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The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one’s own country as a foreign land.” – G.K. Chesterton

Tuesday 23 July 2013

Bonjour from Paris!

We are in the beautiful city of Paris! We endured a 12-hour flight to get here (for at least half of which our son was sleeping across our laps), but we are having a fantastic time so far. We've eaten some really amazing French food, but the highlight for our 4.5-year-old is seeing the Eiffel Tower in person. He'd been looking forward to seeing the Eiffel Tower since I first told him about it a few weeks ago, and he was not disappointed. Here are a couple of shots of the Paris landmark both during the day and night.

The Eiffel Tower by day...

... and by night:

I promise more photos will be posted up on this blog in a couple of weeks time. In the meantime, I'm off to enjoy my European adventure!

Wednesday 17 July 2013

Shanghainese Dumplings and Noodles @ Xia Mian Guan (Elements), Hong Kong

We really do suffer from the we-live-here-we-can-visit-anytime syndrome. Take this little Shanghainese restaurant that opened up more than a year ago in the mall downstairs. We walk past it all the time on the way to and from the MTR station and supermarket, and there is always a queue of people lining up to get a table at peak meal times. Yet it had taken us at least 18 months before we tried our first meal there. I guess we always thought that we could go there anytime we wanted since it is very close to home, so we never did. Hubby said a couple of his Chinese colleagues who also live in the area are regulars at Xia Mian Guan, and it's a popular choice with the locals and the Chinese who come in through the coaches via the Mainland Coaches Lounge located directly opposite the restaurant. The service was sufficient enough in this busy restaurant, but most waitstaff don't speak nor understand English. However it was easy enough to get someone who speaks English to come to our table. Ordering was a cinch, and we made our selections using a bilingual Chinese/English menu-cum-order form that was placed on the table. There were a good variety of appetisers, noodles, dim sum, meat and seafood dishes on this menu, and with the exception of our son's fried rice dish, all the food we ordered were marked "Chef's recommendation". The prices were pretty affordable for a restaurant inside this high-end mall, and serving sizes were generous (especially the huge bowl of noodles!). We ordered too much (as we always do when trying a new place for the first time), but we enjoyed the food and we didn't leave a crumb behind.

The 4.5-year-old always requests fried rice whenever we eat Chinese, which thankfully is not often enough to be a health concern! The Fried Rice Yanzhou Style (HK$62) was tasty:

Mung Bean Noodle with Shredded Chicken in Spicy Sauce (HK$62) - and it was very spicy! Hubby and I have high threshold level for spicy food and chili, but this was one of those dishes that was spicy for the sake of being spicy, and we found it difficult to get through the dish:

Sautéed River Shrimp with Longjing Tea Leaf (HK$128) - river shrimp is one of our favourite dishes to order at Shanghainese restaurants, and this one was infused with the fresh aroma of Longjing tea. The roasted tea leaves are edible, but lent a bitter flavour to the dish - I preferred eating the shrimps without the leaves:

We were in a Shanghainese restaurant, so we had to order the Steamed Minced Pork Dumpling (xiao long bao, HK$32). These were delicious, with tender skin of just the right thickness, encasing soup and meat filling that were perfectly seasoned:

Signature Stewed Noodle Soup with Yellow Croaker (HK$76) - this was a huge serving, and I don't think I could have finished the whole thing on my own. The soup had a prominent fishy flavour, so I would say this is a dish only for fish lovers. We both love fish, and found this quite enjoyable:

Pork Dumpling in Spicy Oil (HK$40) - thankfully this wasn't as spicy as the spicy mung bean noodle that arrived earlier. Very tasty:

Something sweet to finish with - Osmanthus Glutinous Rice Cake (HK$32). This was subtly-flavoured and not too sweet, and I quite enjoyed the chewy texture:

A delicious and filling lunch, and we didn't have to go far from home.

[The prices quoted above do not include the 10% service charge.]

Xia Mian Guan (Elements)
Shop 1008
1st Floor, Elements
1 Austin Road West
Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon
Hong Kong
Tel. +852 2196 8022

Sunday 7 July 2013

A simple lunch @ Panash Bakery & Café (Harbour City), Hong Kong

It's that time of the year again: summer vacation. My boy's been out of school for two weeks now, so my hands are fuller than usual. Our European trip is coming up very soon, and I've been madly scrambling to get the finer details of our itinerary down-pat before we get on the plane. It's not so easy when I've had to navigate French and Italian websites to get the information I need! Hubby is away overseas this weekend, and today I decided to make things a little easier for myself by bringing the 4.5-year-old out to lunch after church rather than eating in. He said he wanted sandwich, so we headed over to the only bakery I know in Hong Kong that bakes bread that is safe for him - Panash Bakery & Café. All other bakeries that I've encountered cannot guarantee their breads are nut-, peanut- and sesame-free, and certainly not the breads sold in supermarkets (which are cheaper but contain additives and preservatives that I don't want my little boy to eat). I get bread from either of the two Panash bakeries in the Tsim Sha Tsui area, but there are other branches elsewhere. It's very popular, and both TST branches have a café adjacent to the bakery selling various dishes ranging from light snacks and sandwiches to more substantial items like burger, pizzas and pastas.

