Pepper-vini's Profile

We came for a modern Italian Michelin one-star experience, and I’m happy to report that’s exactly what we got. We came for the three course lunch menu and added the dessert. This gave us each one appetizer, one pasta, and one main, plus the dessert. We basically ordered one of each menu item that didn’t require a surcharge. We were certainly tempted bythe caviar and the lobster items, but alas, maybe next time. And we will be going back once the menu changes for the next season. Everything we ordered was exquisite. And all of the dishes had character, care, and creativity, from the truffle scallops to the Iberico pork. Overall just a fantastic experience. One Michelin star might not be enough! …Read More

We came for the lunch set just to try. I think it’s OK, but I’m not sure I would return. It looks like a very well-run restaurant and kitchen, and the decor is very nice, but I found it lacking in overall taste and value, even for the lunch set. It’s unique, and I want it to succeed, and the vibe and concept is great. But I really do believe there is some room for improvement on execution. The appetiser was pretty good. We ordered foie gras (extra charge) and rillettes. The first was a hit; the second a miss. The foie gras was very good. Definitely up to the standard, and the jam was wonderful and had a slight spicy kick to it. But it felt a bit steep as a $98 surcharge on a $198 set lunch given the portion size. I found the salad for the rillettes slightly underseasoned, and the greens were less than spectacularly fresh, with the slightest touch of browned edges, so it lost some points there. More importantly, the rillettes was dry and crumbly. In my experience, rillettes should be moist and spreadable. The mains were ok. Both came with fries, which we found slightly overcooked and under-seasoned, and without much duck flavor overall. They were thin and dark and a bit too crispy. Somewhat disappointing. Both came with green beans also. These were perfectly cooked, but was definitely heavy on the garlic and salt. I didn’t mind, but it was definitely the most flavorful thing on the plate. I ordered the duck breast. It was excellently cooked. However, the reduction sauce was not seasoned very much with either herbs or salt. Overall the dish was just missing that full-on duck flavor. My wife got the confit. It was ok, but a bit drier than it should be. We didn’t notice and herbs coming through the flavor, and the duck flavor itself was pretty subdued. I feel like this one was a miss. It was definitely a competent confit, but again—details. Overall it was just okay. My hopes were set higher, but maybe that’s on me. I genuinely hope they can make the best duck in Hong Kong. All the pieces are there. Hopefully, it’s a matter of time. A final note: we were charged $28 each for still water. The server asked if we want still or sparkling at the beginning, and generally places only charge for sparkling, so we went with still. Had I known they would charge us anyway, I would have gone sparkling. (Although I don’t know if that would have been more expensive.) I feel like this should really be on the set lunch menu. It’s not unreasonable to expect free water at HK restaurants. …Read More

We came here on a whim on a Sunday and book through open rice. The brunch special is very reasonable, so long as you are ok with a limited menu. But it did the job well, since now I’m curious about the a la carte menu, which also looks quite good. The kitchen looks well staffed and We ordered two brunch specials, which each came with a choice of soup or salad. We ordered one soup and one salad, both of which were fine. The soup was borderline underseasoned, but I didn’t mind, since I find many restaurant soups salty and basically inedible. The mains were just fine. We enjoyed the steak and lasagne. I do wish there were more pasta dishes on the brunch menu, but perhaps we’ll have to come back later for that. …Read More

This was not my everyday ifc dining experience—in the best sort of way. I’ve seen several restaurants come and go at this location over the years and I’m thrilled that a place like this exists and I hope it succeeds.The concept is simple: a bowl of rice with a beef patty on top. But the deliciousness is in the details, and oh boy are there details. You get 3 patties and endless rice for a fixed price of $138 and it felt like a very good value. You’re also entitled to one raw egg of extremely high quality, and the complementary water is flavoured with mint and lemon. There were a few add-ons you could get (a plate of kimchi or a meaty potato salad) but we passed. (I was envying the kimchi plate the whole time, though.)For each of the three patties, you have an assortment of sauces (and a raw egg) to complement the rice bowl. Our favorite sauce was the lemon one, which added a nice zest to an otherwise very hearty and rich meal. The bean sauce and complimentary pickled cabbage was also a nice touch. The main attraction was highly competent. The chefs grill the patties to perfection right in front of you over charcoal. It’s a fun spectacle and adds to the charm. The patties were juicy, tender, and flavourful, and the rice was of exceptional quality. Overall highly recommended. I’d come back here. I will say that booking is apparently pretty competitive so you may have to exercise some patience there. We saw a few successful walk-ins though, so perhaps you can try your luck. Also, citypop. Excellent soundtrack to a fun meal. …Read More

