Imperial Treasure Fine Chinese Cuisine 御寶軒 (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

Last week, Cousin P from New Zealand pinged me on Facebook telling me that she would be in town for Chinese New Year. She's been gone for almost a decade now and really wanted to meet little nugget in person. After checking out a few places, we finally decided on Imperial Treasure Fine Chinese Cuisine (御寶軒) as the venue of our "re-union".



We were pleasantly surprised to be offered a private dining area (sort of). Always nice to have some privacy for our heart-to-heart talks. 

I was obviously too happy to see my cousin so I totally forgot about taking pictures of our dim sum. Good thing was, I did manage to take a few selfies together with her. Time really flies. Her son who was just a small kid when their family decided to return to New Zealand a number of years ago, is now in university! A young man ready to find his first job. How exciting!

Steamed prawn dumplings (筍尖鮮蝦餃) – Always nice to start things off with some har gow. The thin wrapper wasn't bad and I love the bamboo shoots mixing in there with the prawns.

Steamed beef tripe with 'chu hou' sauce (柱侯金錢肚) – Very tender and not too spicy for our palate.

Baked barbecued pork pastry (蜜汁叉燒酥) – Finally, a photo! We always love to order this here and it certainly didn't disappoint. The pastry was so flaky and this time around, not over the top with its buttery texture.

Deep-fried taro puff (蜂巢炸芋角) – Flaky with lots of taro in the middle. The sauce with minced pork was oozing out slowly after my first bite. Would have been nice to have some dried shrimps (蝦米) there too for some extra bite and flavor.

Steamed rice roll with prawn and crispy golden net (金網脆皮蝦腸) – Not bad (I didn't remember having this myself).

Pan-fried purlie potato pumpkin cake (紫薯南瓜餅) – I was curious about this dessert when I saw it on the dim sum menu. Ended up having two pieces of them at the end. The pumpkin flavored mochi skin had this nice chewy texture to it, complemented nicely by the center of delicate purple potato purée. There's a reason why I had two of these! So yummy... 

Black sesame glutinous rice ball with grated peanuts (擂沙湯丸) – Always enjoy having fried tong-yuen sprinkled with grated peanuts. 

I'm sure we had much more dim sum than we've written here but I was too busy chatting with my cousin that I totally lost track of the dishes we ordered. But this meal was much more than good food for all of us. It was really nice to see my cousin again after so many years and knowing that our families are both doing well amidst the pandemic, that's priceless. During the meal, we even went as far as to call my aunt (my cousin's mom, my dad's little sister) via FaceTime. She has been a bit stranded in Wellington since the start of COVID. I felt a little sorry that she needed to scramble in front of the camera in such short notice but we were all just thrilled to see each other's face again. With our lives slowly getting back to normal, traveling should be back again and maybe, just maybe we could get a trip together to New Zealand to finally introduce little one to my aunt face-to-face. 

Food Rating: 6.3/10
Price: $$$
Address: 10/F, 1 Peking Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Tsim Sha Tsui
Tel: +852 2613-9800

Opening Hours: 11:00am - 3:00pm, 6:00pm - 10:00pm daily