there's food on lockhart road?!

Lockhart Road- The number one pit stop for marines when in Hong Kong. Associated with its vast selection of strip clubs and bars, Lockhart is the farthest thing from being 'family friendly.' This summer I had the pleasure of venturing to Wan Chai's most famous street every day for work. I interned for Time Out Magazine and as you can imagine, there were always interesting people to listen in on or to people watch. The most exciting part of my day however was my lunch hour with the interns. I met a group of awesome people, and each day we selected a new place to eat. On the day of my departure we decided to try a Thai restaurant right across our office (located between two strip clubs-duh). Given my extremely scatter brained nature, I completely forgot the name of the place, but I can tell you that you'll know it when you see it. The food resembled that of a home cooked meal, not mine of course, but the Thai intern Pariya claims it was quite legit. I would suggest ordering off the lunch menu. I ordered fish served in soy bean paste with rice, and all lunch meals come with a drink (the cold lemongrass water was delightfully herbal). The fish reminded me of a less oily light version of gerupa, and the sauce it sat in was awfully yummy-not as dense as it looks in the photo. After we finished eating, we were each presented with an extremely vibrant traditional coconut dessert (too vibrant if you ask me). I wasn't impressed, but it was fun to play with and take apart.

All in all, surprisingly good meal for the price of $45, and probably the most wholesome little spot on Lockhart Road.

man man sik,

Elyssa Yuen

Rice Rolls for Breakfast

Rise and shine, passengers! For breakfast today, you have two options: Chinese breakfast or a Western breakfast. The difference is a Chinese breakfast is only savory, and a Western breakfast can be sweet or savory. Think waffles, pancakes, sausages, eggs. A Chinese breakfast can be a glass of soya milk, congee, fried noodles with soya sauce, or glutinous rice rolls （粢飯）, pictured below.

The rice is glutinous so it's sticky, a bit like the rice in sushi. The filling is pork floss (豬肉松）, fried dough stick (油條）and pickled vegetables（榨菜). And I went to a famous place for it in Causway Bay on Jardine's Bazaar. It's a Shanghainese eatery on a small side street that has signs all over advertising their famous piping hot rice rolls. I was looking for something to eat for lunch that I could carry in my hand and eat while I walk, and a rice roll was perfect for the occasion. They make their rice rolls fresh at lunchtime and breakfast time, and it's so piping hot that I felt it was going to melt the cling film. The big pot behind the rice rolls is hot soya milk, I prefer it cold and sweetened in summertime.

Last summer on my way to work, I'd buy one at the corner shop and bring it to the office. I love the texture of the rice, it's not mushy or soft but chewy. The filling is only mildly salty and doesn't taste too overpowering for the morning. The one thing is, it's a little too filling for breakfast. It gives me food coma for the rest of the morning because it's literally one bowl of rice, and glutinous rice is usually more starchy and filling than regular rice. I've never seen rice rolls being made, so I stuck around and asked the two ladies if I could take some photos. They worked together, one rolled and the other wrapped cling film. Just like how you make sushi, you need strong hands to shape the rice.

If you're a curious epicurean interested in knowing how your food is made then you should visit this eatery. You can watch the two ladies roll and pack, before they nudge you for getting in the way of their business. The rice roll is HKD$11, a bit pricey since it's their top selling item, but if you go to other breakfast places you can get it for around HKD$8. That's only around USD$1, just imagine, a delicious USD$1 meal!

Bon voyage,
Jenny Cheng

agnès b, no longer just a clothing line

I am not a particular France fan; I don't know any French word except Bonjour and Jetaime, I don't favor goose liver so much and never tried those diets that made the French ladies all skinny. However, I do have some knowledge about the French clothing brand names. agnès b. is one of the more popular French clothing brand in Hong Kong. Apparently, this brand does not only make clothes, but also food. Le Pain Grillé was opened in the corner of Leighton Road in Causeway Bay a few years ago. I was surprised to see it standing there when it first opened up. I was wondering, "How could it possibly survive? Food should not be agnès b.'s expertise!" I was wrong, it still stands in the same corner with many people going in and out, praising it after eating.

