Foie Gras Xiao Long Bao at HK's Wang Jia Sha

The Holy Grail of XLBs: Foie Gras Xiao Long Bao

Wan Jia Sha

In a city with enough Chinese restaurants to make you feel no need to pay well for it, sometimes it is worth it to leave the hole-in-a-wall establishments in Hong Kong and venture to somewhere more, well, established. Wang Jia Sha is another import from Mainland China since 1945 offering traditional Shanghai Dim Sum favorites, and has even ventured out as far as California, making this dining spot internationally known.

Chinese Restos to Celebrate Kung Hei Fat Choi

Chinese culture and cuisine is tightly linked with Filipino heritage and history. Hence, we celebrate Chinese New Year with as much jubilation and anticipation as the mainlanders do. Where to go get a super Lauriat meal, or some dim sim in the area? Here are ToT's picks for the ultimate Kung Hei Fat Choi celebration meal:

Choi Garden

My family's Chinese kitchen extension where we dine on a weekly basis. Food is authentic HK cuisine because of the 8 chefs which specialize in dimsum, roasts, soups, sauce, etcetc. Call in beforehand to reserve the Fried Chicken or the Lechon Kawali. My pick over Gloria Maris anytime. Here are my favorite dishes at Choi.

 Summer Palace

The ultimate Chinese restaurant for celebrations & special occasions. I love the Cereal Prawn, the Taro covered duck, and their excuisite seafood. Worth dressing up and feeling very Joy Luck Club for. If you can let go of some semblance of control and let the restaurant manager Nancy order for your party, you will be in good hands.

Eat Well Delicious Kitchen

 The go-to for easy Chinese food, casual ambiance, and pork chop that rivals Delicious in HK. I like the Wanton Noodle Soup as well as pork siumai as big as golf balls.

Xiang Chuan Restaurant

If you want to try something new without breaking the bank, look for this secret Hunan restaurant in Makati that serves up authentic spicy and saucy Hunan food. Nothing fancy, everything spicy!

Din Tai Fung, Hong Kong

If you're willing to fly for good food. Din Tai Fung is the ambassador of Xiao Long Bao, or soup dumpling. The crab version is better than anything in this world. 

Luk Fu Tea House, Hong Kong

They don't serve Xiao Long Bao, but they do have traditional yum cha/dim sum served in a pre-colonial setting right in Central HK.

Yun Kee, Hong Kong

If you want a real Kung Hei Fat Choi meal in HK, I would recommend Yun Kee if  only for their aromatic century eggs, and roasted goose. You can even bring home the Century Eggs for travel!

And if the Manila and Hong Kong restaurants just won't do it for you... I guess there's no where else to go but China!

Kung Hei Fat Choi.... I mean, Choy! Choi!

These Are a Few of my Favorite (Choi) Things

 Since Chinese New Year is coming up, I'd like to refresh ToT with a "Favorite Things" post on my favorite Chinese restaurant: Choi Garden

 Choi Garden is where our family dines when we can't think of anywhere else to go, aside from Cyma for some Mediterranean food. We have tried a lot of dishes, and think that their flavors and dishes are spot on. No need to hit up Hong Kong. They have almost everything you need here and more. 

 One of our favorite things to order is their Shabu-Shabu, or hot pot, which is basically a big bowl of broth and meats & seafoods with vegetables and noodles that you can cook for flavor. Traditionally. Shabu-Shabu involves only dipping the meat onto the soup for flavor, but for most Filipinos, we also use the broth as soup and use the meats to flavor the soup. Different strokes for different folks.

Sumptous Chinese Spread at Shangri-La's Summer Palace

If you can't go to Hong Kong to get authentic Chinese cuisine, bring Hong Kong to your tummy via Summer Palace, my family's favorite restaurant for fine Chinese food with elegant ambiance. Ever since I was a kid, I remembered celebrating our special occasions at Summer Palace. When I grew up and began working, a lot of our lunches would be dimsum in this much-loved restaurant.

Though we frequent Choi Garden more because it's more relaxed and their Shabu-Shabu menu is fantastic, Summer Palace is the perfect lunch location. Plus all Shangri-La hotels have impeccable Chinese restaurants, and Summer Palace is really in a league of its own.

One of my favorite spots for dining is the Crystal Room, which is right in the center of the restaurant, enclosed by Chinese etched rosewood enveloping diners for more privacy.

HK Stopover: Yum Cha at Luk Yu

I had a few hours to kill during my layover in Hong Kong Airport to LAX. After running an errand for my mom, I decided to do the the next best thing in HK aside from shop.

Traditional Yum Cha at one of Hong Kong's Top 10 Best Restaurants!

To "Yum Cha" is to go to a teahouse for some dim sum.

Xiao Long Bao 101 at Din Tai Fung

Aahh.. the makings of a good xiao long bao are simple. Delicate dumpling wrapper, lots of soup, and a lot of bamboo steamers on a table. For Xiao Long Bao fanatics, there's one restaurant that claims fame for this soupy dumpling.

