RenHK's Profile

What is it with these high ratings?!! I was quite shocked at the poor quality of the food here. The surroundings are comfortable, and the service was friendly, but to me, the taste of the food is paramount. In fact, I once had an amazingly good steamed pork on a Korean Airline flight that was so much better than the same dish at Antidote, which was tasteless and the meat was not fresh, sliced too thickly, and wrapped in lettuce instead of the usual fragrant vegetable leaf. The fried chicken was the worst I've ever had; the chicken was not fresh, the thick coating overwhelmed the meat, and the sauce was as sweet as candy. It was not even close to the fried chicken sold at a little food stall called 'Korea Food' on King's Road that closed down. I just don't understand. I for one would never eat at Antidote again.…Read More

Such a great deal for good honest Korean food! It’s a humble takeout counter only, next to a busy bus stop. The sweet and spicy fried chicken is delicious, crispy, fresh tender chicken with no bones, comes with a bit of pickled radish, as it should! You have to wait about 15 minutes for that, but it is so worth the wait. Everything I’ve tried is good: seafood soup, spicy pork, glass noodles, bibimbap. Warning: bibimbap has no beef, nor does the glass noodles dish, but they are both delicious, with very fresh veggies.…Read More

Previously named just 'il Bel Paese', this has been around for a long time, but its reviews seem to have disappeared from OpenRice.Those who stop in just for the market (which I used to do) or for the apperitivs or for brunch are totally missing out. The secret is that this place makes delicious Italian food without gimmicks and at a reasonable price, and is open all day.The environment is casual and in reasonable weather, the front windows are open to the sidewalk. I have enjoyed a wide variety of dishes here, but here are some recent favorites: the Spaghetti Carbonara used to be better, but is still good enough for me to crave it. The Octopus Salad is delicious, with a generous helping and just-right in tenderness and refreshing flavors. I'm not a big Bolognese sauce fan, but theirs is really good. The Osso Bucco with Saffron Rice is AMAZING! We tried it on the recommendation of the hostess. It was a big helping, but we were warned of that, so we did some sharing. Wow, delicious.Their menu has changed, but I have not been disappointed by their new offerings. This seems to suggest good management and a solid chef.I must put a warning here that the food here seems quite authentic Italian, and has not been tailored as much to local habits. For example, the pasta is really al-dente, Carbonara sauce is not full of cream, and the Bolognese sauce is not ultra-sweet. This could explain why it is mostly expats and western travellers who love this place, so the rating on tripadvisor, for example is 4.5 out of 5 stars. To me, it just tastes like honestly good food, not dumbed down or dressed up. That's the way I like it.…Read More

We still call this place "Il Bel Paese", and indeed it has not changed that much. After a slight remodelling and renaming, and some changes to the menu, I still find the food is fantastic. The ambience is casual but nice, with a small grocery area in the back, and doors open to the sidewalk when weather permits. Most importantly, the food is delicious: fresh and honest, without any gimmicks. There are different specials on offer at different times, and my experience is that they have been terrific. The pastas are wonderful (I used to be indifferent to Spaghetti Carbonara until I tasted it here; now it is one of my favorites), the roasted chicken is succulent, and everything else I've had here over the years has been great. This place is a jewel. The only thing that has changed much is the choice of desserts. They don't seem to be Italian anymore. The one I have tried on the new menu is the white chocolate cheese cake, which I only ordered because it was recommended. (I mean, are cheesecakes Italian, and what is "white chocolate" but "NOT chocolate"?) Well, I'll have to admit it was quite delicious.This restaurant is also reasonably priced, by Hong Kong standards, a great value for money.…Read More

Why are so many horrible burger places receiving so many good reviews on openrice? This is one of them. Yuck, totally disgusting burger with freezer-burned burger patties. Why would anyone eat here more than once? Maybe it's a small step up from McDonald's? It's not even that cheap! I don't understand.…Read More

It's obvious that the most important ingredient of a good burger is fresh, tasty beef. Without this, all the crispy fries, fancy toppings, and crunchy buns are pointless. The beef patty at Big Bite is so obviously frozen and thus mushy and tasteless, making it essentially no better than McDonald's.  I suppose most people don't care, but real burger lovers beware: if you really love a good fresh beef burger, this is not the place for you.…Read More

The fries were okay: crispy with a layer of cheese. (No one asked if I wanted it with cheese, but okay.) The bun was crispy and light: quite good. The toppings included fried onion rings, also good. One piece of bacon in the "Texas Burger", properly cooked but a rather stingy portion. The real problem was the meat itself, obviously once frozen. I made the mistake of ordering it "medium rare" which I regretted upon the first bite. It was mushy, kind of disgusting when it is raw meat thawed from frozen. You may not mind if you order your hamburger medium or well done. For those who think that quality beef is the essential element of a good burger, all the dressing-up doesn't save it from being a truly mediocre burger indeed.…Read More

A waitress GRABBED MY WRIST while I was reaching for food with my chopsticks and SHOOK IT. Why?!Because they had accidentally placed an item on our table that we had not ordered. My husband couldn't remember if it was something he had ordered or not, so we started digging in. Other items arrive, and we are busy eating and chatting, when a few waitresses come over to our table to check us out. They tell us we are eating someone else's food. The Cantonese speaker among us tells them we didn't realize, but that it was their mistake for having placed it on our table.Seeing as how we had already eaten 2/3rd of it, I continue to eat this, thinking it was no big deal if they added it our bill. But as I reached out with my chopsticks and picked up one of those items, a hand grabs my wrist and shakes until I drop the item. She then swiped away the dish in question, meanwhile yelling some nasty comments at me.When I turned to complain, not only did I not get any apologies from this woman, all the other waitresses looked on as though I was being the unreasonable one. Then when I went to pay, I asked to speak to the manager. Apparently, there is none on staff. The person working the register gave me a sarcastic "What's the problem?", and when I described the grabbing of my wrist, and asked it this is the way they treated their customers, she merely smirked and said, "I don't know."The food is only just okay, certainly not good enough to make me submit myself to this horrific service. If it were just the one woman, I might forget it, but the entire restaurant gave me the same cold shoulder. I am never going back.…Read More

