This place is iconic and has been on my list for a long time.  Finally, I got to try what so many have raved about.

We ordered two bo lo yau, singapore noodles, french toast and two dong lai cha.

At our cramped, shared table, we waited in anticipation.  

First - the tea.  It was good.  Nothing exceptional, but strong and sweet and refreshing.  

The singapore noodles were mediocre at best.  A little too underdone for my liking, they are better in other places.

The french toast - have seen better.  There was not enough peanut butter in the middle, but the bread was really soft and ate very nicely.  Good, but room for improvement.

The BO LO YAU. Ok, so a pineapple bun with iced butter can't be that much better than at anywhere else right?  WRONG.  This was THE BEST one ever.  Full stop.  There is no better.  I have tried many, but this is the one to rule them all.  It is large, so it is more substantial than at other places.  It has the crispiest most delicious sweet topping that yields to super soft warm bread.  The butter is good too and has just the right amount of saltiness to play against the sweet bun.  No messing around - hands down - the best.

I will be coming back for the bo lo yau and tea as soon as possible.  It is the crack of the pineapple bun world.

I have been on the hunt for a good dan dan.  The Hong Kong style, while potentially good, is often disappointing.  This place does both a Chongqing and a Chengdu style dan dan mian.

We opted for two bowls of Chongqing style (no peanuts and spicier) - Sichuan spicy and eight of the dumplings of the day.

The meal was served with lemon tea, which was OK (nothing special), but the food was sublime.

The dan dan was exceptional.  It had the angry red of potent chili oil and the soup had a good depth of murkiness.  In my experience, soups from that part of the world should have the colour of dirty river water.  It is always a good sign.  Having lived in Souttheast Asia and China, I swear by it.  They used a sparing hand with the hua jiao (sichuan peppercorns), which was welcome as many laces tend to overdo it a little.  They did not spare the chili though and it delivered the great heat that it promised.  With a dan dan, it's got to be spicy.  The noodles were good and had a nice firmness and the minced meat added to the symphony.  A great bowlful.

The dumplings were excellent.  They were filled with pork and leek and served in a spicy broth.  The wrapper was big and allowed for a lot of broth to coat the dumpling.  The filling did not play second fiddle to the sauce and they were just great.

We will be returning as soon as we can to try the Chengdu style dan dan and see how it compares. This place is very good.

I know that this place is an institution in HK, but I am ready to tear down the preconceptions.

This place is terrible.  We have wanted to visit for years.  We never had the chance until now.  It is an old world place with its fair share of stories, including the famous 2002 gangland hit job that was done here.  Founded in 1933, the place hasn't changed much, including the staff.  It is filled with a charm that comes with age, but unfortunately the food has stagnated and the service staff are all grumpy old men who have worked the same job fo 50 years.

We were grufly sat down and brought tea.  Tea, by the way, that costs $32 per person!!!  

We ordered beef balls, egg tarts, siu mai, lotus leaf wrapped sticky rice and a large chicken bun.

The rice came first and was OK. It should have been great, seeing as it had as it cost $98.  I have had $30 versions that were a million times better.

Next came the egg tarts.  These tiny thimbles, were dainty and tasted OK, but were almost non-existent.  

The beef balls were gelatinous balls of pinkish meat that was very unappetizing.  Hard to swallow.  It was like eating poorly prepared and overcooked brains (I love calf brains by the way).

The siu mai were nothing special and actually looked very washed out.  The roe on top was a little off-putting in colour.

The worst thing on the table was the big chicken bun.  The bread was stodgy and the chicken gelatinous in all the wrong ways.  We ate little of it.

For more than $350 plus service charge, this has got to be one of the worst food experiences I have had iin HK.  The building is lovely, but the rest of the show is not worth the ticket.

This busy Shanghai/XLB joint in Jordan is a great place for affordable dim sum.

We ordered xiaolongbao, mini ham and leek pies, wontons in chili oil, liu sha bao, sweet potato buns, sour soup and lion head meatballs.

The meatballs came first and they were on the money.  They tasted just like the ones we used to get when we lived in Hangzhou.  Great start.  

The soup was thick and satisfying.  A real crowd pleaser.

The xlb came next and were were pretty impressed.  Having had a glut of bad ones in recent weeks, these really hit the spot.  The ratio of soup to filling was good and the skin was thin, but sturdy.  They tasted good and were well made.  

The wontons were nice and tasted good in the chili.  The pie things were fine, but nothing to write home about.  A little disappointing, as we had to wait 20 minutes for them after the rest of the food had come out.  

The deserts were a bit of a mixed bag.  The sweet potato buns were a little on the perfumed side for me.  They were very pretty as they were purple and decorated with yellow osmanthus flowers, but they were not my kind of thing really.  The liu sha bao were great!  These are a little different, as the molten egg custard is encased in a glutinous rice flour casing rather than a wheat one and they were coated in sesame seeds.  I culd have eaten a bag full of them.  Delicious and moreish.

All in all, a great spot and worth visiting more than once.  Their noodles also looked good, so we will have to return to try those.

Korean Mexican fusion is a proven combination.  Ever since Roy Choi started his Kogi trucks in LA, the flavours of Korean classics have been findingtheir way into Mexican and American dishes.

TaKorea is a welcome addition to Hong Kong's food scene.  

We ordered beef tacos, a pork burrito and some of the special momos made for the Nepalese earthquake relief fund.

The Tacos were very good.  They were served in corn tortillas and the flavours worked well.  If anything, I would say they didn't have a strong enough Korean taste and were more tex-mex than anything else.  They did have perilla leaf in them, giving them that herbal hint of Korean influence.

The burrito was great!  The flavours were distinctly Korean, but with the format of a California mission-style burrito.  Delicious and satisfying, I wanted another immediately (but didn't get one).

