Cheap and Cheerful Thai

The flavourful (and not spicy!) boat noodle soup with pork

 

Earlier this week a friend I haven't seen for a while suggested we catch up over a cheap and cheerful Thai lunch in Wan Chai.

It's a noodle shop called Kin Kao and one may want to characterize it as a cheaper version of Samsen, an extremely popular Thai eatery in Hong Kong that has expanded to two locations in Wan Chai and Sheung Wan.

I ordered the set lunch for the unbeatable price of HK$78: a bowl of boat noodle soup with pork balls and sliced pork in a flavourful dark soup stock with lots of chopped basil, and comes with a drink and I chose an iced Thai milk tea.

A very fluffy crab omelette at Kin Kao

My friend ordered stir-fried broad noodles with prawn, chicken and pork in a dark soy sauce (HK$78) and we also had the crab omelette (HK$88) that was fluffy and light.

The staff there are Thai Chinese and it's definitely a shop where you eat and go, though we lingered for a while, as tables around us had two to three rounds of customers.

During lunch most of the people who ate there worked in the area. Afterwards if you still weren't full you could line up at the nearby Bakehouse for its famous egg custard tarts, dark chocolate cookies, scones, danishes...

Also at the opposite end of the same street is International Curry House, offering Hong Kong-style curry dishes in a range of styles (Malaysian, Tamil, Vindaloo, East Indies, Pakistan), and any ingredient like beef, chicken, mutton, prawns, vegetables, along with rice or chapatti. This place is also cheap and cheerful! 

Kin Kao

G/F, Tai Wong Building

3 Tai Wong Street East

Wan Chai

2529 3806

Baking Smiles for Protesters

These mooncakes say "Hongkongers" at Wah Yee Tang Bakery

A bakery in Sai Ying Pun has shown its support for the anti-extradition bill protesters by producing funny mooncakes and cookies with protest slogans on them.

Wah Yee Tang Bakery began making mooncakes on Monday with phrases like "no withdrawal, no dispersal", "be water", "Hongkongers" and one with Cantonese swear words that the police shouted at reporters during clashes.

The bakery has been open since 1984

"I started making cheeky mooncakes last year, but I usually do quirky designs on my products throughout the year. This year there were some funny phrases [from the extradition protests], so I had the templates made," said the owner, who goes by the name of Naomi.

She is the third generation of her family to run Wah Yee Tang Bakery, that was founded by her grandfather in 1984. She now runs the shop with her mother.

Originally she had not thought of making the mooncakes with expletives against reporters, but Naomi was convinced into doing it after a customer -- who happens to be a journalist -- requested them as gifts to give to friends.

The cookie has the swear words police shouted at reporters

Naomi reports being very touched that so many customers come from far away to purchase her cookies and mooncakes. "It's like they are offering their support by saying, 'I'm by your side'," she says.

Although those who support the police are calling for people to boycott the bakery, saying its products are leading youngsters "astray", Naomi is undeterred.

"I'm not afraid. I'm sticking to my bottom line. Everyone must take their own stand. I have no control over how others see me. I'm just going to continue doing what I'm doing. I haven't done anything which I feel has betrayed my conscience."

The small bakery is struggling to keep up with demand

She adds while everyone is very angry, once they buy the mooncakes and cookies they have a laugh. "I'm trying to turn negative emotions into positive ones. I hope everyone can get this message."

Wah Yee Tang Bakery
120-126 Second Street
Sai Ying Pun
2915 2263

Yuen Long Eats

Noodle-fest at Ho To Tai, which was mentioned in this year's Michelin Guide

On the weekend my relatives took me to Yuen Long, where we went around and had our own foodie tour of local eateries.

Don't underestimate the flavours from this simple noodle dish

We took a bus from Jordan which went through West Kowloon and then north west to Yuen Long in a relatively short period of time.

Our first, and most important stop was Ho To Tai Noodle Shop. Opened in 1948, it was the place my great aunt and grandmother would go to get noodles for the family. They would get as many noodle cakes as they could carry and then store them in giant tin containers. After school my dad and his siblings would get steaming bowls of noodles to eat.

My mom remembers the place fondly. My mother's side of the family lived on a farm in Kam Tin and probably not every weekend, but it was a treat to come here to the noodle shop and have a bowl of wonton noodles.

The ground floor dining area of Ho To Tai in Yuen Long

This was my first time going to the shop and by today's standards it has its old school charm. The two-storey shop packs in the diners much like Mak's Noodles with small booths, while cases of glass bottled soft drinks are stacked haphazardly around the dining area.

As there were four of us, we each ordered a different dish. First up was the sui gao lo e-mein. The sui gao are flat and triangular, filled with minced pork, shrimp and wood ear fungus with a touch of shrimp roe. We also ordered the soup version.

Next came egg noodles with thin strips of pork in a tomato sauce. The noodles were slightly al dente and went well with the pork and sauce when mixed together.

The bowl of beef tendon at Victory Beef Ball was delicious

Finally the wonton noodles with egg noodles arrived, and while wontons are not delicate like Mak's Noodles, the ones here were a bit rough around the edges and slightly salty.