It's a mystery to me how this place has survived all these years, and why there are so many good reviews on Openrice. Because of all the misleading advice here and by acquaintances, I have been here 3 times over the years, hoping the reason why I thought the food was horrible before was because I had ordered badly, or it was an "off" day for the chef.On the last visit, I found the food consistently HORRIBLE, bringing back the memory of the former 2 visits from years ago! Not a single dish was fresh or tasty. This lack of good flavor is somewhat masked over by the hot chili peppers, but Sichuanese food is NOT just about how SPICY it is. Good Sichuanese is a balance of flavors, and fragrance is just as important or even more important than how spicy it is. The food here can be ordered super spicy, if you like, but that doesn't make it taste good.Indeed, there are many mainlanders here, but that doesn't mean the food is authentic. I believe the rave reviews and the crowds are caused by the low standard of Sichuanese food in Hong Kong overall. It's true that I have had many even WORSE Sichuanese food experiences in this city. I suppose for those people who live in Hong Kong and like spicy food, there is very little choice, so standards drop as they desperately look for something spicy. Next thing they know, they are raving over terrible Sichuanese food like the food here at Little Chili, just because of their desperate craving for spicy food.I will not make the mistake of going a 4th time, and I write this review so other people who love AUTHENTIC Sichuanese cuisine will not make the same mistake I did. I guess I must be the fool for falling for this place 3 times!…Read More

This little jewel of a restaurant is on a side street in Happy Valley. You would never find it if someone didn't direct you there. I'm so pleased that someone did so for me!I've eaten here twice. The first time, the dish that left the deepest impression on me was the green papaya salad. It was fresh, tangy, spicy, and really flavorful. All the rest of the meal was also terrific, but this dish was a stand-out, all the more so because it is so commonly found. It made me realize that all the others I had tasted in Hong Kong were just wrong, including my former favorite pseudo-Thai place, Thai Basil.This last time, the green papaya salad was lack-luster. I was really disappointed, and when the hostess came to ask me how it was, I told her honestly how I felt. She said she would tell the chef. I feared they had lost their former chef, but she assured me they had not.We were very happy to find that ALL the rest of the meal was fabulous! The Gai Yang (Grilled Chicken), was fresh and really tasty. The fried fish chunks were fresh and perfectly crispy but not heavy, with a tangy, sweet, hot sauce just like I remember tasting in Thailand. Also amazing was the fried rice with shrimp paste, full of flavor! Maybe we should have gotten steamed white rice for the green curry dish, which was also terrific, but we were already stuffed. But happily stuffed!There are only several tables in a small, tastefully decorated environment, seems to be a place for regulars, but it's also great for a romantic dinner for two.The hostess and waitress were both extremely nice and attentive. The hostess spoke English very well, while the waitress was struggling (she told me she had just arrived in Hong Kong), but her innocent smile made me hope that harsh city life would not wipe that away.We all walked out smiling ourselves. Definitely a place to come back to! Hopefully, the chef will return to his outstanding green papaya salad, and it will be perfect!…Read More

This is supposedly Chau Chiu style food, but the Chau Chiu specialties were not very good: the cold fish was small and not very fresh, the "lu rou" pork was tough and fatty at the same time, in other words the pork was not fresh to begin with. The chicken feet with peanuts was soggy, overcooked.  The vegetable was okay, a standard Cantonese dish.The worse thing was the bill: $340. The food was barely okay as chachanting food, but at that price, it was a total fraud. There are plenty of good Chau Chiu restaurants in this city. This is not one of them.No wonder it was empty on a Friday at 6:30. We thought we were just early.…Read More

There was a special Christmas menu on the first day we went, stopping by on a whim. We ordered: Chestnut and Italian Sausage soup, and Mixed Grilled Meats from that special menu, both AMAZINGLY good. Though not available usually, it shows the skill of the chef. Each generous helping of meat (which included lamb, beef, chicken) was perfectly cooked and flavored, with nice little vegetable sides nicely presented on a slate slab. I haven't had such good tasting meat in a long time. So much for my thoughts of becoming a vegetarian.The Chestnut soup was also delicious - thick, slightly sweet, with bits of sausage to add a touch of chewy texture - great on a cold day.We also had the Spicy Pizza - also great! Not too spicy, but enough to give it a bite, topped with pepperoni.The tiramisu, a dessert that in my opinion has been destroyed by its own popularity, was enthusiastically recommended to me by the host that evening, so I overcame my reluctance and tried it. Was I glad I did! NOT the usual tiramisu, with gelato at the bottom and some crunchy bits of amaretto inside the fresh creamy parts, it was delicious!In short, everything was cooked beautifully, much more than we expected in this casual-looking cafe setting.The place was rather empty, but we were there early and it was the holiday week when expats are mostly out of town. Nevertheless, made me worry that this gem will not last.Hankering for the pizza, we went back on 2nd of January, a Monday. It wasn't quite as good; I'm guessing it was the chef's day off.…Read More