Tuen Mun Seafood Dinner

I have decided to go on a 3D2N local tour to Tin Shui Wai / Tuen Mun which is at the northern part of New Territory.  As I live in Wanchai, it takes 1-2 hours to the destination, so I consider this as a local trip.  I stayed at the Harbour Plaza Resort at Tin Shui Wai.  The room is very spacious - 409 sq ft. with very good open view. The cost is only HK$720+10% per night including breakfast, which is actually a very good deal.

After checking in to the hotel, we went on a visit to the T Park at Nim Wan Road, Tuen Mun. It is a sustainable sludge incineration plant featuring spa pools, extensive gardens & a wildlife habitat. A HK$53 billion environmental construction which went into work in 2016.

After the visit, a friend of mine who lives in Yuen Long took us to Tuen Mun for a seafood dinner. There are many spots in Hong Kong famous for seafood, Tuen Mun is one of them. The place we went was called Sam Shing where there are many seafood sellers and restaurants.  We bought the seafoods and then took them to the restaurant which charged cooking fee only. 

Clams with Udon in White Wine Sauce

Very fresh clams!

Baked Lobsters

Signature cooking method of the restaurant. Seafood restaurants in town usually do steaming, baking is relatively rare. It was coated with a layer of smashed potato and baked to golden colour. Very delicious. Forks and Knives were provided.

Mantis Shrimps

Mantis Shrimps stir fried with garlic.  A very traditional cooking method and yet very well done and yummy.  Very fresh with lots of meat.  Scissors were provided.

Steamed Prawns

This was my pick and my favourite way of eating shrimps and prawns. A typical way of Cantonese shrimp eating. Simple cooking but very delicious. However we must have to use our fingers. The restaurant provided us with wet tissues and we can easily clean our hands after eating.

Abalone Hot Pot with Ginger and Green Onion

Abalone in hot pot is quite a special way of cooking. Also a signature cooking method of the restaurant. These were fresh abalones which are less expensive than the dry ones. We like this dish very much! This is something I don't understand. Fresh things are usually more expensive than their dry versions, but abalone is the other way round.

Steamed Scallops with Jelly Noodle

Another traditional way of Cantonese seafood cooking. Very simple cooking, just steamed the scallops with garlic and jelly noodle. The tastes all matched very well.

Stir Fried Vegetable with Garlic

As a matter of balance diet, a dish of vegetable is a must. Again we've picked the simplest cooking method - stir fried with garlic.

The Seafood Party

We also had seafood soup and pork chop.

Thai Seafood

Take West Rail to Tuen Mun, then change to Light Rail #505 (or taxi) to Sam Shing. Buy the seafoods you like and tell the restaurant to cook them the way you want. The fee varies according to the cooking method.  Restaurants also provide set menu and some other non seafood choices.

Total cost: slightly under HK$2,000 (~US$260) (including food and cooking). My friend's treat, so I don't know the actual cost.

Hong Kong Food Blog - Tuen Mun Seafood Dinner

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

Special Price Dinner Set

We earned some interest recently, so my sister and I decided to go for a little celebration. The restaurant nearby our houses offers special price dinner every now and then.  But we have to go on weekdays.  Take our dinner for example, weekend price is HK$495 per person, but if we go on weekdays, it's only HK$295 per person.  Almost half the price, quite a good deal.

In fact I quite like this kind of western style Chinese dinner set.  There are six courses, plus dessert. If we had to order a la carte, it will come in regular size and we won't be able to eat that many different kind of foods.  With the dinner set, every dish come in one-person portion, with seafood being the major theme.

Starter:  Sea Cucumber and Roasted Pork

Stewed 4-Head Abalone

In Hong Kong, the size and cost of abalone is generally categorized by the number of heads.  Meaning how many abalones there are in one catty.  4-Head means there are 4 in a catty.  Likewise, 5-Head will mean 5 in a catty.  So the larger the number, the smaller the abalone is.  Got it?  

