Elephant Grounds (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

After a long lunch at Jan Jan Kushikatsu, I decided to go and check out the new Elephant Grounds on Wing Fung Street right next to PP3.



I'm not a coffee head so no, I'm not here for a sip of coffee. Instead I am here to see if I could bump into a celebrity or two. Rumour has Hilary Tsui (徐濠縈) coming here sometimes (Jennifer Tse Ting Ting too.). Perhaps I could get some tips from her on how to run a good marathon?

#EGKoolKids: The lovely @hilaryxtsui knows where lunch is at! ⭐️🐘 Come find our newest lunch location, #EGSS! 🍴❤️🐘 It's lunch 'til 3PM at all #EGLunch locations 😁😁😁 📸: @hilaryxtsui

A photo posted by Elephant Grounds Coffee (@elephantgroundscoffee) on May 22, 2016 at 8:00pm PDT

Well, I guess it doesn't hurt to get some caffeine before my afternoon meeting. At least, I know I could keep myself awake for the entire meeting!



Okay, this is REALLY what I came here for - an ice cream sandwich. Last time I wasn't all that satisfied with the peanut butter ice-cream sandwich at Elephant Grounds Kitchen and cafe in Causeway Bay. I was hoping I could change that today but obviously it's not happening. There's only one flavor left today and guess what that is??? The Salty Peanut Buddha ($68)! Lucky me!!! 

This is virtually the same thing except that the strawberry jam and candied peanuts are replaced by peanut butter powder. Can't say I'm all that exciting having this again.



Food Rating: 4.5/10
Price: $$$
Address: G/F, Win Fung Building, 8 Wing Fung Street, Wanchai, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Admiralty
Tel: +852 2778-2700

Jan Jan Kushikatsu (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

I have been longing for some kushikastsu (fried skewers) for a while and now that my annual trip to Osaka has officially been cancelled, I can certainly focus on finding an alternative locally. Of course, local options for a good kushikastsu have always been limited over the years but I am counting on that the arrival of Jan Jan Kushikastsu to change that with a bang.



Honestly, I have not been to any of Jan Jan Kushikastsu's 12 outlets in Osaka and Tokyo before so I won't say I am familiar with their food menu. Yaekatsu (八重勝) is my go-to kushikastsu in Osaka and it would take something disastrous for me to drop them from my list. 



While Jan Jan has already opened doors to customers more than 2 months ago, it was only recently that they started serving lunch. However, it was nice to know that they are also serving their a la carte menu during lunch hours so with no further delay, I picked up the phone got myself a table. 

Starting things off for me was a trio of fried skewers, fried prawns ($25), chicken with shiso ($24) and lotus roots ($30) from left to right.



I thought the fried prawn was pretty nice and bouncy but the fried lotus root and chicken with shiso were not nearly as good as the ones I had in Osaka.



Next up were grilled skewers and there are really not that many choices here. We ordered the grilled beef ($39) and pork ($32) skewers and they were both alright although somewhat not as mouthwatering as those founds in your typical yakitori place. 



Dashimaki tamago ($52) was fluffy like my pillow. Not bad.



I have never been a fan of cold soba noodles and looks like I won't be changing my mind anytime soon. 



I was really pumped up for this meal so I was naturally disappointed with the lack of (pleasant) surprises. Perhaps I should re-consider that cancelled Osaka trip again. 

Food Rating: 4.5/10
Price: $$$
Address: 2/F, 100 Queen's Road East, Wanchai, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Wanchai
Tel: +852 2157-1408

Mercato by Jean Georges (Hong Kong, CHINA) ★★★☆☆

This week, Hong Kong welcomes Chef Jean Georges back with open arms in Lan Kwai Fong at the new California Tower. Having spent part of his career in Hong Kong, the world renowned French chef returns to open Mercato, a brand of vibrant Italian restaurant under his empire, which has seen a fair amount of success in Shanghai.



The restaurant has just opened for 4 days and really not a lot of people have heard of its soft opening yet. There's a bar area on one end.....



....while the open kitchen and a separate dining area (with a different color tone) on the other....



The 2 -course lunch set is going for $198 and we wasted no time getting ourselves ready starting with this spicy tuna tartare with black olive, cucumber, avocado and mint.

I was kind of expecting the same signature tuna tartare we have experienced both in Jean Georges New York and Tokyo but this was clearly a "trim down" version with a much less appealing presentation. 



Next we have the endive and sugar snap pea salad with parmesan dressing and herbs. It looked a little like a lettuce wrap with the little salad sitting in the middle of the leaf. Not bad although I did find the parmesean dressing a little too overpowering.



Our last starter was also the most successful one of the bunch - lightly fried calamari, spicy tomato sauce with black olive and capers. This was done like a Japanese tempura but the batter was a lot thinner with minimal seasoning. The texture was pretty nice. I like this one.



We had our first took at the restaurant's homemade pasta, a capellini with golden garlic, Jalapeños, herbs and fresh ricotta and it was fairly decent. Very nice eggy flavor from the capellini although personally I won't mind a little more Jalapeños to spice things up.




I saw this dish on almost every single ad they have in the city so I assume it's a signature dish then? I thought this was easily the best dish of the afternoon. The porcini crusted salmon sat on a nice bed of garden green while we poured a warm leek vinaigrette all over. The leek vinaigrette provided a pretty refreshing touch to the salmon, which was tender and velvety.



The last and least successful main dish was crispy skin chicken with lemon braised potatoes, golden onion, green chili and herbs. This has a lot of Asian inspirations judging from the ingredients and presentation and I thought there were certain improvement areas needed there.



We decided that we shouldn't leave without trying at least one dessert. Since mom wasn't feeling all that adventurous today, we settled with a more "down to earth" dessert - homemade mascarpone with strawberries and ginger granita. It was a very nice palate cleanser with the mascarpone and ginger granita leading the charge. A slightly stronger ginger flavor would probably make this even better!



A very good start to their soft-opening. I could see the staff all raring to go and I am looking forward to trying out their dinner menu in the very near future.

Food Rating: 5.5/10
Price: $$$
Address: 8/F, California Tower, 32 D’Aguilar Street, Central, Hong Kong
Closest Metro Station: Central
Tel: +852 3706-8567