Din Tai Fung

The New York Times hailed it as the 10 best restaurants in the world in 1993. The Michelin Guide rated the chain's Tsim Sha Tsui location with 1 Michelin Star. Specializing in the Chinese soup dumpling, Din Tai Fung first started in Taiwan in 1958 as an oil company and became famous in 1980 when founder, Yang Bingyi, and his wife decided to make these soup dumplings to survive drastic business conditions. Now, there are Din Tai Fung restaurants all over Asia, and even in the United States

Eat Well Delicious Kitchen

The name of the restaurant says it all.

If you want to "Eat Well" in a "Delicious Kitchen", run to Eat Well!

For me, it's like the ultimate Hong Kong Chinese Restaurant experience minus the costly airfare ticket to get authenticity. Headed by Law Kwok Keung of Shangri La Hotel Restaurant fame, it's surely not going to disappoint.

I Love Turtles, But...

Palau 2010

I LOVE Turtles.

Tubbataha 2009

I even try to befriend them underwater when I meet them while diving. BUT...

Hush Hush Hunan Haunt

On my past 3 trips to China, I've been fed a lot of Hunan food lately. Yes, if you noticed, that's a whole lot of Chili peppers in the dishes, because Hunan cuisine's main characteristic is the level of heat in the dishes that leave you hot and sweaty, and not in that way.

The very next day, my suppliers made me eat Hunan food for lunch again, sweat dripping from my brow with every bite because of the spiciness and the humid July weather. Hunan food is notoriously spicy because the Hunan province, in southeast China, gets wicked winters. Adding chili and heat in the food makes you sweat (duh), and cleanses the body from toxins that usually just sit and linger inside.

HK Holiday, Part Due

After the first family day in HK town, and a night of debauchery, vodka and Tsui Wah, my bro and I woke up at the unreasonable hour of 2pm! Sheesh!
But come on, who wouldn't want to wake up to a view as beautiful as this one??
One of the perks of staying at the Parklane in Causeway Bay is the convenience to major shopping meccas and the MTR. This was a Sunday, so the park was filled with (it's completely true) Indo and Filipino house hold help on their day off. I love the camaraderie especially when they share their baon or packed meal. It's so sweet and completely Filipino.

After we washed down the leftover alcohol and took our respective baths, we headed off to meal #1:

HK Holiday, Part Uno

It's been about half a year since the inception of this blog... when it all started when I had a vacation with my entire family at a resort in beautiful Bohol. Since it was the holiday season we strategized, as stress-inducing and patience-trying planning a fam vacation was, we needed another family outing. We did it again, and we survived it!

The chaos that was the airport

Well, I did. Not so much my sister who has three kids and, unbeknown to her nor us during that time, was preggers with her (omg) fourth kiddo. Talk about genetically superior bloodline!

This was the airport situation. My family hates flying together, so la famiglia had to be divided into three flights. This was my team: Sis, 3 kiddos + brother (appearance in next picture). Clearly from the beginning, Sis already sensed she had a lot on her plate...

My Bro also carried his weight... but then we also caught him snoozing on the side while waiting for the airplane. hee hee cruel girls.

We were headed to the closest place possible with the easiest recall factor:

hk = heart killer

Last week I was in HK for a quasi-business trip. Supposedly to attend some expos and shows, the trip ended up being more of a slow walking tour of the jewelry shops north of my HK hotel. The non business side of the trip was just crappy. Slow walking and HK streets just don't mix.

On the flipside, I had some pretty good meals during my stint which alleviated the stress I endured during the entirety. No explanations. All the meals were memorable. See? When God closes a door, He opens a restaurant or two :)

Dinner at Padang Indonesian Resto

Coconut Milk with Grass Jelly Drink

Read the complete post on the NEW Trip or Treats 
http://www.triportreats.com/2009/11/16/hk-heart-killer/

Choi Coma

Chinese food always has a certain appeal to it. From haute chinois locations to fastfood moo shoo, everyone craves for Chinese at one time or another. Be it dim sum or peking duck or salted fish fried rice, Chinese food is almost always tasty. The plethora of flavors, spices and concoctions are so intricate yet complex that the balance must be established to make sure that it is truly authentic.

Most celebratory events for our family involve Chinese food. Lately, our resto of choice is Choi Garden, owned by, duh, Mr. Choi. Mr. Choi was a previous partner of the Gloria Maris restaurant group which has branches from here to there. After some disagreements and undisclosed issues, Mr. Choi decided to separate from the conglomerate and set up shop in Annapolis Greenhills. Not one to get in between drama, we went where our tongues salivated more. We have been willing and hungry Choi chompers since then.

Since the parentals were out on a safari, I played matron and decided to order set D. Set D is supposedly good for 12 people. Our party was for 9. But when you take into account that 6 out of 9 are all males, with 3 being my oversized brothers and the rest my brother's equally hungry friends, it was evident we needed more food.

Do I even have to elaborate on the authenticity and flavor of these dishes? Can you just take my word for it?