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2020-08-21
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Despite having heard of it from Chapman To’s Yellopenrice, I wasn’t exactly too tempted to try out this restaurant because I was under the impression that gimmicky / insta-worthy meals are equivalent to overrated food as it means that the chefs try to impress their customers with the appearance instead of the real taste of the food. But since my friend really wanted to give it a try, I unwillingly spent nearly a thousand bucks with her on this fusion-style omakase place. But THANK GOD IT’S THE B
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Our dinner started with a small sip of iced pineapple juice with an alcoholic hint as a welcoming drink, as well as a salad with plum sauce dressing as appetiser.
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Then we had this smoked duck breast and quail egg. Enclosed in a traffic cone, once it’s opened, the dainty treat was instantaneously enshrouded in a cloud of mist that the waitress said it drew inspiration from the excessive tear gas in protests (haha well, hk police contributed to the aesthetics of our culinary scene!)
I wrapped the quail egg into the duck breast and ate them together. OH MY GOD, the succulent texture of duck breast and the fatty layer at the skin-side go so well with the smooth, crispy white and the extra-rich, creamy yolk of the quail egg, resulting in this extremely scrumptious bite with a strong smokey aroma to it. Simply wonderful!
Smoked duck breast and quail egg
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Let’s kick off the series of sashimis!
First we had this translucent white squid sashimi sprinkled with white sesame on top. Unlike the usual one which is served as one big piece, the chef demonstrated his superb knife skills by thinly slicing it into these fine, tiny shreds! I really like that it’s so smooth and silky, contrasting with the usual crispy texture.
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We also had bonito sashimi served with turmeric sprouts and chrysanthemum petals, seasoned with bonito soy sauce. It has a gingery flavour complemented with a refreshing floral and woody fragrance. What a creative combination!
white squid sashimi, bonito sashimi
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Mikan Tai
This sashimi comes with an interesting story! So in 2011, a fish farmer in Ehime experimented with feeding sea breams with mikan (mandarin orange) peels, hoping that the lemonene inside the peels would extend the storage life of the fish, but unexpectedly, it resulted in a tangerine flavour in the fish! And since then, it becomes one of the local specialties of Ehime Prefecture.
But to be honest, I didn’t taste any citrusy fragrance to it... At best, it’s just more refreshing compared to other sashimi. But rather I was quite surprised by its slight fatty layer at the skin-side, considering that the fish grows up eating oranges hahaha.
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Halibut sashimi
This one is BOMB 💣 Known as hirame in Japanese, halibut is a type of flounder fish. I’ve tried the seared cut along its fin, which is noticeably the oiliest portion of halibut, and I could never forget how scrumptious it was.
But to my pleasant surprise, this apparently leaner meat of halibut still has a nice fatty texture. What’s more, it wraps grated pickled daikon radish and halibut intestines are the bottom. The oiliness of the sashimi, the acidity of the vinegar-based radish, and the slight bitterness of the intestine complement each other so well, with a refreshing touch of the spring onions on top.
Definitely one of my favourites in this memorable dinner!
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Striped Jack sashimi
Known as Shima Aji in Japanese, it’s another favourite sashimi of mine in this dinner. Leaner and crispier than Japanese amberjack, shima aji has a nice oily sheen on the skin-side, which contributes to most of its fat content. With a consistent firm and smooth texture, it ends with a calm sweet note👌🏼
Mikan Tai, Halibut, striped jack
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Kinmedai Splendid Alfonsino
‘Kinme' (金目) means 'golden eye' in Japanese, and 'dai' (鯛）is the Japanese word for 'sea bream'.
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Look at this fish skin! Bright red in colour with those tiny rhombus patterns, it has a unique crispy and bouncy texture, thanks to its rich gelatin! I’d say it’s a bit like blanched fish skin, the delicacy that we Hongkongers and mainlanders in Guangdong province love a lot!
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Botan Ebi
You can tell the shrimp is really fresh as it has a delicate, crispy texture! Compared to ama ebi, translating as “sweet shrimp”, I think botan ebi has an even sweeter flavour!
Btw, the brownish paste in the bottom left corner is extracted from the shrimp heads! This bitter and briny goo complements the sweet, slimy delicacy so well!
𣲙鯛, Kinmedai, botan ebi
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Isaki no sashimi
Also known as ‘threeline grunt’ in English, it has an oily texture, accompanied by the seared fish skin which is a bit bitter!
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Toro
Needless to say, the belly portion of tuna, as its most fatty part, is always divinely delicious. Nothing beats that melt-in-your-mouth texture, right?
