georgegong's Profile

Pacific coffee is a very good place to get a decent cup of coffee.  The best way to describe the quality is to compare to another chain.  I would rate coffee taste, service, ingredient quality, and preparation as slightly better than Starbucks.  The Crema Scura add-on is even better.  The food is okay as it is prepackaged rather than made fresh.  For example, they have many pastries, sandwiches, yogurts, and American or Canadian cafe style breads.  I liked the crema scura coffee more than the regular coffee because it tasted more fresh.  However, perhaps it was just a personal preference other than based upon objective things.…Read More

Walking around the science park in the mid morning, and the place hardly had anyone walking around.  Come lunch time and the entire restaurant area fills with people.  We ended up choosing Dim-Sum to get out of the crowd.. and wow it was a good choice.  The restaurant is relatively clean and has a wide variety.  The service is about what I would expect in a business area... rather professional however not overly fawning over you. The food comes out well and good, and there is a television set.  Our meal had a few different varieties.  The pork buns were good.  Nothing spectacular.. nothing wrong with them.  They did have a good fragrance and were served straight from the steamer.The chicken feet had a good texture.  I prefer them soft, not chewy.  They had just enough chew to contrast with the softness so that they balance out.  It has a red pepper there, however I didn't think that it was spicy at all.OK.  Yee-mien or these noodles are really good.  It's something about this dish.  It's very simple.. yet comforting.  It has a good flavor to the noodle dough.  The BBQ pork was fresh.  I felt that they did a good job on this one.  However, watch out or you will fill up on this before tasting other things.They had a dessert that I did not see before.   The name was like 'Black Hearted Tart'.  The filling was like a hardened black sesame pudding.  It was just really fun to try this.  I felt that it tasted as expected.  The crust was a little flaky; however not too much.  The filling was a little dry in a thin layer on the very top; however not to the point of having problems chewing.  This wasn't bad.. however I probably thought the novelty of the tart was the best quality.…Read More

Wanted to try something different for coffee.. and found this upscale coffee place.  It was quite busy, however not any wait on that day.  The menu has a wide variety of filling that go well with coffee, such as seafood spaghetti, large sandwich, or French Toast.  I wanted lighter food so I tried the melon and ham.  The ham is a little salty and the melon is a little sweet.  That makes a very nice combination.The French press coffee that I ordered seemed to be measured to custom precision to both the brewing time and the customer's taste.  They give you the chance to choose which color mug to receive.  That was surprising, and was a little bit entertaining in a group setting.   They link together the person and the coffee making together.  I was not aware that they also give you an hourglass to time the brewing of the coffee.  I tried this.  This setup worked well, as the coffee was ready on time.  As to precision for the coffee.. I would say that they did a good grind for the French Press.  The trick that they mastered is to grind the beans precisely.  There were not many bits left at the bottom of the cup, as I have had before.   I liked the coffee choice that I made, because I took the coffee without sugar or milk.Overall I would recommend this place if you are in the area.  It is upstairs close to both the elevator and escalator systems in the very comfortable shopping center.…Read More

Tried this soup dumpling chain in the Sha Tin New Town Plaza.  Right away you can see a window with cooks making the dumplings.  The restaurant was very clean inside.  The staff was very to the point, that you must finish within a set amount of time.  Sort of a contract like, 'Get in, eat dumplings.. then get out.. more people need dumplings.'We ordered a few dishes and they were done well.  The pork soup dumplings were juicy.  However, dumplings with crab were not available that day.  The wonton with spicy sauce was well executed.  We tried sticky rice dumplings.  We ordered some lettuce, and it was not too oily.  All the dishes were cooked well.  My only wish is that crab dumplings were in season.So we were adventurous and tried dessert dumplings.  These were decent as well.  Overall a good package.  I expected, given the shopping mall's upscale nature, that the bill would be very high.  Although not the cheapest, it is a fair price for the immaculate clean tables, the hand rolling of the dumplings,  and spectacle of the dumpling folding outside.…Read More

