Another deluxe meal ticket at Po Lin Monastery

Made our way up to the metal Buddha again this year and got a deluxe meal ticket at the monastery's food hall..

Today's soup was filled with different beans and sweetened by figs.

I don't recall how I felt about this mixed vegetable stir fry from the last time but I enjoyed it today. Bell peppers and all. Those toasted cashews were great.

Love their fried spring rolls. That's coming from someone who normally doesn't bother with fried spring rolls.

Those mushroom caps look reptilian methinks. Don't you?

Love the lemon sauce tau kee.

These Chinese vegetarian meals at Po Lin Monastery are possibly one of the more memorable ones we've had.

More breakfast at Sai Kee Congee (西記粥店)

Because we missed what we had here from our previous trips. No kidding. Don't expect the skies here because what they do is simple and comforting food.

Stuff like the blood curd and century egg congee.

Cheong fun with dried shrimp.

And their straightforward soya sauce stir fried noodles with superb wiry texture. 👍🏼

Pity that they don't do the steamed radish cake anymore.

A few days later......

One more. 😬

Bowl of sweet intestines and blood curd in a pepper broth.

Minced beef congee. We couldn't tell that the minced bits were beef. Now we know.

Alice Pizza, Cochrane Street, Hong Kong Central

Interesting. This relatively new looking Alice Pizza (G/F, 18 Cochrane Street, Central, Hong Kong, tel : +852 6685 9642) does Roman styled pizza al taglio.

One basically picks a pizza with the topping of choice and indicate a preferred portion. The pizza is weighed and then charged. Just like in Rome. We picked one with Mortadella, stracciatella and pistachio. Greasy in a good way with a crunchy crust and not bad tasting with chilli flakes.

Re-visiting Tsim Chai Kee (沾仔記) after all these years...

I haven't had wanton mee from Tsim Chai Kee in like forever. Since the first time actually. The queues are still here.

Here's a bowl of their king wanton noodle. I don't know why but I'm getting the feeling that these king wontons are smaller. Anyways, still as tasty. Those amazing wiry textures of the noodles are still as I remembered them. Would have been great if the lye/kee flavour wasn't in the soup.

Kang kong/tong choi (通菜) in fermented bean sauce. This one was stinky that I thought it was a waft that came from refuse in the street. No kidding and I've been eating and loving this for a long time. Glad it was delicious. My only complain was that the vegetables were too stemmy.

Oh lookie. Just across the road from Mak's and they don't have a queue.

Chukfo Taipan Restaurant (竺扶大班燒味), Triangle Street, Wan Chai

Nice roast meats/siu mei/燒味 stall (Shop 3, G/F, Wah Yan Court, 2-3 Triangle Street, Wan Chai, Hong Kong). Crowd was pretty crazy and seating's limited.

How could we have said no to all of these?

Soup of the day - papaya white fungus and pork soup.

Roast meats were delicious. I prefer their siu yok/roast pork & ngor pei/goose drumstick over the char siew.

Their sour plum sauce was outstanding. I thought I could taste dried tangerine peel in it.

Wing Kee (榮記茶餐室), Yuk Wah Crescent, Tsz Wan Shan

Wing Kee (Shop A-B, G/F, 12 Yuk Wah Crescent, Tsz Wan Shan, Hong Kong) is known for their satay meat noodles and claypot rice. We trekked uphill from Diamond Hill MTR and was disappointed to discover that there were no claypot rice dishes as it was a public holiday. 🥲 The friendly proprietor did furbish us with how to get some the next time though.

Note to self: 

• claypots only available from 5pm

• not available on Sundays and public holidays because they close at 5pm
• not available on 1st/15th of every lunar month.

First time having ginger Horlicks. Both the ginger and Horlicks were a little thin here.

That's their claypot satay beef instant noodles. It's apparently a thing for those who're in the know. For some reasons, I had the idea that the satay gravy would be viscous. It wasn't. There were bits of crushed peanuts and toasted garlic in it which added flavour and the taste was somewhat more intense, but otherwise, it was kinda similar to the regular satay beef noodles. Didn't think was bad tasting. That being said, I also probably wouldn't get them again. 

The menu described this sandwich to contain minced beef and smoked meat. The minced beef component was corned beef - which we had already guessed. But the smoked meat wasn't the sliced pink sludge that's commonly used. I'm not sure what ham this was but it was indeed a little smoky and better tasting than the regular variety.