Four of us came here for dinner. We arrived early (around 5:30) without a reservation and were promptly seated. The place was full by the time we left, so I’d definitely recommend booking ahead. I don’t typically comment on interiors but I will say the setting and decor is really lovely. It’s a cozy space but the ceiling is high. The wait staff was also professional and friendly. Now onto the food: I’ve had some Lebanese food before, but I’m not supremely refined regarding authenticity. I do know what I like, though, and I can say that the flavor palettes for the dishes we got were satisfyingly complex for me. We only ordered two things: the hummus and pita mezze and the Mashewe Mshakal, which is a large plate of skewered and roasted goodies for 4. All of it was quite good. The hummus was silky smooth and had a nutty flavor that I quite appreciated. The paprika was also surprisingly flavourful and was a lovely touch. It reminded me of a proper hummus shop in Europe. My only gripe is that they didn’t give enough pita, but more on that later. Our main dish, the Mashewe Mshakal, was quite good—an assortment of roasted/grilled skewers and bits of meat and veggies and some grilled pita on the side. The meat was cooked and seasoned well and it felt like a decent portion for 4—just decent, though. The lamb chops bordered on comically small, but flavourful. I’d recommend this dish if you come as a group of 4. My main complaint about this restaurant is the value. I found the pita portion a bit stingy and absent this dish, I think I would have felt a bit underwhelmed by the price for the portions of the other dishes I saw being served. They were also a bit stingy with the pita—not nearly enough for all the hummus and side sauces. What we ordered felt like a good value though, so I would recommend it if you’re price sensitive. Otherwise, ordering strategically is recommended. The roasted cauliflower dish also seemed popular and well-enjoyed. I’m sure it’s good, but there’s just a part of me that can’t pay $248 for a cauliflower, and it won out. If you’re not as stingy as I am and just want to enjoy some quality Lebanese food, I’d recommend visiting. …Read More

It’s a deceptively simple concept: salad, steak, and endless fries. No mess, no fuss, no decisions to be made other than what to drink and how to cook your steak. All of the above are of excellent quality. Our steak (ribeye) was very lean but surprisingly tender and cooked to perfection. It’s served with two lovely sauces and a veritable mountain of frites that just keep coming. The staff was also very friendly and professional. There’s not really all that much to say other than it’s a great dining experience in a fun atmosphere, and the value is there. Highly recommended and I would return. One thing I might say is that the fries were a bit heavy on the salt for my liking. They were still delicious, but next time I might ask for a bit less. Another thing I might note is that the steak comes out on a hot plate with a candle underneath. This is great for the presentation and for keeping the steak warm, but if you unscrupulously leave your steak directly over the flame, you can expect it to be a bit more cooked than you ordered by the end of the meal—just something to note. Finally worth mentioning is that they have recently started taking reservations. I remember for years walking by en route to other places in soho on numerous evenings and seeing the impressive queue but I never mustered up the patience to give them a try. I would definitely recommend making a reservation. …Read More

Popped in for dinner after a workout and was not disappointed. Lung Kee is a classic, competent HK canteen with a full menu worth exploring. What really brought me inside as I was walking by was the fact that they had dinner sets. It’s not the cheapest I’ve ever had, but I found the portion to be generous and the quality is there, at least for my dish. I got the G set, which included a selection of 5 meat/protein items from the bbq. The soup was hearty too. One thing to note is that the dinner set menu is only in Chinese and displayed in the TV. I was pleasantly surprised that one of the staff members started deciphering the menu for me while I was trying to read it myself. This I found quite welcoming. I noticed a lot of people eating a lot of different things on the menu, so I’m looking forward to working my way through the different dishes if I come back. At any rate, I’d definitely recommend it. …Read More