I have decided to try it. My mom and I walked in and we were greeted very nicely by all the waiters and waitresses. The restaurant's decoration has this 70's Euro style. The floor tiles are beautiful, they are colored with red, yellow, white and green with a circular cross shape. It immediately transformed the whole atmosphere into a very old school cafe. On the right side, a dozen or more pastries sit in an opened glass fridge, waiting for people to enjoy them. They all look so delicious it makes you drool. They also have a mini bar, with many liquors on shelves and a few coffee machines sitting on the counter. The restaurant is not big, but the petite tables they use made it seem very spacious.

When we sat down, the waitress came to us and walked us through their lunch sets menu. They have appetizer with either a soup or salad, then main course with the choice of beef, chicken, fish or seafood and at last dessert with a cup of coffee or tea. The total price is around $200 HKD (excluding 10% charge and water charge if you drink water.) It is definitely an expensive restaurant comparing to the others since many lunch set costs at most $130 in the area. But we were still excited cause the menu was very attractive.



They served us bread before any food comes out. As you can see, the bread has agnès b.'s signature logo "b" on it. It's very creative and special. The bread smells fresh and was very warm. The butter melted right in the bread.





Both of us ordered salad because it sounded very tempting. It is green salad with chicken and herb patty. It uses vinegar as its dressing with balsamic sauce as a little flavor for the chicken and herb patty. It gives you this fresh and healthy after taste.






I had chicken. It comes with a very rich mushroom sauce. The chicken meat was very tender considered it was frozen chicken. There's potato and a little more green salad as side dishes.





My mom had the fish fillet. It was cooked with a buttery sauce, very smooth and creamy. The side dish mash potato was very good. It was cooked with other ingredients so that it wasn't too heavy with a potato taste.





Here is the hazelnut cake as one of the desserts. It was decorate very prettily with cherry sauce and chocolate sauce. The hazelnut taste is very distinct. There is little biscuit crusts around the cake, which takes a little of the strong hazelnut taste away.




This is milk chocolate moose with dark chocolate sauce. A very heavy chocolate tasting cake. The bottom of the cake is a crunchy biscuit, something to chew on. The cake was decorated nicely and it has a little card with the Eiffel Tower on it, representing Paris, France.


This restaurant is a place I definitely recommend. Although it may seem to be a little pricey, the food quality was worth it. I was not only impressed by the food but also very charmed by the restaurants' decorations and atmosphere. It felt like I was in Europe, somewhere in Paris. I think agnès b.'s goals of spreading the wearing and eating living styles of French have succeeded in Hong Kong. This restaurant's service was not bad as well, but I think it could be better. One thing I wasn't exactly fond of was that it charges us for water. I do not believe the place opens up almost 300 or 400 bottles of water everyday, it's probably just tab water refiled in the bottles. $50 HKD for a bottle of water is very expensive, almost a rip off. If you didn't want to spend that extra little money, you can wait for the coffee or tea after the meal. However, in general, I definitely recommend this place, especially for couples for just a little cute luncheon or a romantic dinner.

Eat Up!
Michelle

PS. Le Pain Grillé stands for "toasted bread." The Reason agnès b. named it Le Pain Grillé because bread is a daily food for every French!

Taste of Shanghai

This past Tuesday the interns at work and I decided to try this Shanghainese restaurant that's always packed during lunch hour. Apparently famous for their crab- a conclusion made from the newspaper and photo clippings in the stores window, this eatery is a great place to take a group of more than three. Taking in to account that we're meager interns, and that crab isn't in season, we opted to order some local cheaper delights. We ordered: fried tofu, siu long bao (of course), pan fried dumplings, noodles, chicken, and soup. My apologies for the pathetic translation, but that is a result of my pathetic chinese. The meal was delicious. Each dish was full of flavor, with nothing overpowering. The six of us left completely satisfied.

If you're looking for a quiet relaxing meal, this is not the location for you. We were seated with another party, sharing our table with about six strangers (some of whom were photographed in the background of the soup shot).

