Sun Heung Yuen (新香園), Kweilin Street, Sham Shui Po

Came to Sun Heung Yuen (G/F, 38 Kweilin Street, Sham Shui Po, Hong Kong, tel : +852 2386 2748) after hearing about their allegedly delicious minced beef and omelette sandwich (a.k.a. their 馳名蛋牛治 on the menu). Those are apparently a thing here. 

A piping hot 茶走 to start.

What came as an unexpected and pleasant surprise was their beef brisket macaroni. First thing that reeled me in was the piping hot beefy broth. And then the tender beef briskets. I could come back just for this.

This was their signature beef sandwich. Today, I have confirmed that it's regular minced beef and not corned beef. I'm not a fan of what most of the char chaan teng calls fresh or minced beef because by tradition in the way of prep, they're sodium bicarbonated to death leaving behind a smooth, unnaturally textured and bland-ish protein I wouldn't call beef.

This one wasn't as bad as some but it was still processed. And there's a sweetness in it that I didn't like. Edible but will not come back for it.

Their rendition of company/club sandwich (公司三文治) features the same minced beef omelette with ham and luncheon meat.

Water Gate Chicken Rice (水門雞飯), Soy Street, Mongkok

Little did we expect to eat Thai chicken rice in Hong Kong (G/F, 21C Soy Street, Mong Kok, Hong Kong, tel : +852 2809 2918). What got us intrigued was likely a combination of them being featured on social media and that we noticed their queue out at the actual shop a couple of times we passed by. 

Not bad tasting. No qualms eating again. It's not exactly the same as the Singapore version but the flavour profile wasn't very different too. Got the combi plate with both poached and fried chicken. The bunch of stuff at 5 o'clock are called giblets on the menu and it consisted of some chicken blood curd, gizzards and intestines. Gizzards were hard and chewy.

Both sauces on the side were nice.

Tried the wagyu boat noodle out of curiosity. According to them it's A5.

Could tell that it was nice fatty beef but I don't think I tasted the A5 in it. Their egg noodle option for the bowl was mee pok rather than the mee kia we were imagining. Broth was sweet, savoury and peppery - not bad tasting but also nowhere in the leagues of what we consider great boat noodle broth.

Decent cha yen.

Lok Yuen (樂園), Kowloon City Municipal Services Building, Kowloon City

Breakfast at Lok Yuen (3/F Kowloon City Municipal Services Building, Kowloon City, Hong Kong, tel : +65 +852 2382 3367). Their menu at this shop has a bit of variety which consists of ingredients that are put together in various permutations. Just like many of the bing sutt or char chaan teng.

While they've caught up with a QR menu for ordering, payment here appears to be cash only still.

Red bean with bottled milk. Kinda nice.

I was curious about this one.

Satay beef stuffed in French toast with butter and condensed milk drizzled over. Not so different from eating a fried bao with the sweet meat fillings. It's not bad.

Lok Yuen's special stir fried noodles feature bits of chopped up luncheon meat, pickled mustard, fried egg, spring onions and cabbage. A little pricey but portions were good and I enjoyed this.

Milk tea with almond. I saw them adding the almond powder into their brewed tea. The beverage turned out to be pretty viscous with both the flavour of the almond powder and the tea coming through. For the benefit of those that may not be aware, the almond referred to here is Chinese almond which are actually apricot kernels.

Lemon tea's pretty astringent. But that's how we usually like it.

Vission, Staunton Street, Hong Kong Central

Came across Vission (LG/F, Chui Man House, 7 Staunton Street, Soho, Central, Hong Kong, tel : +852 5545 6787) while trudging uphill at Central.

Left the bakery with loot.

It happened that we forgot to refrigerate the banoffee pie. So the cream layer over the top collapsed as we unboxed. 😂 Turned out to be a fortunate accident because this tasted great at room temperature. The flavour from the cream, the banana and the coffee were all more pronounced. Fuck me this was good. 

Pistachio custard danish - this tasted like it had a layer of pistachio butter over pistachio custard in that buttery danish cup/crust. Very nice. 👍🏼

Their lemon pound cake was totally overshadowed by how impressive the other earlier two were. Just a lemony sweet glaze over pound cake. But I'm sufficiently impressed to try other things from them.

Fini's, Elgin Street, Hong Kong Central

We waited about 45 minutes for an order of pizza and the place was barely a quarter filled up. Now that that's out of the way, we were in Fini's (49 Elgin Street, Central, Hong Kong, tel : +852 9143 2402) to try their New Haven styled pizza. Allegedly the first in Hong Kong to do so.

Meatballs were tender, quite loosely packed and pretty delicious. The sauce though tasted like a blend of fresh and concentrate tomatoes. Pretty tart. Not impressive.

This was their Bronx that came with a few meat toppings like sausage, meatballs and salami over their thin, almost biscuit New Haven crust. Didn't taste bad but I didn't find it particularly memorable. I think what bothered me was the tartness in the tomato sauce that felt invasive for every flavour nugget on the pizza. For a 318HKD pie, it was expensive and not half impressive methinks.

The chilli sauce that came with it thanks to Uncle K.

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.