After a run of sunny days, I knew we were due for some heavy rain but I was hoping we could dodge the bullet this weekend when we visited The Legacy House (彤福軒) at Rosewood Hong Kong. Unfortunately, no such luck. In fact, it was raining so hard that we could hardly see a thing from the window.
Touted for its harbour view and hearty Shunde dishes, The Legacy House has been the talk of town since its soft opening in early April but I decided to wait a bit before their kitchen finished warming up.
Instead of admiring the harbour view, we decided to shift our attention to the other "attractions", including the open kitchen instead!
The Legacy House casts a pretty wide net with its food menu bringing together Cantonese dishes and Shunde specialties of the Pearl River Delta region. To fully experience what they have to offer, we decided to hand pick a number of Cantonese and Shunde delicacies to share among the six of us.
Steamed rice rolls with Barbecued pork (鮮梅頭叉燒腸粉) ($100) - This wasn't bad but I can name a dozen places with a much more delicious steamed rice rolls. Not the impressive start I was expecting here.
Deep-fried stuffed pastry, pork, crab meat, shrimp, yellow chives and water chestnut (金錢酥蟹盒) ($160) - Very crispy on the outside but slightly oily at the same time.
I think all of us would love to have a bit more crab meat in there but it's not going to happen. Instead, the filling came with more diced pork, shrimp, water chestnut and yellow chives.
Pork dumplings, shrimp, crab butter and mushroom (原蝦蟹黃香菇燒賣) ($90) - Pretty decent. Personally, I always think crab butter is one of the most overrated (and overpriced) thing in Chinese cuisine. Enough said.
Shrimp dumplings, asparagus (晶瑩蘆筍鮮蝦餃) ($90) - I love bite-sized har gow with bamboo shoots. This came with a bit of earthy flavors thanks to the asparagus. Pretty nice.
Turnip puffs, conpoy, Yunnan ham (雲腿瑤柱蘿蔔絲酥餅) ($80) - The best dish of the afternoon by quite a wide margin.
This was very very flaky and I think it came with some 300 layers (okay just kidding). The shredded turnip was really sweet and delicate.
Pan-fried Dace fishcake, preserves meat, minced pork, coriander and spring onion (均安煎魚餅) ($170) - I was really looking forward to this famous Shunde dish (probably one of the few ones I know) but sadly, it didn't blow me away like I thought it might. And we had to wait more than 50 minutes for this to arrive.
Wok-fried rice noodle, wagyu beef, satay sauce (沙茶和牛面炒河粉) ($320) - Surprisingly decent "wok hei" and everyone just loves the heat from the satay sauce. The wagyu beef was really tender too.
Pan-fried e-fu noodles, Chiu Chow style (潮州黃金煎伊麵) ($170) - Like the pan-fried fish cakes, it failed to wow us at all. Not much difference from the ones we were getting from Chao Inn (潮樓) or Chiu Chow Garden (潮庭).
Deep-fried prawns, orange sauce (香橙脆蝦球) ($300) - I was expecting some seriously big tiger prawns but I guess I'm having a really bad day today. This was again pretty decent but I really couldn't tell it's a dish coming from a 5-star hotel restaurant (and it's a restaurant that would eventually receive a Michelin star because of the view). Sad.
Bok choy, taro, sweet potato casserole (香芋紫薯白菜煲) ($180) - Something healthy for everyone.
Afterwards, I tried to convince everyone to take a flyer on Butterfly Room's afternoon tea set but no one seemed to be interested. So, we simply walked around the lobby and took a few photos with the sleeping elephant before slowly heading back home.
This was a pretty disappointing meal altogether. Service was very slow all afternoon highlighted by the really awful job of pacing. I was joking that our table must be too small to fit more than one dish at the same time which explained why they decided to come out with a dish every 15 minutes. Quite frankly, I hate having a Chinese lunch with this kind of pacing. It's like squeezing toothpaste (擠牙膏). Your stomach is never full this way.
