Miscellaneuous Food Stuff

...Golden Goodies. In Hong Kong (and Shanghai), we've come to appreciate -- and even search out -- Chinese Egg Tarts,. These little golden yellow two and a half inch pies are made of flakey crust filled with an egg custard -- a perfect combination of texture with enough bite to hold together and enough creaminess to melt in the mouth.


Egg Tarts in Tai Po Market
(The New Territories)
Some are plain custard and some are "Portuguese" style, with bit of caramelized topping. They're available in some supermarkets, most small bakeries, often open to the street or market lanes, and even featured in take-away windows of restaurants. Lois and I are both partial to those that are on the "eggy" side, a near perfect example of which we found in Shanghai. The woman doling them out insisted -- in "sign language" -- that we eat them immediately, still warm. Good advice. The four she sold us for 10 Yuan (about US$1.25) didn't make it to the end of the block.

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...In the weekly lifestyle publication ShanghaiTalk, we came across a restaurant review of a place called "We Go," appreciated in the review for its bilingual menu,

"...which is useful for those English speakers who are squeamish about what they eat. It means they can avoid any of the dishes with duck blood, pork bowel, shark fin, cow tongue, pig brains, or bullfrog. And of course 'stinky tofu.'"

After a couple weeks avoiding unidentifiable ingredients that would clash with Lois' near-vegetarian diet, there was little chance of finding ourselves in such a place.

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...Hong Kong bills itself as "Asia's World City," and as such, the range of available dining is "world wide." Our breakfasts have been primarily "French" a la light, fresh croissants from a Delifrance, a chain of coffee shops around town, and the slightly heavier chocolate croissants from the bakery of the Mandarin Oriental hotel. Another chain around town is a little more "American." No, not McDonald's, for which Hong Kong is one of it most profitable cities...Starbucks. I'm not a coffee drinker -- Lois is -- but even I occasionally appreciate a mocha frappacino for a mid-afternoon kick of caffeine and sugar. In addition to the Dim Sum lunch with Randall, one great meal we had was at a mall restaurant, Thai Basil -- large grilled tiger prawns in a curry sauce or some sea bass infused with ginger and wrapped in cucumber, followed by a steamed ginger pudding with rum raisin ice cream. Another excellent meal was at Kikuzen -- a deluxe sushi platter featuring a piece of melt-in-the-mouth toro (from the rich, fatty part of the tuna).

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...Golden Goodies II. Mango pudding. Mango ice cream. Sago (tapioca) with mango. I'm not that big on tropical fruits like papaya or passionfruit, but there's nothing more refreshing during a subtropical Hong Kong afternoon than mango. Fortunately, there's a lot of dessert shops around town that feature it.

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...Cafe Deco. Up on Victoria Peak, overlooking the city, any restaurant could probably make it on the view alone. At Cafe Deco, they do really good food as well. Fresh sushi was my choice, while Lois enjoyed a tasty Indian-based "veggie-burger" on a bed of asparagus and chutney. And I'll admit, the view was good, too.

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...And speaking of views, our "special dinner" for this trip was at Felix, atop the Peninsula Hotel with floor to ceiling windows overlooking the harbor. One of Conde Nast's "50 Best Restaurants of the World," Felix is overseen by a chef who was originally based in Hawaii, and has a special way with seafood -- seared ahi on a bed of garlic mashed potatoes with essence of pinot noir for me, and grilled snapper with wasabi mashed for Lois. The place is also renown for a surprise in it's men's room, but I won't spoil it for you here.