Shark Soup

This is generally an expensive item.  I don't know how they can make profit out of selling at such a low price.  Anyway it was good and delicious.  

Garoupa Steak

Baked Oyster (Add on item)

We picked this from the a la carte menu.  As we both love oysters and this was allowed to be ordered minimum 2 only.  We were sure that we can take an extra oyster on top of the dinner set.  Indeed, the oyster was nice and fresh.  Good pick!

Tomato and Veggie Soup

Dao Ting Wu Dong

I don't know what Do Ting means. But it usually refers to good quality wu dong. In fact after the veggie and pasta, we were completely full.  To wrap up the meal, we had a bowl of almond tea with bird's nest and egg white.  

Dessert: Bird's Nest Almond Tea with Egg White 

(the entire thing was completely white, hence didn't take a photo)

Special Seafood Dinner Set

HK$295 per person

Oyster HK$48@ (minimum 2)

plus tea and 10% service charge

Final bill: HK$400 per person

Hong Kong Food Blog

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

Seafood Annual Dinner

Seafood dinner is many Hong Kong people's favourite.  9 out of 10 Hong Kong Cantonese love it, including myself.  As Chinese New Year is approaching, our family decided to go for a seafood annual dinner.  Normally we pick from set menus, but we're tired of them, so this year, we go for a la carte and pick our own favourite seafood. 

Many travel tips advise visitors to go to Aberdeen, Le Yue Mun, Lamma Island...kind of places to eat seafood, but these places are generally far from city, and prices are more or less similar.  There are many seafood restaurant around in the city with fish tanks.  These are the place you can eat fresh seafood.  The one we went for annual dinner was one of those.

Here's our 8-course a la carte seafood dinner.

To start with, we didn't have seafood, we had the Almond Soup with Pig's Lung.  Quite a new combination, I don't know when chefs started to get almond juice into pig's lung soup.  But indeed, very nice.  Each of us had 3 bowls of soup, as well as a big dish of soup ingredients, including pork, ham, chicken feet...and so on.  In fact this is one of the restaurant's signature dishes.

 Almond Soup with Pig's Lung 生磨杏汁猪肺湯

Our first round of seafood started with Pan Fried Tiger Prawns with soy sauce.  Nice color and although on a Chinese dining table, we were served with forks and knives for this dish.



Pan Fried Tiger Prawns 煎老虎蝦

This dish of steamed Razor Clams let us down.  Although it looked nice, but it was cool to cold.  The low temperature critically discounted the taste!





Steamed Razor Clams with Jelly Noodle and Garlic

We were given a private plate for our razor clams.  So the time the waiter took to distribute the plate let the food cool down, I believe, or else it might have been sitting in the kitchen for an hour before some brought them to our table.



金銀蒜粉絲蒸聖子皇

American Barrel Oyster, in traditional Cantonese hot pot with ginger and green onion.  Very fragrant and delicious.

Oyster Stew with Ginger and Green Onion 薑沖焗美國桶蠔

This giant garoupa was the second disaster of the night. At the beginning we were very excited about this giant fish.  But because of the thick meat, the fish came to the table not fully cooked.  Some of the fleshes were still sticking to the bone.  If we asked to re-cook, then the whole fish will be destroyed.  So the waiter suggested us to eat those cooked parts and then get the chef to add some hot oil to cook the rest.  We had no choice.  But don't know why, while we ate, the meat gradually got cooked and we finally manage to eat the entire fish without re-cooking.  Even so, we were not happy with it.

Steamed Giant Garoupa 清蒸沙巴龍躉

Eggs with Prawns is generally not served in banquets, but why here?  Remember we tailored our own menu?  My original choice was deep fried mini white fishes or kau fishes, but restaurant said they did stock those fishes.  So we end up with this egg with prawns, still we have prawns to match our seafood theme.