Conclusion: great food, authentic experience, clean enough, and each of us only shelled out around 50 hkd.

man man sik,

Elyssa Yuen

Bouncy Fishballs of Aberdeen

Aberdeen (香港仔）used to be a fishery so it's famous for fishballs. And the best place to eat fish ball noodles is Tse Kee (謝記山窿魚蛋) on Aberdeen Main Road (香港仔舊大街). Tse Kee used to be a hawker stall and set up tables on the street. It was next to a huge boulder that the kitchen was next to, and it made the eatery look like it was in a cave. The restaurant is run almost entirely by family. Tse Kee is also famous for their fish cakes (魚片), fried fish skin （炸魚皮), deep fried dumpling wrapped in fish skin (魚皮餃） The fish balls are famous for their bounciness. There is a myth that the best fish balls can bounce up and down on the table.


They have two types of fish balls, both pictured above. Fried is golden and not fried is gray. If you just buy fish balls or a block of fish cake, it's very expensive and can cost over HKD$100. I like to eat it with thin yellow noodles, but most people like to eat it with the thick white vermicelli. Tse Kee is also one of the last places left that still serve bottled cream soda (pictured up top). I think it tastes better than canned cream soda, not sure if this has been proven though so it's probably just psychological. Glass bottles are actually very environmentally-friendly because you can reuse it.

The bowl of noodles was around HKD$16 but I was sort of bored with what was in the bowl. No doubt it's of a higher quality, but nothing I can't find in the rest of Hong Kong. Passengers, if you ever find yourself craving noodles in Aberdeen, go for the less healthy but much more delicious options like the fish skin dumplings. It's deep-fried but guilty good.

Aberdeen is dear to my heart. My grandpa made a living making fish sauce in Aberdeen, and my mum went to primary school there. This was also a hang-out spot for many an afternoons during high school days. Aberdeen, which in Chinese means Little Hong Kong, is like a mini city that seems to have minimal Western influence, which is rare to find on Hong Kong island.

Bon voyage,
Jenny Cheng

Green Summer Treats

Passengers on board Delight Express, I'm going to switch up the AC because the heat + humidity in Hong Kong is unearthly. Don't you think we feel we deserve more junk food in summer time? Somehow when you feel like you've sweated the equivalent of a swimming pool, you darn-right deserve a scoop of ice cream! I found here two ice-cold summer treats that are both healthy and refreshing.

At Prince Edward (太子) the other day, my best buddies Melanie, Janette and I were hustled into this brightly-lit dessert shop on the intersection of Sai Yeung Choi South Street (西洋菜南街) and Bute Street (弼街). On the way in, she saw a huge mountain of brown stuff that looks sort of doughy and immediately labelled it 'mud'. Little did she know, that fueled my curiosity to try it. It's actually a Taiwanese dessert and comes in many flavors. If you look below, I'll point out the flavors to you.

Brown: chocolate ('mud') / Yellow: mango / Black: sesame / White: Taro / Green: Green Tea / Beige: Durian


I ordered the green tea one just because the thin layers piled on top of each other looked so much like lettuce, it's quite beautiful in a strange way. Turns out, it's not dough at all but sheets of ice! Janette describes it as like drinking a smoothie, because it melts as soon as it's in your mouth. It costs HKD$25, a little bit pricey so share it with your significant other, like the next table did, or with a bunch of friends. The name of the dessert is cotton ice （棉冰）, I guess because it looks like a piece of scrunched-up fabric, I'll give the Taiwanese credit for creativity.

And to make it seem more like a drink in solid form, there were tapioca balls, sago and jellies right next to it. The ice was very refreshing, but a little cold on the teeth, and way too much for one person to finish, even though it's mostly just ice. The couple at the next table ordered the mango one and could barely finish it. It tastes a little bit like ice cream, but much healthier since there's no milk in it.

It's an interesting summer alternative to the usual summer treats, but I still think nothing can beat a classic scoop of vanilla ice cream.


Hong Kongers can be creative with food too. Tsui Wah (翠華) has a line of creative summer treats. They've paired mango slices with fried fish, but the kale with ice (冰鎮芥蘭）HKD20, is the most creative thing I've seen in awhile. You basically eat the kale like you'd eat sashimi, chill it first and then dip it in soya sauce and wasabi.