I had been to this restaurant and reviewed it many years ago but decided to give it a go again for reasons even I don’t fully understand. I just wanted something inexpensive, satisfying, and not fried from a different area of China, and I’m happy to report that’s exactly what I got. I ordered the original set: it came with cold seasoned flat noodles, a roujiamo 肉夾饃 (call it a Chinese hamburger) and a drink on the side, all for $58. I must say it was an impressive value, which was indeed the meal’s more remarkable feature. The roujiamo was stuffed with meat and the noodle bowl was mighty full. As for the flavor, well, it was alright. I can’t give it accolades for authenticity, as I’ve had the real thing many times before and this was definitely a bit shy of the mark, but still satisfying. One thing worth mentioning is that the payment system is unique. They don’t accept cash, but they do accept Alipay and WeChat Pay, as well as Octopus. I asked if they took Apple Pay and she said “no”, but I saw a Visa logo on the payment device, so perhaps there’s a chance. Just something to be aware of. Overall, not a bad spot for an inexpensive something different around HKU. …Read More

Maybe 2 years ago a friend of mine said that Alvy’s was no good, so I never gave it a try. Fast forward and now Alvy’s is a regular happy hour spot for us. First, they have a good beer selection, although I don’t often make enough use of it. I’m a big fan of the Young Master “classic” beer, so I’ll usually share a pitcher of that with friends. I’ve tried others too that I like, and the list is always changing. Second, their pizza is fun, interesting, and quite good. They have a real pizza oven, use high quality dough, and the price is normal. They of course have many standard pies—pepperoni, nduja, spinach, and your other various assorted toppings—but they also have My current favorite is the Bak Gwei pizza, which combines char siu roast pork, gruyere, green onions, and ginger. It’s really quite special. My second favorite is the Ma La Di Da, which has Sichuan peppercorns, spicy fried chilis and garlic, nduja sausage, and pepperoni. Another favorite of mine, though less exotic, is the meatball pizza. For some reason I really enjoy the meatball seasoning. Their appetisers are good too. The buffalo wings always hit the spot, and any of the dishes that use their pizza dough, like their baba ganoush and “shmear” appetiser. I can’t speak to their other dishes, as we usually just go for pizza, beer, and apps. Third, the happy hour specials are fantastic. Go before 7 (on weeknights) to enjoy lower priced beers, pizzas, and apps. That being said, it’s still a quality experience at the full price, and arriving for happy hour seldom means leaving during it. …Read More

We came here to the Causeway Bay location on a hunch were intrigued by the the 1k positive reviews. The location is interesting too, with partial outdoor dining on CWB’s Fashion Walk food street. Unfortunately, we were very disappointed with our meal, so the location is the only thing I can give this place an unambiguous compliment on. We started with the chicken tenders and guacamole cheese fries. I was very impressed by the tenders. They were tiny, but very flavourful. I especially enjoyed the breading, which seemed more well done than in other places I’ve been to. The BBQ sauce was solid too. Actually, I’ll give two compliments: the location and the tenders. These are really pretty good. The guacamole cheese fries were, well, what they were. Fries, cheese, and guacamole. None was exceptional really, and the fries could have used more time cooking. Overall a solid “meh”. But then came the burgers, and oof were they rough. I ordered the mushroom burger—they add sliced mushrooms to the standard beef burger—and my wife ordered the jalapeño burger (same idea). The burgers came out already cut in half. I could see why they would want to do this, and in fact maybe they needed to do it because of how small the bun is relative to the patty, but nobody cuts my burger. You could ask them not to cut it I’m sure, but I just never expected it to come like that so I didn’t think to ask. Worse though was that when you looked inside the burger you were greeted with a grey mass of greasy mush. I really can’t emphasise enough how greasy it was. I knew it would be greasy from all the pictures and the other menu items—some featuring many ounces of cheese, foie gras, *double* foie gras, and so on, but even the humble mushroom burger was a sopping mess. Additionally there was hardly any taste. I don’t know what kind of beef you need to achieve this—to taste nothing but fat and grey goo instead of real beef flavour—but it was impressively bland. And yet somehow, the fat flavour was so overwhelming I couldn’t taste anything else. I could barely tell the difference between my burger and my wife’s, aside from the occasional kick of desperation from a jalapeño begging to be noticed. The patty was definitely oversized and under-flavoured. I definitely would not return nor would I recommend this place. …Read More