Stir Fried Prawns with Eggs 滑蛋蝦仁

As a balance of diet, we must need some vegetables.  To match the seafood theme, our original choice was crab roe with bean sprout.  But restaurant said crab season is over, they had no crab roe available, so we changed to crab meat, still something from the sea.

Stir Fried Bean Sprout with Crab Meat 蟹肉豆苗

Cantonese banquets usually are wrapped up with rice, noodle to make sure guests all go home with a full stomach.  Because ours was a seafood dinner, we picked another signature dish of the restaurant - fish meat congee. Pinspotted Spinefoot Fish?? Excuse me, I really don't know the English name of 泥鯭 fish, so I looked it up in the internet.

Pinspotted Spinefoot Fish Meat Congee 果皮泥鯭粥

We got some dates pudding and fresh fruits at the end.  Comparing the normal menus with roast pig and chicken, our seafood dinner menu was relatively light and was just right. 

Kam Dou Kee Restaurant

Wanchai, Hong Kong

Private Room for Two Tables

HK$3,888 per table of 10, plus tea and service charge

Total: HK$4,430 (US$568) per table

Hong Kong Food Blog - Seafood Annual Dinner

Seafood Dinner Special Price

I've mentioned in my blog that if you want to eat good things at good price, you can play around with date and time. Here's a good example.  The seafood dinner set below costs HK$398 per person Friday to Sunday.  However if you go on Monday through Thursday, it is sold at HK$198 per person.  Fair enough?

Sunday (Jan 17) is my friend's birthday.  She decided to have an early celebration in order to enjoy the special rate.  So we had it on Thursday (Jan 14).

The seafood set was served somewhat western style. i.e. Individual dishes were served to each person.  So we all ate our own dishes.  It was an eight course dinner, and on top we ordered the Chinese birthday buns.  Here's what we had.

Abalone with Mushroom - Al dente!  Ate with knife and fork.  Abalone is generally expensive.  In some cases, only the abalone will cost more than the entire set.  

花菇五頭鮑

Pan Fried King Prawn煎老虎蝦　

King Prawn is our favourite.  In the market there are always expensive prawns but not fresh enough.  But this one is very fresh and we all love it.

Soft Shell Crab 炸軟殼蟹

I usually don't eat crabs, because I don't know and don't want to struggle with the hard shell.  But this one is different - soft shell crab.  Something new to me, deep fried, a little spicy.  Well done!

Pan Fried Corn Fish Cake 粟米魚餅

In fact, this corn fish cake was the starter.  Crispy!

Veggie in Congee 粥水油麥菜

This is kind of new combination being invented recently.  Vegetables usually go with soup, but current trend is to go with congee.  We can even find some rice in it.  May be its consistency is slightly thicker than soup, hence creating a new feeling in the mouth.

Signature Fried Rice 招牌炒飯

Each of us had a little bowl of fried rice.  It was called signature fried rice, having egg white, vegetables and some minced meat in it.  Quite healthy.  Nice!

Old Fire Soup 老火湯, 粉葛陵魚

Cantonese is famous for Old Fire Soup.  Let me clarify.  'Old Fire' implies long hour cooking in Cantonese kitchens.  Verses 'quick boil', the soup is believed to be good for health and rich in flavour.  

Sweet Potato Soup 蕃薯糖水

The sweet potato was cooked to totally soft.  Together with some ginger juice in it, this dessert is very good to keep warm in cold weather.  And it is easy for home cooking.  Sometimes we make it at home too.

Birthday Bun 生日桃包

We paid this on top of the dinner set.  I thought it was HK$15 each.  Freshly steamed.  With some slight brush on, making the colour look good for the birthday person.  Very yummy!

Kam Dou Restaurant

Wanchai

Hong Kong

January 14, 2016 (Thursday)

HK$198 per person + tea and 10% service charge

Hong Kong Food Blog

Seafood Dinner Special