Food Rating: 5.5/10
Price: $$$$
Address: 5/F, Rosewood Hong Kong, 18 Salisbury Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: East Tsim Sha Tsui
Tel: +852 3891-8732
Website: www.rosewoodhotels.com/tc/hong-kong/dining/the-legacy-house
Maritime Square in Tsing Yi has undergone quite a transformation last year. Gone was the cinema (moved to the new wing) and in comes a number of modern eateries which have taken over the space vacated by the cinema. One of the newcomers is Tendon Tenya (天丼), a brand from Japan famous for its tempura don.
I have never been a fan of restaurants with long queue. With an average waiting time of about an hour, I wasn't crazy about checking Tendon Tenya out in its first couple of months in action. But since someone already did the dirty work, I guess I won't mind a quick bite here.
I can definitely see why it's been such a big hit. The signature tendon don with a tiger prawn, squid, pumpkin and green bean tempura only set us back $49. This deluxe don with three giant tiger prawn tempura is going for $75. Not bad at all. I especially enjoyed the Japanese rice. Very soft and moist.
The restaurant manager gave us a complimentary ice-cream because we managed to squeeze six people into a small table of four. Now, that's a nice touch.
Food Rating: 5/10
Price: $$
Address: Shop G02, G/F, Maritime Square, 33 Tsing King Road, Tsing Yi, NT, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Tsing Yi
Tel: +852 9020-0287
I have been hearing about the departure of Chef de cuisine Nikita Russo from Tosca for months and finally, they made it official. It was announced on the hotel’s website a couple of weeks ago that Chef Angelo Agliano has taken over the reign as their new culinary director. Chef Agliano worked for years under Joël Robuchon both at L'Atelier de Joël Robuchon Hong Kong and Taipei before striking out on his own with the opening of Angelo Restaurant in Taipei (in 2014 I think). He returned to Hong Kong to open Locanda Dell'Angelo, a quiet 28-seater in Happy Valley two years ago. I have not tried the food there personally but based on some trusted sources of mine, it's been largely mixed bags.
I have come at worse weather conditions so this view under the dark clouds didn’t disappoint me a bit.
Lunch is the same usual format, a choice between two ($448), three ($508) and four ($698) courses. It was really nice to see all the signature dishes still there, beef carpaccio, tiramisu among others.
Some welcoming bites to get the ball rolling. Here we have a variety of chilled vegetables from the farm including carrot, turnip, celery, cucumber and cauliflower. It was accompanied by a bowl of zucchini cream that came with a hint of mustard.
I decided to skip antipasti and go straight to my pasta dish. The chef’s signature dish, potato gnocchi emerged as the obvious choice and it certainly didn’t disappoint. The potato gnocchi was soft, delicate and the melt-in-your-mouth texture was exactly what I looked for from a perfectly prepared gnocchi.
This was wonderfully paired with red shrimp, homemade pesto and a delicious tomato coulis. So gooooood!
I was tempted to go with the chef's signature pork belly but since I'm still on my self-imposed meatless diet, I reluctantly went with the black cod instead.
This was a beautiful dish with the black cod fish roasted to absolute perfection. The duo of fennel (fennel purée and poached fennel) provided some lovely complex flavor notes to complement the sweetness of the cod fish.
I was torn between the traditional Limoncello tiramisu and duo of chocolate cakes but at the end, my love for a hearty tiramisu prevailed. I always thought Tosca has the best tiramisu in town and it was at its usual best again.
Soft, light and foamy with the perfect touch of liquor. Noticed they've added a little more amaretti (Italian almond cookies) in there to give this more crunch too, which was a really nice move.
Despite the change of guard, everything looked and tasted more or less the same as it was when Chef Pino was here. The presentation and flavors were noticeably simpler but that didn't take anything away from the quality of the dishes. That's the most important part.
Food Rating: 7.2/10
Price: $$$$
Address: 102/F The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong, International Commerce Centre, 1 Austin Road West, West Kowloon, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Kowloon
Tel: +852 2263-2270
Website: www.ritzcarlton.com/en/hotels/china/hong-kong/dining/tosca
