Cafe de Hong Kong

Came here for dinner with Ms C, another couple with their 3 rascals. Ms C has kindly ordered the nan ru roast chicken before hand when the reservation was made. Apprently it is very popular and requires pre-order. Word of advice now is there isn't parking on premise. Best you seek parking in the lanes around the building.

The eatery appears cozy with some otudoor tables as well. we were seated in a cofmy table meant for probably 8 pax. Service staff are a patient bunch. I would like to commend them on that. Suggestions were made but they weren't pushy about it. We proceeded to order ee fu noodles for the rascals, fish roe fried rice, salted egg yolk prawns, crispy pork stips x2 (coz the rascals like it), steamed pork patty, deep fried fish skin (appetizer) a plate of vegetables (cannot remember what)and the all important nan ru roast chicken!

I am not sure if the dishes are naturally smallportioned or it was a request by Ms C coz she assumed we have ordered too much. Anyways the 2 males at the table were somewhat tickled only at the end of the meal. So do pay attention to the pottion size when ordering  ok?

The food was defintely above average. I wouldn't say it is fantsatic but it does the job. One let down was the much vaunted roast chicken. It tasted simple like any other roast chicken u can have anywhere except u get a plate of nan ru sauce to dip it in! wow...great innovation.

While the food was falls between abv average and good, I find it hard to make the effort to return soon..There's so many other places yet to be explored!  I guess to keep my options open I'll vote not sure.

 

For full writeup and pics please go to www.thenewadventuresofoldelis.blogspot.com. 

Last Friday I gathered some vino-minded friends for a riesling-themed wine dinner. I organized it at 新天地小厨 Cafe de Hong Kong, having heard good reviews on the food, no corkage policy and excellent service which includes providing proper stemware.

Food

In usual fashion we over-ordered:

1. fortune seafood roll - deep fried but light on the palate and not oily, liked this very much

2. steamed fish head in black bean sauce - tender but nothing impressive

3. coffee spare ribs - loved the coffee flavour infused in this

4. roast chicken (need to pre-order) - this was excellent, very tender and juicy, the crowd loved it

5. braised lamb brisket - so-so only6. pumpkin paste and salted egg prawn - my favourite dish of the night but the others found it too heavy. hee hee all the more for me!

7. steamed coral tofu8. fish roe fried rice - loved how the fish roe bursts in the mouth, very tasty

8. french toast - we were already stuffed but we HADto order two servings of this to share. Very very good.

Value

Excellent. We ordered a truckload of food and total bill came up to $150 for the 6 of us. I will definitely return for more.

I visited after reading a food blog's enthusiastic reviews.

Went at 6pm on a Sunday and it's already almost fully booked, so anticipation upped another notch...

Tried the Mei Cai and Shredded Duck Fried Rice that was highly recommended on the blog. It is interesting and quite a refreshing change from the typical fried rice fare. maybe not paradigm shifting but worth a try.

The Nam Yu Roasted Chicken was highly recommended but I don't see what the fuss is about - standard fried chicken with Nam Yu dip. It's fine but just a little dry.

The double boiled soup recommended by the waiter was decent but a touch diluted compared to the standard in established canto restaurants but still fine for the price.

Had a vegetable fried with dried Dace and Black Bean, quite flavourful.

位于马里士他路的新天地小厨(Cafe de Hong Kong)光是菜单就万种风情。碗碗筷筷，杯杯碟碟，菜菜肉肉，鱼鱼虾虾，不但别致，也极为精致。

- Fortune Seafood Roll: 炸得香脆，材料新鲜，为我们的午餐掀开序幕。

- Crocodile Paws: 鳄鱼爪的外皮比鸡爪来得多，肉质柔软又有嚼劲，感觉像是在吃海参。鳄鱼爪本身平淡无味，需要调味。爪的部分肉也不多，吃起来和鸡肉及 猪脚的味道相似。

- Stir Fried Red Garoupa Slices with Roasted Sauce: 加上自己的独门凋味料，没有腥味，只有香喷喷的烧汁味。

- Braised Duck with Sea Cucumber: 是当天最昂贵的一道菜肴。海参掺入鸭肉炖煮，把平淡的海参称得更美味，鸭肉吃起来也有海参的润滑口感，相得益彰。

- Pumpkin Paste and Salted Egg Golden Prawn: 用咸蛋黄炒虾，大虾肉甜，搭配咸蛋，恰到好处。

- Roast Chicken: 老板说，南乳脆皮烧鸡的制作过程相当耗时。首先鸡肉必须用南乳腌一晚，隔天用麦芽糖把整只鸡都淋遍之后再拿去炸，然后还要风干一到两个小时。至于烧鸡皮为什么有那么脆呢？因为厨师在鸡皮上淋了醋，所以烧鸡的皮很薄很脆。