I prefer normal hot vegetables but definitely give this dish a try. The vegetables are kind of hard from being chilled, and the dash of wasabi is a fresh take on a traditional Chinese dish. It's great to see creative dishes, and if more people have curious appetites then food developers will be motivated to create it. So passengers, I'd encourage everyone to have an open mind and be brave, you'll discover a lot of pleasant surprises along the way!

Bon voyage,
Jenny Cheng

Homemade Pizza!

Tonight was the night we decided to farewell our post-formal director from Sumemrbridge. Graham is leaving us!! We have decided to gather few of the staff and have some fun and by fun we meant MAKING PIZZA!

I couldn't exactly help prepare all the ingredients for the pizza making party cause I was there late. But when I got there, I saw pepper, mushroom, garlic, pepperoni, ham and pineapples all cut into dices or stripes. Joyce was working very hard on slicing the cheese! It was so colorful and it already looked so delicious! A pizza really wasn't that difficult to make. I guess the dough was the hardest to make since it has to somehow to be in some sort of softness but not too soft. I don't exactly know how to make it cause our big chef Eddie was done with it by the time I got to his house. So I didn't actually have to go through the most difficult stage of making a pizza!! It's a pity but I was glad at the same time; who knows how it would turn out if I was in charge of the dough. Haha.


Eddie squishing the dough when I was playing with mine. Haha. It's pretty hilarious playing with them.

Anyways, once the dough was ready, I've decided to be the guinea pig and dig in to create my first pizza. Here are the steps into making a pizza.
1) The dough - make sure to put flour on the dough while making it into a flat bread. The flour helps to make it less sticky. I guess it won't work if it was too sticky? Just put flour until the dough doesn't stick to your hand while pressing.
2) Put tomato sauce. I think it really depends on how much tomato sauce you would like. Mine was definitely not enough even though I put a decent thickness of tomato sauce layer on the dough. I think you'll need to put at least a layer until you don't see the dough.
3) Put cheese. This is the part a lot of people forget. You're supposed to put cheese before putting in the ingredients. I guess for the stickiness and the taste?
4) Ingredients! Put anything you would like in your pizza! Like I said, we had pepper, mushroom, tomato, ham, pineapple and lots more! I only put some ham, pepperoni and mushroom and I like!!
5) Another layer of cheese!! Make sure you put another layer of cheese, but this time, make sure it's put in the center of the pizza and don't let it spread too close to the edge. Becasue when it begins to melt in the oven, it really spreads out. My cheese totally cover my whole pizza's crust. Haha.
6) Put it in the oven for like 10-15 minutes. This is the time for the size of a pizza that's as big as your face. Normal pizza with maybe about 8 slices probably takes another 10 minutes or so. It really depends on the size! And I believe it was baked at the temperature of around 120 degree celcius! I didn't pay much attention. I'm sure you can google about it!!

One thing, before putting it into the oven, make sure you wrap the tray with some tinfoil and put a thin layer of oil on it before putting the pizza on the tinfoil!!!! This is crucial. Joyce and I were the first one to make and Eddie didn't warn us! So our pizza was stuck onto the tinfoil! :( It took us forever to peel it off!! and the whole pizza was destroyed because of that!


The two great chefs! :D

Eat Up!
Michelle

PS. This is a great activity for bonding time for a small group of friends. Remember, only small group! Cause it gets the kitchen very messy!! :) I'm definitely gonna try it when I get back to Syracuse!

King of seafood

On my way out of Guang Zhou, I was ready to venture out of my tourist bubble and into some local-foreigner middle ground. On the outskirts of the city sits the largest seafood restaurant in the entire world (yes you heard it, and of course it would be in china...). In addition to it's mass, there is an inclusive seafood market smack in the middle of the restaurant. So, from bartering for live fish to dining on lobster, this restaurant caters to all.

We were on a time crunch so there was no time for messing. We sat down and ordered: a local fish served in black bean sauce, pan fried seafood noodles (chou min), scallops in a chinese garlic butter sauce, and like all traditional chinese meals we started with a soup.