We also ordered turnip with shrimp roe that was delicious, as well as another plate of wide egg noodles with oyster sauce, julienne of ginger and young spring onions sliced lengthwise. When mixed together, this dish worked very well -- simple pleasures with fresh ingredients that made the noodles taste extraordinary.

Our next stop was Victory Beef Ball. To conserve our stomachs we ordered a bowl of only beef balls in broth, and a bowl of beef tendon. The former were meaty but also had a bit of an elastic crunch to them, while we enjoyed the tendon, almost melting in the mouth, very smooth and flavourful.

Wife cakes (top shelf), ginger and preserved egg cakes (below)

Hang Heung is known for its lo po beng or wife cakes so we came here for some, along with ginger and preserved egg cakes, and red bean ones too.

Finally we headed to Tai Wing Wah, known for its roast meats, but also this branch has a menu featuring dishes all at the same price. The place is also famous for its rice baked in clay bowls that you can flavour with soy sauce and pork lard... yes lard...!

Our plate of char siu was disappointing -- the pork was too lean and didn't have enough fat to make it tender and it tasted as if it hasn't been marinated long enough. Our soy roast chicken was delicious, but as it was presented in a bowl, we could later see lots of oil half way up the bowl... nevertheless the chicken was very tender.

Char siu (top left) and roast soy chicken on the right

Fish maw stir-fried with egg whites was nothing spectacular, while the steamed pumpkin with squid topped with garlic was delicious and interesting. The slices of pumpkin soaked up the garlic and squid flavours and overall the dish had many textures, soft, crunchy, sweet and savoury.

Stuffed fish that was deep-fried is labour intensive, but the execution here was not up to par. The fish is supposed to be carefully deboned, the fish meat ground up and perked up with mandarin peel and scallions before being restuffed back into the fish and then deep-fried.

This one had the odd bone stuck in it, and the slices were so roughly chopped, it was as if the chef had no interest in making the dish at all. We preferred the one we ate at Lin Heung Kui over a week earlier.

Fantastic steamed pumpkin and squid with lots of garlic

Finally for dessert, the steamed sponge cake was a light shade of yellow -- using white sugar, though it was nice and fluffy.

We rolled out of the restaurant and I got to my bus stop to get back to Hong Kong Island. The bus stops have an electronic board that tells you when your bus is expected to arrive. In my case, the estimation was off by two or three minutes. Not bad.

It took me 40 minutes to get from Yuen Long to Shun Tak Ferry Terminal in Sheung Wan, and then another 20 by tram.

I bought a box of wide egg noodles from Ho To Tai. I'll be eating them for a while...

Ho To Tai

G/F, 67 Fau Tsoi Street

Yuen Long
2476 2495

Victory Beef Ball

Shop 1, G/F, Kit Man House

Kuk Ting Street

Yuen Long
2475 5575

Hang Heung

66 Castle Peak Road

Yuen Long
2474 5731

Wing Wah

2/F, Koon Wong Mansion

2-6 On Ning Road

Yuen Long
2476 9888

Wellington Street's Changing Face

The bustling La Piola is no more on the ground floor

Yesterday I walked from Central to Sheung Wan along Wellington Street and saw so many changes, it made me wonder if I have been paying attention or not.

First off -- the restaurant La Piola at 8 Lyndhurst Terrace is no more. I heard it was going to be shut down, but to see the bare bones of the place left was sad. It used to be packed full of people all the time, particularly in the evenings, and so it was shocking to see it empty and lifeless.

An abandoned shell of a building

I'd only had drinks at the place once, and was impressed the location really did entice the older crowd from Lan Kwai Fong to Lyndhurst Terrace, less than a 10 minute walk away.

And then further down Wellington Street at Graham Street, there was a very old Chinese building that I never noticed before. It stood on its own, next to it an empty lot waiting to be redeveloped.

This three-storey building probably has an owner but no one has been able to contact them. That is the case of many buildings in the city that look like they could crumble at any moment, but they are left alone assuming the owner is still around. There should be some policy about absentee landlords...

Then I saw a cute little bakery called Dreams. The Bread on 97A Wellington Street. Inside it had a few items that were definitely different from other ones like small cubed loafs of different colours, loafs of chocolate rye bread and buns shaped like mini pumpkins.

The croissant and cranberry cube loaf

I bought a cranberry cube loaf (HK$9) and the intriguing pomelo croissant (HK$15) and tried them at home.

The cranberry one was fantastic. Inside were swirls of dried cranberry inside, a bit sweet and addictive.

I thought I bought a pomelo croissant so I was surprised to find it was plain, but now I see on my receipt it was just a classic croissant. It was mislabeled in the bakery!

The croissant was hardly flaky like the French ones, so this one wasn't particularly interesting. But if I go by Wellington Street again, I'll be sure to try the other cube loafs like green tea and black sesame.

The croissant hardly flaky, the mini loaf sweet and delicious

At the bottom of Wellington Street there was for a short time a restaurant called Black Kettle that tried to be creative in incorporating black ingredients in its western dishes, but alas, the concept wasn't strong enough, and the food was just average.

Less than a year later it has been replaced with Noodle... LAH. I had seen the shop space was being renovated but now it's open.

The changing face of Hong Kong -- presented in one street.