with Saffron Sauce - almost an inch thick, the garoupa fillet is really fresh and wonderful!  There is cream sauce, but I don't notice the saffron!?

Creme Brulee - we had this in place of the fresh apple pudding on the menu.  The waiter didn't even care to explain why?  Well, it's not bad, but I just don't know why I can't have my favourite apple pudding!?

To wrap up the meal, we had a cup of coffee.

Although I dine at this restaurant quite often, but I don't remember it's name.  As there is a large notice at the entrance saying 'push hard', I just name it as "大力推門".  Indeed we do need to push the door with extra effort in order to go inside. 

大力推門 at Hennessy Road, Wanchai

December 24, 2015

11.45am to 12.45pm

Christmas Set Menu

HK$338 (US$43) per person + 10% service charge

Hong Kong Food Blog - Christmas Eve Lunch

Family Annual Dinner 2015

Chinese New Year is approaching. Year-end Family gathering dinner is a big event to Chinese. I made some money in the stock market recently, so I decided to treat my family a nice dinner. Although we all love seafood, but our menu is kind of a semi seafood one.  The restaurant offers set menu for 12, but we had 20 people, so we decided to order for two tables of 10.  Restaurant then agreed to shrink the dishes down to fit 10 persons and cut the price accordingly.

 

Unlike the usual starter of a roast pig, we had five mini dishes to kick start the dinner - roast pork, black fungi, preserved turnip, jellyfish in vinegar, preserved pork slices.  These are lovely light and healthy dishes.

Roast Pork - Tailored for 10 Persons

Roast with honey, tender and juicy, very nice.

Jellyfish and Cucumber in Vinegar

Preserved Sliced Pork

Black Fungi in Wine

Preserved Turnip - Very Crispy

Shark Fin in Chicken Broth

One of the most popular Cantonese delicacy, especially in festival menus.

 

Stir Fried Scallops with Green Peas

Our second seafood dish of the night.  Crunchy green peas and fresh scallops, very nice combination.

Sea Cucumber and Mushroom in Oyster Sauce

For hot pot dishes, we had to mind the temperature, or the tongue will have to suffer.  This photo didn't reflect the bubbles which were still sizzling when arriving the table.

***Giant Sabah Groupa***

 

Steaming fresh fish is the gem of Cantonese cuisine.  No matter how experienced we are in eating fresh fish, we are surprisingly happy with this super fish.  The plate was so giant to cater for the giant fish.  And it was boneless, absolutely silky smooth and we can taste the sense of freshness.  I must say this is the superstar of the night!

 

***Pan Fried King Prawns with Soy Sauce***

This is another surprise of the night - a rare item and it is expensive and few menus has it because they spend most of their budget on the shark fin.  I normally do not order huge size prawns as it's difficult to find good ones.  But these king prawns were so fresh, meaty and chewy.  I didn't had a chance to eat such giant size prawns of outstanding quality for a long time.  So this is another superstar of the night.

Deep Fried Chicken

This is always my favourite! 

Hairy Vege and Dry Oyster with Chinese Lettuce

Chinese dishes nearby Chinese New Year are usually given good names - names that carries a sense of luck and fortune.  Dry oyster means 'good business'; lettuce means 'profit'.  We all love these of course.

Stir Fried Taiwanese Noodle with Sliced Pork

Well, I would say this is the third surprise of the night.  As at the end of a Cantonese feast, we usually have noodle and rice to wrap up the dinner.  However our menu had only one dish of noodle which made us thought that restaurant was trying to cut cost.  But this dish was even bigger than a dish of rice plus a dish of noodle.  We were so excited because it didn't only look good, but also taste very delicious.  Cantonese treat 'wok heat' as an important element of food, and this dish of noodle was really well done.

 

For desserts, we had puddings and fresh fruit platter.

 

After all, we all went home with a heavy stomach.  Luckily we brought some boxes to take some food home so that we didn't have to leave them on the table.  So the next day I still had noodle and chicken as dinner. 

 

Cost per table:  HK$3,488

Tea per table: HK$140

Service charge: 10%

Total bill (2 tables): HK$7,982

 

Kam Dau Kee Seafood Restaurant

Wanchai, Hong Kong

 

Hong Kong Food Blog - Year End Family Gathering Dinner

 

Message to Shark Fans

Please DO NOT post comments about your shark protection / protest message. I will NOT publish them. If you want to protect sharks, here are my suggested methods:

1. Advertise in mass media
2. Everyday protests, demonstrations…in front of all shops selling shark fins
3. Everyday protests, demonstrations in public areas such as streets, parks to educate the public not to eat shark fin
4. Letter, fax, email, telephone or personal visits to restaurant owners to insist them to remove shark fin from their menu
5. Write to the government to request shark fin eating to be illegal
6. Hire fleet of ships to go out to the sea to stop any shark catching activities.  

LEAVING COMMENTS IN MY BLOG IS A MATTER OF WASTING MY TIME TO READ AND DELETE. IT IS IN NO SENSE CONTRIBUTIVE IN SAVING SHARKS.