Fine Foods (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

It’s been a while since I last visited Fine Foods at the Royal Garden Hotel in East Tsim Sha Tsui. After getting my ramen fix at Nadaman, I thought the popular cake shop would be a convenient stop before heading home to get some work done.

I spotted some familiar creations from my previous visits years ago, but I made it clear to myself that I wanted to try some new flavors this afternoon.

Rose, watermelon, strawberry & Earl Grey ($68) — It isn’t the first time a cake shop has attempted the idea of a rose–watermelon–strawberry cake without following the mold of the patented Black Star recipe, and it won’t be the last.

The varying textures of the rose, watermelon, and strawberry weren’t bad, and the introduction of Earl Grey tea was a nice touch. However, the design — everything hidden inside a chocolate hemisphere (meant to be half of a watermelon) — made the dessert much less enjoyable to eat. 

Even with my best attempt to break the chocolate crust apart, the watermelon slice still got in the way.

Pandan mango sticky rice ($64) — Much better than the previous dessert.

It had all the elements of a solid Thai-style mango sticky rice: mango, glutinous rice with a mochi-like chew, and the pandan sponge neatly combining everything into a pillowy cake. While the execution wasn’t exactly perfect, the balance of flavors and the mix of textures were enough to excite even the ordinary palate.

This was definitely a long overdue visit. While I still enjoy the consistently stable quality of Fine Foods’ pastries, a few smaller French patisseries—such as Finesse Patisserie, Relive Patisserie, among others have already quietly overtaken Fine Foods on my short list.

Food Rating: 6.4/10
Price: $$$$
Address: Lobby Level, The Royal Garden, 69 Mody Road, Tsim Sha Tsui East, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: East Tsim Sha Tsui
Tel: +852 2733-2045
Website: theroyalgardenhotel.com.hk/index.asp

Opening Hours: 11:00am - 8:00pm daily

Ramen Ginza Onodera Pop-Up at Nadaman (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★★☆

Ramen Ginza Onodera (麺 銀座おのでら) is an acclaimed ramen brand from Tokyo’s Onodera Group, celebrated for its French-influenced approach to traditional Japanese ramen. Their menus are conceptualized by Executive Chef Keiichi Terada. They’ve just recently launched an exclusive 5-month collaboration, running from July 31 through the end of the year at Nadaman (灘萬日本料理) Kowloon Shangri-La (九龍香格里拉).

The pop-up is hosted in one of Nadaman’s newly renovated private dining rooms, which has been transformed into a sleek, dedicated ramen haven.

The restaurant prepares signature recipes on-site using noodles and a complex chicken broth that’s shipped directly from Japan.

Their ramen is offered in Shoyu (soy sauce), Shio (salt), and spicy broth styles. Each bowl is generously topped with slow-cooked pork chashu (煙豚肉叉燒), tender roasted duck chashu (燒鴨叉燒), and an ajitama egg. Lately I’ve been especially hooked on shoyu ramen, so I knew exactly what I wanted — Special Soy Sauce Ramen ($148).

The broth was surprisingly light in volume, yet still rich and packed with deep poultry flavor.

True to its French fine-dining lineage, each bowl is served with a small side of homemade herb butter. Diners are told to enjoy the clean, pure flavor of the broth first then sink the herb butter into the soup midway through. That creates a richer, creamier transformation without losing the essence of the original base.

The bamboo shoot was thick-cut and juicy.

The seasoned soft-boiled egg was spot on, and even the presentation looked perfect.

The smoked pork char siu (煙豚肉叉燒) was tender, and slightly chewy in a good way with subtle smokiness

The grilled duck char siu (燒鴨叉燒) was succulent with a deep gamey duck flavor. It tasted a little better than the pork char siu but that's coming from a grilled duck lover.

My only complaint was the noodles: they didn’t absorb the broth’s essence as well as I expected.

I didn't get the chance to try their truffle pork wontons and mini charsiu rice bowl, both of which are supposed to be famous. I guess those will have to be my next mission.

Food Rating: 6.6/10

Price: $$$

Address: Nadaman Japanese Restaurant, Kowloon Shangri-La, Lower Level II, 64 Mody Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong

Closest Metro Station: East Tsim Sha Tsui

Tel: +852 2733-8751

Opening Hours: 12:00pm - 2:30pm, 6:30pm - 10:30pm daily

Chill Vietnam Cuisine and Bar (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★★☆

The Queen of News is back in town! A few months ago, we already settled on a day to catch up and the only thing left was deciding where to meet.

And last week while I was still in Osaka, we finally nailed down the venue. It was my neighborhood Vietnamese restaurant, Chill Vietnam Cuisine and Bar at D2 Place.

Vietnamese platter (越式拼盤) — This came with chicken wings marinated in lemongrass, Vietnamese-style spring rolls, and rice rolls. We each had a piece of the trio, and it was just a great way to kick things off.

Fried soft shell crab with salt and pepper (椒鹽炒軟殼蟹) — At first, we thought there weren’t many fried soft shell crabs hidden under all that salt and pepper. But after digging in a bit more, we found quite a few of these babies. They were cooked like soft shell crab tempura, with an extra kick from the pepper.

Fried rice noodles with pork neck and bay leaf chili paste (香葉辣椒膏豬頸肉炒河) — We asked our server to tone down the spiciness, but even with that note, it still came with a pretty strong kick. It was still pretty tasty and of course, we love the wok hei from the rice noodles.

A cold drink to cope with the spicy dishes.

It was always nice to see my friend back for the summer. We always seem to have endless topics to talk about, and the best news was hearing that she might actually come back here to work. Hong Kong has lost so many talented people over the years, so it'll be amazing to get some of them back.

Food Rating: 6.1/10

Price: $$$

Address: Shop 301, 3/F, D2 Place ONE, 9 Cheung Yee Street, Lai Chi Kok, Hong Kong

Closest Metro Station: Lai Chi Kok

Tel: +852 2858-8606

Opening Hours: 11:30am - 10:00pm daily