The momos were very nice.  Deep fried, they had a good taste and texture and worked well in the chili sauce they were served with.  

My only criticism is that the size of the burrito was a little on the small side and if it were bigger, I would have felt it was more of a substantial meal.

A very good lunch nonetheless.  

We arrived just as the place opened in the evening and the staff were not quite prepared for service.  After being let in, the person who ran the floor disappeared for about 30 minutes, leaving the solitary 'cook' to run the whole show.  As more people came in, he struggled to do so, but just about got by.

We ordered two buttter ramen and a side of gyoza.  One thing I noticed immediately, was that the 'cook' was handling everything with his bare hands - bad hygiene.  After a short while, he brought out our food.  It was a sorry looking affair, but we ate it.

The gyoza - awful.  They were bland and greasy and not worth eating at all.  Four soggy dumplings - a sad sight.

The ramen had absolutely no flavour.  The taste of miso was missing and the components added nothing.  There was a distinct lack of freshness.  A dull soup.  

The kitchen guy - who, by this time seemed totally out of his depth, was still bare handed and making some other people's ramen.  When he brought it out to the table for them, they called him back, as he had put some meat on one that was not meant to have it.  I saw him go back to the kitchen and put the meat back in with the rest of the pork in a container on the counter.  CARDINAL SIN - that meat had been in the hands of a customer.  While it hadn't been touched, he couldn't have known for sure, it had to go in the bin.  

I must admit to not feeling 100% the next day and would certainly never go to Domon again.  

The ladies who run this place are nice and seemed to be on top of their service, but the food let them down in a big way.

We ordered dan dan mian, xiaolongbao, shengjianbao and jiaozi.  Three of those four were not good.

First, the dan dan came out.  It was not quite Sichuan-style and not quite Hong Kong-style, but was OK.  The soup could have done with being more peanutty, but it didn't have dried shrimp (yay!).  The noodles were fine and in general no huge problems.  

The dumplings were a bit of a disaster.  

the xiaolongbao were poor.  The skin was too thick, but fragile and burst open on every one.  They stuck together and were a mess.  The flavours were not right and the soup, which had escaped, was not tasty.  Having just come back from Shanghai (which I know well), I had just eaten the best XLB in a few of my favourite restaurants there - these were a million times worse.

The shengjianbao were the thick, breadier Beijing-style ones as opposed to the more popular thinner Shanghai-style.  They were disappointing.  The filling was meagre and they were pretty stodgy with no juiciness to the meat inside.  

The jiaozi were made from the same clumsy, clunky wrapper dough as the XLB.  They were better flavoured, but basically chewy lumps that lacked any of the refinement of a good dumpling.

Basically, this place does low quality dumplings and bao.  Go to a better place.  It could also do with a good cleaning, as some of the surfaces (not dining or cooking ones), were filthy.   

I have wanted to come here for a while and try a couple of things and finally I did!

SO We had a milk tea first - pretty good, nothing special, but it did the trick.

We ordered three dishes.  Fried kwai diu, chicken curry with spaghetti and peanut butter in french toast.

The curry came first and was pretty good.  I had never had curry with spaghetti before, but I really enjoyed it.  The combination worked well.  The chicken was well cooked and tasted good.  It had a nice crispy texture on the outside.

The kwai diu was basically singapore noodles but with thicker rice noodles.  What's not to like!?  The flavours worked (they should!) and the thicker noodle added a good texture to the dish.  I love Singapore noodles, so I really liked this dish.

The main event was the french toast.  I have wanted to try this for a while.  Basically it is a french toasted peanut butter sandwich smothered in butter.  OK - so it is immediate artery clog and cardiac arrest, but it is worth it.  With a bit of golden syrup on top, it was a great dish.

I think that Kai Kee is better than Tsui Wah, but that they are both good.  I will definitely return for more spaghetti and french toast.  

Tsui Wah is usually a decent option and this branch is no exception.

We came here on a Friday night and were seated immediately.  

We ordered an iced butter pineapple bun, pork chop curry, fried rice noodles and milk tea.

The noodles were good - not too oily.  The milk tea was good - not the best in HK, but acceptable.

The curry was nice - it was that sweet 'Malaysian style' that is so popular in HK.  The pork chop was well cooked and went well with the curry.

The bo lo yau was pretty good and with the cold butter made for a pleasant mouthful.

The service was good enough too.

The thing with Tsui Wah is that it never blows your mind, but it hits the spot.  The food is good, but not incredible, the service is average.  The price is good and you get good value for money.  Some people don't much care for it, but it is a solid option for quick tasty HK classics.

We were pretty excited about going to Boomshack and really wanted it to be good.  Unfortunately, I was not.

The service was very friendly and the girls who took our order and served us, were very nice and accommodating.  The food, however, did not live up to the service.

We ordered some beet fries, a chicken waffle and sme char siu tacos.

The good - the fries.  These were good.  Crispy and sweet, they hit the spot.  The pathetic thimble of sauce that they came with was utterly insufficient though.  

The bad - the chicken waffle.  In the States, fried chicken is served alongside the waffle.  Here they sandwich the chicken between two small waffles and glue them with cheese.  The result - soggy fried chicken.  It tasted like cheap shop bought chicken and the whole thing was a mess.  Again, insuffient sauce. 

The ugly - the tacos.  And they were really bad.  I have to say, that these were one of the worst things I have put in my mouth for a really long time.  This is one of those cases of an interesting idea becoming a poorly executed nightmare.  The meat was nasty and the tough lean meat was held together with luke-warm fat and sinew.  Yuck.  Also, it was swimming in grease.  We actually poured out oil from the tacos.  They were disgusting.

The real kicker is that this place is pretty expensive.  For quite small portions of badly cooked food, we paid over the odds.