- Stewed Lamb Brisket: 加入多种药材和香料，完全遮盖了可怕的羊骚味。羊肉鲜嫩，配搭豆腐乳及泰国柠檬，非常清新。

- Fragrant Fish Roe Fried Rice: 厨师结合日本和香港的作菜风格，港式炒法加上日式的飞鱼籽（tobiko），让炒饭也能变出新花样！ 飞鱼籽在口中咬破时，有卜卜的‘爆破声’，很特别！除了让炒饭多了飞鱼籽的味道，太子炒饭也多了一种脆脆的口感。

- French Toast: 多士是厚厚的一大片，外层烤得酥脆，内层仍然松软，而且涂上花 生酱。虽然炸过，但不会太油腻，被许多顾客赞为“新加坡最好吃的”西多士!

详情可阅读Miss Tam Chiak's Food Blog

When I saw a facebook invite to check out Cafe de Hong Kong, I have never heard of it, but I decided to give it a shot, so imagine my surprise when I read all the good feedback from the bloggers. My, how could I not have heard of this place before?

Anyhow, I decided to have lunch here with fellow bloggers, and importantly, to attempt to "conquer" the crocodile paw that is being served here.

To start we had the fortune seafood roll, which was nice and crunchy but the prawns had a slight fishy after-taste to it.

Next on the menu was the braised duck with sea cucumber. This is a traditional dish with a rich soy sauce. The duck was a little chewy but that is to be expected.

The Prawn with salted egg and pumpkin paste is a treat. The large prawns were fresh and meaty and was a nice crunch with each bite.

The stir fried sliced red garoupa with roast sauce had a nice bouncy feel and went well with the dried onions.

The roast chicken is a winner. Soaked in fermented bean, the skin is very crispy but the chicken is not dry.

Vegetables were next, and I enjoyed both. The stir-fried you mak cai with dace fish has a nice salty finish and suitable for those who like their vegetables wet. The stir fried french bean with minced pork and garlic is more suitable for those wanting their vegetables dry.

Finally, the dish I had been waiting for- the stewed crocodile palm. This reminds me of the pig's trotters, although the nails of that paw will scar(e) some. The skin is a little thick but there is a lot of gelatin in the paw with the meat tasting something similar to a pork and chicken blend.

The last main course was the fish roll fried rice. There was a lot of rave reviews on this but I found this dish a little overrated and quite ordinary, other than the little pops in the mouth one gets after each bite.

Dessert was a french toast that will have your heart pumping. With a nice crispy surrounding in butter, there was enough stomach for this dessert despite being filled up by such a sumptuous lunch.

Overall, I enjoyed myself and I would like to thank Ms TamChiak for organising the lunch.

I took the Waitress recommendation for lunch, which is their signature Beef Hor Fun ($4.50++). Though the Hor Fun was good, the beef was of good texture, not overly tenderised, the portion was too small even for petite mummy. When I was done with the WHOLE plate, I was STILL hungry and thus, decided to order a veg.

Ordered a Spinach (I think is $10++ bcoz it's not the usual $8 at small chinese restaurant / cafe / zhi char). The spinach turns out to be "Phuay Leng / Por Choy" which was overdosed with both garlic and salt.  It was so salty that I left it untouched! The waitress was attentive enough to ask what's wrong with the dish. Interestingly, after telling her it's too saltish, she went away (seeking advise from either the boss or mgr that was present), and then came back later to offer the very salty veg to be packed away. Har? It would be nice to replace me with another veg. Come on, the cost price for that plate of veg is less than a dollar.

I was STILL hungry! Ordered Reb Bean Soup for dessert ($2++). It was decent, but just not of a restaurant standard. There was no hint of orange peel or glutinous yellow rice dumpling, nuts or any other stuff that makes the dessert special to be served in a restaurant / cafe.

The service was very good and attentive from the same waitress.  I have had wanted to order another cup of tea but the waitress offered to refill it with hot water instead.

After spending about $20 in total, I was still hungry. However, I do admit that in a hot afternoon, the cafe was a good place to relax for a meal. But the meal must be at least satisfying. 

Looking at other reviews, I had certain expectation.  By the way, the saltish spinach was left on my table till I finished my dessert and paid the bill. Yup, there was no service recovery ..... I got the message......it's ME, the veg must be so perfect that there was no need to even bring it back to the kitchen to taste.