I had been told by a friend that this place was very good, so I finally decided to try it with another friend. The long and short of it is that while I was impressed by some of the innovative additions and takes on the various elements of a classic ramen, on the whole I wasn’t terribly impressed. Let me start with the appearance. As you can see below, the presentation is thoroughly interesting in terms of ramen, with a delightfully oversized bowl, meat hanging over the side, and a brown mass of deep fried goodness. When I dug in, however, I was met with a slow but certain impetus towards mediocrity. The soup base was chicken flavoured rather than pork flavoured, and the texture of the soup was a bit creamier than normal. I might have been okay with this if the soup itself wasn’t so salty. It was almost like a chicken flavoured Tsukemen broth that was nevertheless over salted, and indeed I couldn’t imagine enjoying a Tsukemen version of this broth. The meat on the side felt a bit odd too, especially the piece of pork. I don’t know how it was processed or cooked, but I didn’t care for the texture, and the flavour was bland on its own. It just felt weird for a chicken based ramen to have a slab of processed pork draped over the side of the bowl. The other piece of meat was a sliced chicken breast, and that, on the other hand, was really delicious. The most interesting thing was the extravagant deep fried sweet potato slice. As it softened in the broth, both the flavours of the broth and the sweet potato were able to come out. If I saw this garnish in particular at other ramen places, I would probably order it. Finally, the portion was decent, and the price was standard I think if not just a bit much, but I didn’t feel ripped off. …Read More

We went here the other day purely because the Instagram advertisement for one of their chicken dishes—honey mustard curry I think—got stuck in my head. For this reason, I was expecting some over the top flavour on top of juicy, succulent chicken, but really all we got was *some* flavour over some pretty dry chicken. It was really disappointing, and not cheap. We ordered two chicken dishes, a Caesar salad, and a kimchi pancake, and 2 beers. Everything was mediocre at best. We ordered with the intention of doing lots of take away to share with a friend, so we purposely over-ordered. That said, our bill came out to about $850 and I don’t think we will be returning. It’s not quite a ripoff, but the food quality just wasn’t there for me. Here’s why:The Caesar salad we ordered just because we knew that there wouldn’t be much in the way of vegetables otherwise for this meal. It was a good call, and a serviceable salad. However, it had some seasoning on top that I can only describe as “dust” that made for a strange texture. Otherwise the salad was fine. The kimchi pancake was not a great introduction to the genre. It was a bit greasy, which I expected, but the batter was also quite thick and starchy, and there was surprisingly little in the way of kimchi flavour. It wasn’t terribly impressive. Now for the main attraction: the chicken. We ordered two different chicken dishes, one sauced the other dry. The first was a half-half mixture of smokey bbq flavored and “volcano” flavoured, which is named for the spice factor I presume. As you can see, the pieces aren’t exactly swimming in sauce here. We were expecting the pieces to be oozing and dripping with this mess of a sauce, but this was a glaze at best. Worse though was that inside the chicken was rather dry. You could dip the pieces in the sauce for a bit better texture, but really there wasn’t much in the way of chicken flavour, the pieces having been considerably dried out. The sauces were serviceable at best. The smokey bbq sauce might have passed for a decent American bbq sauce, though a bit less sweet, and the volcano sauce was similar, just with spice instead of smokey flavour. The volcano sauce was the more interesting of the two, but still not terribly impressive. After we decided to commit to doing take away, we ordered another chicken dish, this time dry. We wanted to test the flavour of the batter and seasonings on their own without any glaze, so we ordered the spicy version of the dry chicken. Dry indeed it was. Really dry. The chicken, the batter, the bones—everything was dry. There was again not much in the way of flavour, both for the chicken itself and for the batter, and this time certain pieces of batter were uncomfortably crunchy, due again to dryness. I wanted to like this place, I really did, but it’s just too pricey and mediocre. I’ve enjoyed the chicken from Jollibee and KFC more than I enjoyed this, which really shouldn’t be the case with this price tag. …Read More