Chinese soup to a chinese person is like grass to a cow (okay maybe not quite, but you get the picture), and we will drink it if you put it in front of us, without loking at whatactually has been boiling in our soup for a good half a day.

The soup that was brought to us was a broth made of pork, bitter melon, fish, and scorpions. It was a little on the thick side as the oil had not yet been skimmed (and i reminded myself i was in china not at home), but the flavor was still delicious. When boiled, the bitterness from the melon becomes mild, and when mixed with the other soup ingredients becomes a slight aftertaste. The overpowering flavor was of course the pork, and quite frankly the scorpions didn't trigger a single one of my taste buds.

The pan fried noodles that came were a hugeeee disappointment. The size and texture of the noodle was one similar to that of a bloated spaghetti noodle...now everyone who's had pan fried noodles knows that is unacceptable. My father threw a fit, called the managers, and threatened to email their boss as he 'says' he is a close friend. The shrimp were miniscule, and the noodles too oily. All in all, not worth valuable calories or chewing energy.

The fish was mediocre, nothing you wouldn't be able to find at the dinner table of a typical Asian home so I feel no need to elaborate.

The scallops were still attached to their shells, sitting in a bed of garlic butter, and garnished with vermicelli glass noodles. The presentation was clever, the sauce was nice, the noodles were delightful, but the scallops were a failure! Biting into one I had to ask myself if it was dried or cooked (the obvious answer is cooked) and someone obviously overcooked them! Cooked scallops should be served at a soft succulent texture, and ours were nothing close to being prepared correctly. Overall, this dish has the potential to be fabulous, but if you order, demand that your scallops are unde

rcooked rather than over.

Overall rating: A must have experience to a traveler in the area purely for the experience. Their food however was nothing other than mediocre. Bill was 311 RMB (but this could have resulted in part to the yelling of my father).

man man sik,

Elyssa Yuen

Calling all Americans, Chinese, and ABC's

This past week us Americans celebrated July 4th.

Hong Kongers celebrated the turnover.

And as an added bonus, it was also the 30th anniversary of Chinese-U.S. relations.

To celebrate these events, my family took the train to Guang Zhou (a nightmare to anybody who had the luxury of growing up in Hong Kong) and stayed at an ecological resort called Chong Mine. I will most probably never learn to appreciate mainland China as much as I should, but Chong Mine surprisingly has tons to offer. Connected to the resort is (as standing) the number one water park in the world, a zoo that includes a safari, an amusement park, and a circus (with such lax safety regulations) that would never be permitted in a first world nation.

In celebration of July 4th, the U.S. Consulate in Guang Zhou

hosted a standing picnic at the Grand Hyatt Hotel. The concept was genius, and one you'd never expect to be pulled off or be found in the mainland. There were no tables or chairs, forcing guests to mix and

mingle, or at least bop to some American classics being played in the background. Around the perimeter of the room were a variety of food stations guests could pick from. There was: a NY styled cold cut meats station, a hot dog stand, buffalo wings, a dessert table, and a make your own ice cream sundae table. There was also servers serving hamburgers off of wooden trays.

I went straight to the hot dogs. Living in Asia, the closest exposure to a real hot dog was the hot dogs sold at Ikea. As seen, these hot dogs were cooked in a large rice cooker which I found overly amusing, and resulted in them being a tad overcooked, but the choices of toppings made up for the slightly chewy dog. I topped mine with chili, cheddar, and there was actually a hot dog relish made with mustard that added an extra kick.

I always look forward to desserts at these functions. I pretty much sampled everything except the cheesecake (because i hate it), and was utterly disappointed. The apple pie was however, the best I have ever had in Asia, and the cherry was decent enough to be noted. The cookies were dry and tasteless, but the brownies had a fudgy texture that was interesting enough to eat. Overall these desserts confirmed the notion that Chinese people should stick to traditional treats, but I appreciated the effort.