The food was restaurant quality, a tad expensive and limited menu but probably because it was CNY period (4th day of CNY). Staff were attentive and friendly. They don't charge for water which is always a plus in my book.

Dishes tried:

Mongolian spare ribs-- excellent, tender, well-marinated  ($11)

Black pepper Beef with glass noodles-- this was pretty decent but not outstanding compared to everything else we tried

Smoked duck slices-- extremely flavourful and succulent. just the right amount of 'smoke' and saltiness  ($17)

Crispy skin chicken-- pretty good standard, one of their signature dishes  ($17)

Spinach stir-friend with garlic-- simple and yummy dish ($8.80)

Fish roe fried rice-- Considering that this was a signature dish and $11, it was a very very tiny portion. portion was only enough to fill two small rice bowls. taste was yummy enough I suppose   ($11)

Coffee spare ribs-- sweet with a touch of coffee taste. Meat was very tender. My friends have had coffee spare ribs elsewhere and this did not really impress them! Probably because they felt that the coffee flavour did not quite infuse the meat as much as they would have liked.

Steamed mince pork with dong chye-- tasty and well done simple dish! 

Supreme tofu-- this was pretty decent. 

French toast-- this was unbelievably fantastic!!! What a gr8 job!! And I am not even a tan of french toast/bread to begin with! The bread was fluffy, soft, freshly cooked, with a thin layer of peanut butter n between two slices of bread. I only wish they could serve it with Killeney kopitiam kaya! That would be heavenly when combined with the slice of butter they place on top of the bread!!

Stocking Milk tea-- was pretty smooth and had good flavour

Definitely a place that I would visit again in spite of the fact that it is somewhat out of the way for me!!  

Now I do worry that I will never be able to patronise most HK char chan teng in Singapore because they do not like up the high standards of CCTs in HK! But Cafe De Hong Kong is most definitely an excellent place to try and hang out with friends because of its relaxed atmosphere and unintrusive staff. We only wish that they would be a little less quick when it came to clearing plates!!

Believe me when I say this was a magnificent feast of epic proportions. First of all, we had to order three dishes two days in advance. Then, 10 of us ate 15 courses of the most decadently delectable Hong Kong cuisine outside of the island. That's 150 percent more than what you get at a wedding banquet.

You see, sometimes you've just got to look in all the wrong places for the right stuff. Who would have thought affordable, perfectly prepared Cantonese cuisine would be sandwiched between lighting stores on Balestier? Then again, who would have thought that without asking, we were served a complimentary basket of fried fish skin to go with the bottles of sauvignon blanc that we'd brought to dinner (with no corkage charge)? And who would have thought to create delicate dumplings out of egg white, that willfully submit to your palate to reveal seasoned shredded vegetables inside? Every dish was brilliant, but that was the Albert Einstein moment of the evening for me. That was genius gastronomy.

Next, the fortune roll that under a complex and intriguing Web of fritter laid a plump, fresh, abundant cornucopia of seafood. Then, a steaming pot of braised crocodile paw so melt-in-your-mouth tender you can't believe that once crawled out of a swamp (bonus points: the roast pork to enhance the stewed gravy). Now, when a platter of roast chicken was served, it was seemingly the most conventional item we would eat all night. But one bite into that crisp skin that tantalizing revealed tender, juicy meat, you know you were dealing with something special.

Back to trotting off the beaten barn, a smoked duck was delivered in slices, with a thick covering of fat (one can only imagine what that creature's foie gras might have been!). It's not hard to see why this was one of the restaurant's signature dishes. In fact, why see... just taste. Give a foot, and get an immaculately braised goose's web that captured every spice and every ingredient that went into its gravy. Cod filets, pan-fried and tossed in chili, leeks and onions then found its way onto the lazy Susan. You know a place is good if it takes something so simple in concept and transforms it into a deeply philosophical matrix of culinary kung-fu. Enough said.

No, we're not done. To ease the guilt of all the above indulgence, a dish of green beans stir-fried with ground pork (superbly seasoned) cleansed our palate for a bit. Before you know it, we were back on the dark side with a basket of battered oyster mushrooms - my only regret was that we didn't have a bottle of pinpointedly chilled stout to go with it. And what's a Hong Kong meal without prawns sauteed in salted duck egg yolk? If I could have put it in my wallet, I'd be a millionaire - that's how rich and happiness-inducing it was. The claypot extravaganza of black pepper beef with glass noodles was aromatic, the kind of dish you can smell even before it's served. One final burst of epicurean explosion came in the form of a complete grouper swimming in a perfectly balanced gravy, luxuriously reclining amid mushrooms.

