Teakha 茶。家 (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★★☆

The beauty of not having a schedule on a lazy Sunday was that I gotta wander around Soho without a plan. I stuck with my plan (of doing nothing) as long as I could before finally realizing that I still had some unfinished business to attend to - a long overdue visit to Teakha (茶。家).

It's been a while since I last visited Teakha so I had no idea what would be available from their cake menu. It turned out they only had two cakes available by slice.

Didn't know the cafe has a mezzanine floor next door with a throw back theme.

I decided to camp here at the corner with my Basque burnt cheesecake while I waited for my drink.

The burnt cheese came with a bit of apple cinnamon on the bottom.

Let's get started, shall we?

This was pretty tasty. Couldn't stop eating it.

Have to admit, the burnt cheesecake tasted a little weird with the apple cinnamon. 

For drink, I went with a cup of hot chai tea infused with masala.

My first experience with a spiked chai tea. Very interesting.

Food Rating: 6/10
Price: $$$
Address: 18B Tai Ping Shan Street, Sheung Wan, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Central / Sheung Wan
Tel: +852 2858-9185
Website: www.teakha.com

Opening Hours: 9:00am - 6:00pm (Mon, Wed - Fri), 8:30am - 7:00pm (Sat - Sun)

Zagin Soba 座銀 (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★★☆

Before this weekend, I've long thought that Soho would be one of the quietest places on earth with no nearby office open on Sunday.

But boy, was I wrong! The corner of Gough Street and Aberdeen Street certainly was anything but quiet. Zagin Soba (座銀), in particular was again having a very busy afternoon.

Touted as one of the city’s top ramen restaurants due to their impeccable bowls of chicken broth ramen, Zagin Soba is the target destination for my very late lunch. It took me a good 45-minute wait outside but finally, I made it.

The menu offers three ramen choices: chicken broth ramen, chicken broth tsukemen (dipping noodles) and a seafood-base ramen. Of course with their reputation of having the best chicken broth ramen in town, I had to check out their signature ramen myself.

Noticed that their "cappuccino" technique for frothing up the broth had the top layer foam up lightly.

The noodles were working really well with the thick, creamy and flavorful chicken broth. That's the thing about chicken broth ramen!

The deep-fried burdock root, always a nice alternative for bamboo shoots.

The sous-vide chicken fillet was very tender.

I couldn't tell if the char siu was made with chicken or not but the texture was very very nice. Delicious! 

The soft-boiled egg was just OK. That was the only blemish.

Comparing to the other chicken broth ramen in town, I thought Zagin Soba's white chicken broth was more balanced. It doesn't have the thickness as the chicken broth from Kane Tsuru Ramen Shell Street (金鶴拉麵) and Menya Takeichi (麵屋武一) while the chicken flavors were equally strong. It also doesn't seem to have the same sweetness and umami-rich flavor of the others.

So, is Zagin Soba now my favorite chicken broth ramen in Hong Kong, you ask? Not so fast. That title belongs to Ramen Cubism (立体派) and I don't plan to give it away anytime soon.

Yes, their chicken broth is more "watery" (and oily) comparing to its competition but I like it that way. 
Plus, I thought the mix of bonito and premium Japanese soy sauce (with chicken flavors) really comes together nicely to achieve a more nuanced umami flavor. 

The Osakan Zagin Soba operates locations in Central and Happy Valley; and they have a sister shop in Maru De Sankaku (鯛白湯らーめん○de▽) across the street who is best known for its Madai broth ramen.

Food Rating: 6.7/10

Price: $$$

Address: G/F, 7 Gough Street, Central, Hong Kong

Closest Metro Station: Central

Tel: +852 2447-1398

Opening Hours: 12:00pm - 10:30pm daily

Duck and Waffle IFC (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★★☆

I don't know what hit me over the last weekend but I noticed a pretty big drop in fatigue this week. Rather than staying in my office, I decided to take off during lunch time to get myself some fresh air. I also decided that it’s a good idea to go for a nice meal somewhere. That turned out to be Duck & Waffle, which I haven’t visited in ages.

 
It was almost 2pm when I finally arrived but the restaurant was surprisingly full at this late hour. I guess everybody was trying to enjoy a late lunch today.

 
Grilled 18-hour pork belly – First up, some meat to whet my appetite. The fatty pork belly was slow-cooked for 18 hours before finishing on the grill. It was served with a Sambal glaze, pickled cucumber and kewpie.
 
The pork belly wasn’t bad but I thought it carried a little too many textures with it (actually on top). Different seeds, and what I thought was buckwheat…

 
Roasted fillet of sea bass – This was way better than the starter. Very simple cooking with
smoked pancetta, baby artichoke and garden vegetable vignole. Love the hint of mint as well. Sometimes less really is more.