The experience of this event was more worth while than the actual eating, but then again, what would food be without its presentation?

man man sik,

Elyssa Yuen

Chinese Mango Dessert

mango dessert
Tin Hau's a little underrated. It has some of the best restaurants on Hong Kong island waiting to be explored, if you're willing to venture out of the usual Causeway Bay-Wanchai-Central.

I visited 甜姨姨私房甜品 (Auntie Sweet Desserts) on 13 Tsing Fung Street, Tin Hau yesterday with an Indian friend who adores mangoes, (Indian mangoes are delectable, he says) to have some desserts. Now this place is famous for their 阿旺芒果凍湯丸 (Chilled Mango Dumplings), pictured below. If you've ever tried the regular Chinese 湯丸 tang yuan dumplings that have sesame paste or peanut paste wrapped around with dough served hot in boiling soup; then this is exactly what it is, except the filling is egg yolk and mango and served cold, it's a fresh take on a dessert with age-old traditions. Now, it's worth a try but share it with a few people. The dumplings were acceptable, the dough was soggy and the filling wasn't anything spectacular. The mango soup was too thick and overwhelming, it might as well have been a mango smoothie and not in a pleasant way. The only good part was the tropical fruits laden in the soup that had a nice chewy texture.

The dumplings were made famous from TVB drama 阿旺新傳 (Life Made Simple). Now, the way 湯丸 dumplings is pronounced in Mandarin sounds a lot like 團圓 meaning reunion. So 湯丸 dumplings are often eaten during Chinese New Year when the whole family has dinner together, so this dessert has a very sweet tradition. And in the drama, 阿旺 (Ah Wong) is a mentally handicapped guy who makes these chilled mango dumplings he calls 老婆湯丸 (wifey dumplings)，because every dumpling is made out of love for his favorite lady. It's a very, very sweet (no pun intended) drama, one of the most successful that TVB ever made. And the guy who owns Auntie Sweet Dessert used to work at TVB, so his dessert shop is famous now thanks to that connection. The first time I went there a few years ago, right at the peak of the show's fame, the shop was a tiny place that had to set tables and chairs onto the pavement. Now, they've moved to a new location and to bank more on their famous mango dumplings, the tiles on the floor and wall are mango yellow. I took a picture to see just how similar the color of the tiles are to the mangoes, and it's almost exactly the same. And if you notice, even the spoon is yellow!

The chilled mango dumplings in mango soup is HKD$25, but remember to share it with a few people!

Bon voyage,
Jenny Cheng

Daily Bread

'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" - Matthew 4:4

Point taken! And the word of God is often referred to as the daily bread, because it fills us up, a meal wouldn't be a meal without some good ol' carbo! I've always loved bakeries, Chinese or Western. When I was young, my friends and I would save money and buy food from the supermarket to sneak into the cinema, while everyone bought chips and sweets, I'd be a geek and buy French rolls. As I got older, I stopped liking French bread and returned to childhood tastes and began to grow fond of Cantonese bakeries. Every time I return home from the US, I'd go straight to a bakery and pick my all-time favorite pineapple bun （波蘿包）. Now that's my bread 'n butter.

The last time I made bread was years ago for Food Tech class, and now I'm giving it another try. I was following a recipe and wanted to try adding a green tea flavor, so I used Nestle's foamy green tea powder which give the dough blue spots for some reason. Aha, they used food coloring to make the powder green! How unnatural, tsk tsk tsk. Anyway, I was too cheap to buy matcha, real green tea powder.

Kneading the dough is my favorite part of breadmaking, because it's like playing with playdoh. Bread kneaded well will be very soft.

Cutting a slit to make the insides cook faster.

Waiting for an hour for the bread to prove, or the yeast to rise. During Passover, only unleavened bread is served which is bread with no yeast, some like to call it the 'Feast Without Yeast.' The yeast is supposed to symbolize arrogance, literally causing one's ego to rise.

And here's my mistake! I didn't brush milk or egg on the surface of the dough, so the dough didn't turn brown. And my brother said it tasted bland and boring. But spreading some jam, nutella or peanut butter will make the bread come alive. I heated up the bread this morning and had it with currant jelly, yep, that's my bread 'n butter.

Bon voyage,
Jenny Cheng