The title really says it all. I had an appointment nearby and found an interesting collection of shops tucked away next to Braemer Hill Rd. My coffee shop luck has been pretty crummy overall in HK, so I wasn't expecting much. But to my surprise, I found the shop quite good indeed. I ordered a double macchiato (my standard drink when I'm not sure about the coffee somewhere, since this way the flavor is diluted if it's not very good) and to my surprise the aroma was both fruity and full bodied. I'm sure I would have been very satisfied had I ordered a more potent drink, but this was enough to let me know this place means business. The price was $27hk, which is much better than, say, Fuel in Central, but in a much more charming location. The decor is pretty neat. On the one hand, it's plain and quite urban, like some other coffee shops I've been to in HK, but one interesting thing that stood out was a tube amplifier for the sound system, an old Dynaco no less! It was indeed working with what looked to be a CD player. I found this also to be a neat surprise. I also ordered a salmon croissant. It was serviceable: the salmon was fine and the croissant was flaky and seemed to be reheated properly. Overall a great find!…Read More

I've never had Japanese curry before, previously believing that it would just be too rich and salty. My wife suggested this place as a reliable purveyor of Japanese curry, and indeed it delivered a lovely Japanese curry experience that has left me now able to truthfully say that I enjoy Japanese curry. I would recommend this place to those who haven't had it before and want to give it a try. (Admittedly, I cannot recommend this place for an expert on Japanese curry, as I lack the experience.) We ordered two dishes and those were plenty. One excellent feature of the restaurant is that it allows you to select how much rice you would like, including smaller portions, so you don't have to worry about having a mountain of rice you can't finish. Additionally, there are multiple rice options, including multigrain options to make things a tad healthier. I felt quite comfortable with the small, multigrain rice portion especially given the decadence of the rest of the dish. The first we got was the fried pork chop with an omelette curry. The pork was tender and juicy and the egg was light and fluffy, all surrounded by a lovely plain curry sauce and stuffed with multigrain rice. It was a winner.The other dish we got was a cheese-stuffed chicken burger with vegetable curry. The option to have veggies in the curry was also a nice surprise and added to the overall texture of the dish, as without the veggies the texture would have been kind of bland. I really enjoyed this creation, and found myself genuinely surprised at how jiucy the chicken was, as I half expected it to be more dry. One thing I will say is that this place is in some ways below HK standards on it's spice level. (I am a spice lover and frequently underwhelmed by HK spice.) There were a number of spice levels (5 I think) and I picked medium while my wife picked less spicy. Unfortunately, for my own dish, there was barely a kick---some, but really not much---while for my wife's dish I couldn't taste any spiciness. When we come back, which we will I'm sure, I know to go straight for the max spice level, which I trust will be pleasant for my spice-loving tastebuds. This isn't really a complaint so much as it is a suggestion that if you're a spicy food enthusiast, be ambitious when making your selection. …Read More

I first visited this shop 6 years ago and it was one of the first places I ate in Hong Kong. I thought it was good, but I didn't know any better. Now, after living here for 5 years, I still think it's one of the best shops for local food. I also just realized that I haven't yet written a review for one of my favorite dinner spots, I figured it was about time to write a little something.This place is a treasure. it is a classic, Cantonese dai pai dong 大排檔 with decent prices and a few stand out dishes. It is consistently good, reliable, and usually packed, so come early for dinner (before 7pm i'd say) especially with a big group. The most highly recommended dishes for me are the garlic fried chicken (ask for this as soon as you sit down because they sometimes run out), eggplant in clay pot, cuttlefish cake, sweet and sour pork, clams in black bean sauce, and fried calamari. Whenever we come here, we get these dishes without fail. In the past I've also enjoyed the black pepper beef stir fry. Overall this place is a gem and if your in western district or near HKU and looking for a fun, excellent quality, dai pai dong experience, come to this place. …Read More