 
Black sesame sticky toffee pudding – I have been missing Gordon Ramsay’s sticky toffee pudding since he decided to skip town at the beginning of the pandemic. But I knew exactly where to find my cure…..at Duck & Waffle IFC!

 
But just when I thought I had my mission accomplished, no such luck! While the original sticky toffee puddings are made with dates, and finished off with a toffee sauce and vanilla custard, this was a curveball thrown by the chefs here. What we had here was a sticky toffee pudding with a modern twist. The pudding was made with black sesame. Even the custard was sesame flavored so the taste was a bit one dimensional. The burnt honey ice-cream finally provided some contrasting flavors but not nearly enough to make a difference in my opinion. Yeah, I want my traditional sticky toffee pudding back!

No duck and waffle, no problem~

Food Rating: 6/10

Price: $$$
Address: Shop 1081, 1/F IFC, 1 Harbour View Street, Central, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Central / Hong Kong Station
Website: www.duckandwaffle.com.hk
Tel: +852 2267-6338
Opening Hours: 8:00am - 12:00am (Sun - Thu), 8:00am - 1:00am (Fri - Sat)

ÉPURE (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

Just when I thought I've given up on fine dining altogether, a voice inside me urged me to do something special on my day-off. So, once I dropped little nugget home from his Mandarin class, I decided to head out on a small culinary journey on my own, something I haven't done in months.

Michelin starred ÉPURE at Harbour City is my lunch venue this afternoon. I didn't realize it was already 3 years since my last visit so this was really long overdue.

After starting me off with some homemade bread, it was today's amuse bouche taking center stage, sweet corn cream and charred corn kernels with a scoop of mustard sorbet on top.

The sweetness of the corn was a nice way to get my palate ready but I wasn't sure about the powerful mustard. I thought the intensity of the mustard sorbet really caught me by surprise (not in a nice way).

The second dish of the afternoon was octopus served with a small porridge topped with a drizzle of date infused vinegar. I thought the octopus was very bland as if it's been poached and left there without seasoning. I didn't know if it's such a good idea to match it against the vinegar (definitely not for someone who hates strong acidity like me). The burst of acidity was way too much for my liking.

For my main dish, I decided to pick fish over meat. The brilliantly cooked suzuki fillets from Japan, lightly peppered, were matched with an earthy herb emulsion, and zucchini which was cooked with what I thought was pumpkin purée.

While the combination wasn't perfect, it was easily the best dish of the afternoon.

I particularly enjoyed the lightly roasted zucchini, which was enriched by the flavors of the melting pumpkin.

Dessert was a staple in ÉPURE's menu for years - chocolate and raspberry.

Under the sheets of beetroot wafer were Tulameen raspberry, raspberry purée and 70% Guanaja chocolate cream. A lovely balance between sweetness and acidity! 

I am always delighted by cutting edge cuisine with bold flavors but there were just way too many hit-and-misses here from this afternoon (sweet corn + mustard; octopus + vinegar). And I thought today's service was a little "robotic" as well. I had an exchange with one of my servers when I asked him about the herb emulsion that was served with my Japanese suzuki. I still remembered the words I used and I was asking exactly what was in that herb emulsion (parsley, coriander?) but the poor guy caught me by surprise when he responded, "Oh, it's a foamy sauce made with herbs using French cooking techniques.". Well, that's not what I was asking him, is it? Of course, I could've asked him to go back to the kitchen and find out about the ingredients but I wasn't in the mood for that fuss today. 

For some strange reason, I wasn't enjoying this meal like I usually do and it's not 100% the food. I think the pandemic is really getting to my head.

Food Rating: 6/10
Price: $$$
Address: Shop 403, Level 4, Ocean Centre, Harbour City, Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Tsim Sha Tsui
Tel: +852 3185-8331
Website: www.epure.hk

Opening Hours: 12:00pm - 2:30pm, 6:30pm - 10:30pm (Tue - Sun)

Kam Sha Kok Cafe 金沙角冰室 (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★☆☆☆

I'm taking a rare day off to bring my little one to Mandarin class this morning. After dropping him off at the school, I walked around the area looking for a place to kill approximately 50 minutes off the clock. Good thing it's an area in Prince Edward where there was no shortage of tea restaurants.

At 11:10am, it was an odd time to stop by a tea restaurant cuz most places would be offering their lunch menu by now but Kam Sha Kok Cafe (金沙角冰室) actually extended their breakfast menu until 11:30am. That's tough to turn down...

I could use a bit of caffeine by now. Heck, it was a bit too strong for me. Would have asked for more milk on a "normal" day but I was too lazy (and shy) to raise my hand this morning.

A very disappointing bowl of noodles with fried egg and sausage. The broth was way too bland
to make this work.