What do you think is the best way to end this Cantonese feast? No, you did not guess right. Yes, we had slabs of three-inch thick French toast, fried and lightly tossed in sugar, with peanut butter in the middle and pads of butter atop. It's as delicious as it sounds.

Don't even try to picture what I've just shared with you. Just go. And eat. Try to eat more than we did. It's worth rolling home and groaning in bed after. And then do it all over again. Repeat.

By the way, not to be slighted but easily overshadowed by the art on the table are the masterpieces on the walls. Drawn and painted by children, scenes of Singapore and Chinese traditions are depicted in the most natural and unconventional ways. There's nothing about it that goes with the sparse decor of this straight-up cafe, but it greatly adds charm to a tabletop already brimming with it.

My family and I dine out a lot to save the hassle of cooking and cleaning the mess. We often get sick of eating the ‘exquisite’ dishes given that we do a bit of entertain with clients. We prefer something like simple like home cooked dishes. That’s why very often or not we would return to the familiar shop that we patronize café de Hong Kong.

Among the dishes that we ordered, I prefer the sweet & sour pork, steamed meat patty with preserved vegetable, stir fried red garoupa with spring onion and ginger, stewed goose web and stir fried long bean with minced pork.

The sweet and sour pork sauce was just to my liking not too sweet or sour and the pork used was lean one unlike some restaurant that uses fatty pork, the pork were very well battered and crispy, something that would be lacking when we try to do ourselves at home.

The meat patty with preserved vegetable was soft but not overly done. I found out from the manager that the shop put in a lot of water so that the meat patty (for the steamed meat patty with preserved vegetable) can be soft and maybe of course some of their secret recipe. Haha.

The garoupa was really fresh and juicy together with the spring onion and ginger it was a perfect combination.

Another worth mentioning was the long bean with the minced pork, the bean was blank and the pork was slightly salt so that they would complement each other, according to the boss the dishes require good control of the fire to achieve the presented taste.

Needless to say, I was delighted with the well-executed goose web that brings the full favour of what is expected, very soft and slowly melting in your mouth.

Going back to the restaurant is a definite affair for me!

Cafe De Hong Kong serves one of the best Yuan Yang ($2) around (IOHO). The yuan yang had a nice balance of coffee and milk tea, with a slightly higher tone of distinctive HK milk tea we would say. The level of sweetness and bitterness was just appropriate for us.

J's & A's rating: 4.5/5

Previously when we tried the French Toast ($4.80), we were quite disappointed as the peanut butter slapped onto the thick slices of bread was rather miserable. Nevertheless, we decided to give it another chance and specifically requested for more PB. We were waiting in anticipation, fantasizing about molten PB oozing out of the toast and polishing the plate sparkling clean. But none of this was realized when the toast was served. No doubt the french toast looked yummy, perfectly fried to golden brown. But the taste was utterly a letdown, with little PB which turned out to be very dry. Can you imagine 4 people sharing this yet we couldn't finish it?

J's & A's rating: 2.5/5

A’s heart was leaping in joy when she finally get to eat her favourite dish, Three Cups Chicken “三杯鸡”($12). As the name suggested, a cup of soy sauce, rice wine and sesame oil are each added to marinate one chicken. The dish was served sizzling hot, really comforting! Chicken was tenderly fresh and succulent. Slightly sweet and savoury, basil and ginger were added for extra fragrance!

J's & A’s rating: 4.5/5

Country Tofu ($12) came next. Bits of seafood mixed in silky soft tofu and embedded in its thin, crispy exterior. We definitely enjoyed it but pity J wasn't impressed with the presence of some unidentified greens in the tofu which put her off totally.

J's rating: 3/5, A’s rating: 3.75/5

The Salad Dressing With Prawn Ball ($12) seemed to have lost its wow factor. Prawn balls were not as crispy as we would have liked, and the flour coating seemed too thick. Overall, it was a decent dish.

J's & A’s rating: 3.5/5

Stir-fried You Mai Cai with Dace Fish ($10)

Surprisingly, this last dish came as a big hit! The dace fish and black beans were delightfully salty, which added robust flavours to this otherwise ordinary vegetable dish . It was tantalizing to the tastebuds when we simply paired it with a bowl of plain white rice. Awesome!

Visit http://sistafood.blogspot.com/2009/12/cafe-de-hong-kong-day-out-with-family.html for full write up and other reviews!