The boy and I shared a Panash Original Club Sandwich (HK$68), which was big enough to fill us both. I was informed that this usually comes with bread that contains sesame, but the kitchen was happy to fulfill my request to use a sesame-free bread. While the white sandwich bread tasted good enough, I must admit that I would love to try the original version, which looks like it's made with delicious-looking Turkish bread. (The two times that we'd given Middle-Eastern food to the boy, he had reacted badly afterwards - so no Turkish bread for him for now. I'm glad the waiter double-checked the bread ingredients with the bakery which is separate to the café's kitchen.)

The club sandwich was a triple-decker, nicely toasted with omelette, pressed roast chicken/turkey, processed cheese and the usual lettuce, tomato and cucumber slices. Each quarter was topped with an ingredient - pickle, olive, cherry tomato and bacon:

The boy ate his lunch quite happily, so the outing was a success! We made an impromptu visit to the nearby Toys R Us store where he had fun while I secretly grabbed a couple of items for the upcoming long-haul flights.

[Prices quoted above excludes the 10% service charge]

Panash Bakery & Café
Shop OTG04
Ground Floor, Ocean Terminal
Habour City
17 Canton Road
Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon
Hong Kong
Tel. +852 2327 7071

Monday 1 July 2013

Revisit: Thai @ Mango Tree (Elements), Hong Kong

It was great to have met up with my friend Steph a few times in the past month. She came over to Hong Kong for a day visit on a public holiday (a rare occurrence since she usually works on weekends and holidays at a language school in Shenzhen), and this time she got to catch up with hubby and the boy over dinner out at Mango Tree. This was our second visit to this chic Thai restaurant, and it has become our favourite Thai in the 'neighbourhood' (the mall downstairs from us). I'm happy to report that the quality of the service and food were consistent with our first visit, and this time we got to try different dishes. We chose a dish each and shared them banquet-style. The menu is pretty big, and there are several more dishes that appeal to us, so I'm sure we'll be back here again in the future.

Green Papaya Salad (HK$98) - shredded green papaya mixed with tomatoes, long beans, fresh chili, roasted peanuts, dried shrimp and spicy lime sauce. Deliciously piquant with the right balance of sweet, sour, salty and spicy:

The boy chose to have Shrimp Paste Fried Rice (HK$128), with tiger prawns, dried shrimp and shallots accompanied with sweet pork, shredded egg and fresh pineapple (menu stated mango, but I guess they were out of mango since there were cubes of pineapple instead). Pretty good, and lucky for my son, the extra ingredients were put around the rice rather than in the rice, since he can be picky about food mixing together. He ate his rice quite enthusiastically:

Thai Crispy Golden Cups (HK$98), topped with shrimp, minced pork and sweet corns tossed in sweet and sour sauce. We'd wanted to try this little goody last time, but they'd ran out of it! Tasty little bites of sweet, sour and salty:

Steph selected Rice Noodle with Pork (HK$108) - stir-fried flat rice noodles with pork and egg, mixed vegetables and soy sauce. The Malaysian char kuey teow came to mind when we read the description on the menu, but this Thai version was quite different. It was perfectly enjoyable in its own right, less greasy and quite a lot more healthier than its Malaysian counterpart with the generous amount of vegetables in it:

Hubby ordered Roasted Duck Curry (HK$168), in a mild red curry with pineapple, cherry tomatoes, lychee and sweet basil. Since the first time we tried duck curry with lychee as an ingredient - and loved it - we make it a point to order this dish whenever we see it on the menu at Thai restaurants. This was lovely, with moist duck meat and loads of vegetables in a slightly sweet curry - perfect with a side order of steamed rice (HK$25):

For dessert, we enjoyed Steamed Pumpkin Custard (HK$85), which was delicious! We would love to try the other desserts on the menu:

A successful dinner out with fabulous food and fantastic company!

[Prices quoted above excludes the 10% service charge]

Mango Tree (Elements)
Shop 2032, Elements Mall
1 Austin Road West
Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon,
Hong Kong
Tel. +85 2 2668 4884