2020 (and start of 2021) has been a difficult year for me. Anyone that reads this blog regularly would notice that I have pretty much lost my desire for good food. To the contrary, I've enjoyed more time visiting local tea restaurants. For now, I just didn't have the mood for indulgence.

Food Rating: 3.5/10

Price: $$

Address: G/F, 749 Nathan Road, Prince Edward, Hong Kong

Closest Metro Station: Prince Edward

Tel: +852 5596-4018

Opening Hours: 6:30am - 2:00am daily

Antoshimo Cafe & Bakery (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

Our tour of the forgotten shopping malls continue this weekend at Hollywood Plaza in Diamond Hill. We stopped by a number of places in the mall before running into Antoshimo Cafe & Bakery, a Japanese cafe that also doubles as a doughnut shop.

They have all kinds of different flavors of doughnuts. Needless to say, the colorful doughnuts immediately caught little one's eyes.

Interestingly, all these doughnuts are decorated with a shisa, or guardian lion often found in Okinawa. 

I decided to get the salted caramel flavor for little nugget not knowing whether he would like it. I laid it on the dining table and went into my room for a quick while but when I came back, only a small corner of this was left in the bowl! It's safe to say that he absolutely loves it!

I went on to try a small piece of this out (from what's left from little guy) and I realized it was really tasty. Very very spongy as if it's just came out of the oven. I definitely won't mind having it again when I visit Hollywood Plaza again.

Food Rating: 4.8/10

Price: $$$

Address: Shop 182, 1/F, Plaza Hollywood, 3 Lung Poon Street, Diamond Hill, Hong Kong

Closest Metro Station: Diamond Hill

Tel: +852 2955-5538

Opening Hours: 12:00pm - 10:00pm daily

Toriten 鳥十 (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

UBUDS, the same F&B Group behind ANA TEN (天穴) at Ocean Terminal and Yaki ANA (穴) at Olympian City is flexing their culinary muscles again with a new venture at Festival Walk in Kowloon Tong. Toriten (鳥十), a traditional Japanese izakaya, offers a conventional Japanese menu highlighted by a series of skewer dishes.

We haven't visited Festival Walk for a while so this worked out perfectly for us.



Starting things off for us, a small bowl of salad finished off with a Japanese-style mustard dressing.

Little nugget wanted his noodles as usual and this shrimp broth ramen looked very similar to what I had at Ebisoba Ichigen Harbour City (一幻拉麵) the other day. I thought it wasn't bad but little one didn't like it.

Jelloman wasted no time ordering her favorite sashimi dice donburi (角切魚生飯). Very colorful, that's all I can say...

I had trouble picking what I want this afternoon. At the end, I went with this Angus sirloin which was teppanyaki grilled. The succulent steak really surprised me with its juiciness. 

With the rate the UBUDS group are expanding, it won't be long before they see their presence at every single major shopping mall in town.

Food Rating: 5/10

Price: $$$

Address: Shop G25, G/F, Festival Walk, 80 Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong

Closest Metro Station: Kowloon Tong

Tel: +852 2337-8223

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

Shugetsu 麵鮮醬油房周月 (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

I thought by having lunch a little early today would help me avoid the crowd but no such luck. At least not when I'm trying to have a decent bowl of Japanese ramen in Central.

Like any good ramen shops in the world, Shugetsu (麵鮮醬油房周月) has its own facility to make fresh noodles in-house. That's a good way to control the quality of your noodles.

I was lucky that the wait wasn't very long (for solo diners only).

One of the things I hate about sitting at the counter tables is that, you get to see all the little things chefs do behind the scene. Last time at Nagahama No. 1 Ramen (長浜 No.1拉麵 ), it was the chef taking his mask off for a breather. Today, I caught our chef here scratching his head (and hair) while he was cooking the noodles. Mind you, that's the same hand that put the noodles into the boiling water.

Shugetsu Ramen - Shugetsu is best known for its tsukemen, or dipping noodles but as a purist, I prefer something much simpler, which will be their signature shoyu, or soy sauce based ramen. 

Their soy sauce based broth was prepared with sardines, mackerel and kelp giving it great depth of flavors. But make no mistake about it, the soy sauce which is produced by a longstanding factory in Ehime (愛媛県), is what makes this broth so damn good.

The succulent grilled Kurobuta pork belly, very smoky and full of flavors.

The marinated egg very nice too.

Other than this location on Gough Street, they also have two other locations in Quarry Bay and Causeway Bay to help get your ramen fix.

Food Rating: 6.5/10

Price: $$$

Address: G/F, 5 Gough Street, Central, Hong Kong

Closest Metro Station: Central

Tel: +852 2850-6009

Opening Hours: 11:30am - 9:30pm daily