Wonder what those long, thin green strands are on top of the reddish toro? Namely ōba, aka green shiso, this herb has an distinctive grassy aroma which is at first a bit too astringent to my liking, but gradually complements the oiliness of toro perfectly!
Isaki no, Toro
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Does this sharp yellow parking ticket take you aback? No worries, it’s edible! But it is tasteless and already a bit soggy on the outside, which left me a bit disappointed as I thought it’s crunchy.
On the other hand, the gyūtan, aka the grilled beef tongue, is on another level! First with the high fatty content, it’s so thick yet so tender with that melt-in-your-mouth texture! And the sweet teriyaki sauce is just on point!
Beef tongue
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Mud
Uni wrapped inside a pinkish rice paper!
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Zongzi
Ok, it’s actually just zongzi figuratively as the fillings inside the bamboo leaves are scrumptious seared salmon sashimi coated with irresistible mashed salted egg yolk. It’s bomb!
Seared salmon sashimi coated with mushed salted egg yolk
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Below the Lion Rock
I always like my mom’s steamed fourfinger threadfin, but rarely do I try the grilled version of this fish! Its succulent, oily flesh can never go wrong, right? But what surprises me is how well the crispy fish skin adds an amazing texture to the fillet!
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The cube next to it is a Japanese tofu topped with sesame sauce. Silky and smooth, it actually resembles almond tofu even more texture-wise, but with a subtle aroma of soybean and sesame flavour-wise.
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Here, it’s nearly impossible if I don’t mention the lyrics of Below the Lion Rock in the backdrop. I can’t help but feel moved and at the same time depressed by the poetry by the literary genius James Wong jum-sum, especially amidst the sociopolitical turbulence and tensions nowadays. I still vividly remember when I was 5 or 6 in 2004, I saw James Wong’s funeral live on TV, and my parents introduced his notable works to me patiently, which I pompously and shallowly disdained for their old-fashioned style. Little did I know that I was witnessing the end of the golden era of Hong Kong!
Below the Lion Rock
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This tempura isn’t the usual ones with simply prawn or crab stick or cod - it’s more like a combination of all three: fish, crab meat and roe, and small shrimps! Then sprinkle the sweet and sour plum sauce on top to balance out the tangy, salty, deep-fried exterior of the tempura. Crispy and yummy!
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The menu isn’t bilingual so I can’t think of a better English name of this dish. Literally translating as “trash elderly”, it’s a colloquial Cantonese expression to describe bigoted elderly people who like to moan about the deterioration of the future generation without putting themselves into others’ shoes. But I guess the chef drew inspiration from its Chinglish term which is “old seafood”, because this is definitely a memorable seafood soup that warms your heart and soul.
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Using a Japanese-style siphon coffee maker, the top globe held Katsuobushi, the dried, fermented skipjack tuna flakes, while the bottom globe contained the flavourful seafood soup stock. When heated over the butane burner, the soup gradually boiled and rose into the top globe to soak and absorb the essence and aroma of the dried smoked fish. Finally, the chef kindly turned off the burner for us so the soup began to draw down, then the soup was ready!
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It’s then poured into a bowl of seafood jelly, which is made of the collagen from fish, carrot, corns, and some unknown hydrophilic vegetables that forms a mucilaginous coating with a gel texture, just like chia seed.
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I thought the soup would be more like a gimmicky dish, but it turned out to be really delicious! The soup was not salty at all, but it encapsulates the best of seafood and the bonita flakes so well and the multilayered texture absolutely takes it to the next level. What a treat!
廢老湯
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It’s a pity that I forgot to take picture of the very last dish of the whole meal, which is a really refreshing Kanten, a Japanese-style jelly, produced by boiling and straining tengusa seaweed and algae, then forming in an oblong mould. The dessert is mildly matcha-flavoured, served in ice-cold yuzu tea, in which the subtle herbaceous and bitter notes of the kanten is well balanced by the light sweet and sour yuzu. I also like the wobbly, smooth, gelatin-like texture of the semi-translucent kanten so much!
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So I’ve looked forward to this dinner for a few weeks ever since I watched the yellopenrice youtube video hosted by Chapman To, from which I learned that Joe, the restaurant owner, is a keen supporter of the anti-extradition bill movement, and started the business after suffering from blood cancer several years ago.
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In that evening, two customers in suit and tie sat next to us, one of whom has already visited the restaurant for two times before and so Joe remembered his story! The three of them discussed the intensifying tension between China and Hong Kong, and also the future of Hong Kong. As a shy person, I dared not joining their chat, but at the end, I approached them and expressed how much I agreed with them. Let’s hope the virus outbreak will end soon so I’ll defo revisit Uo N!
張貼