It was amazing to find such a place in Hong Kong.  This is a bit of an old-fashioned British inspired sort of place, with displayed woodwork and reliable continental cuisine.  The menu is a heavy large book, with land and sea dishes.  The type of dishes are freshly made Caesar salad, rack of lamb, selection of fishes.  Classic dishes that are excellent when done well.The seafood was perfectly cooked.  The plating on the other dishes was not bad either.They have a bar downstairs, that I presume is open at night.  The atmosphere is such that if you do come here, know that it is classic fine dining.…Read More

The staff is very rude.  The food is not very good.  However this place is really cheap.  Some things to watch out for.  The chicken feet were very tough, and had a terrible texture.  Everything is very loaded with MSG.  You have to be careful if you are like me and get MSG headache after eating.   The staff is rude.  There is no bathroom to wash hands inside, so you have to exit the restaurant and go to the shopping mall.However this place is cheap.  So if you don't mind eating high MSG food that doesn't taste good if it is cheap.. this place is for you.  I did find better deals in the back streets.  However this is in a large shopping center and the place has air-conditioning.It's popular with people because of its location in a shopping center.. However you get to wait next to the construction refuse collection point, outside of the shopping mall, and next to the street.   The reason is that their entrance is outside.  If it is raining or 38C outside then bring an umbrella.…Read More

Simple sit-down place.  It is simple enough to order and get your food.  However the food was edible but not tasty.Not much to say here, as I only ordered one dish.  For a noodle soup place with a lot of branches, I would expect that this would be something to enjoy.  Unfortunately, it seems that you only go here if everything else is closed and if you don't mind mediocre food.  I didn't feel like giving it another try because the soup base was not tasty on the day that I went there.Menu…Read More

Good service and good looks.  Bad taste and terrible MSG feeling afterward.  The bill was the highest I paid per dish for Chinese food in Happy Valley.This place has a really well nicely done interior.  As you sit down, your orders are taken with an iPad.  They can change the language of the iPad very easily.  I also found that the customer service was very good.  My tea cup was filled by waiters as needed.  With all of this well appointed inside, I wondered where all the customers were.  Over the entire night only four or five parties came there.   We found out a hypothesis why people are staying away...Each dish looked very well done indeed.  It was impressive how well each looked.  If I had a business client I would think about this place.  However, the good appealing looks do not extend to the taste or health impact.Well, here is one hypothesis as to why not many people are not going there that evening.  The dishes were all very oily, when not expecting such feeling.  Having grown up on Hong Kong style Cantonese food, I was disappointed that much of the food was both too salty and too bland.  Especially I was disappointed in the BBQ roast pork (cha-siu).  The meat had looked very delicious.  However taking a taste, the meat was tough inside.. and the meat did not have a good natural flavor.  The outside marinade didn't go through.  The beef was too greasy.The feeling is that the food is not healthy.  Perhaps it was the dishes that I ordered.  I can't say for sure if there was a lot of MSG in the food; however I had a very large MSG headache afterward lasting throughout the night.  This required drinking a lot of water.  Our entire party felt this way.  It was strange that everything looks so visually appealing, and the service is so good and we felt this way. Our meal:…Read More

My group was on a mission in Happy Valley to try all of the Chinese places for lunch or dinner in one week.  The most appetizing food was here, because each piece was made with such high quality.  They made all of our dishes to order, and each one had higher quality than any of the others that I tried.  For example, the ha-gow shrimp dumplings seemed to have three or four times the normal shrimp inside each dumpling than ordinary.  And you simply taste fresh shrimp rather without any unpleasant after taste.  Although I took many pictures of the foods here and at other restaurants during my trip to Hong Kong, I ended up going here a few times on this trip and posting the photos many times.I found a review here that says this is expensive.  That didn't seem to be the case.   Each piece came with more food inside than a small order at most other pieces.  Also, I found that they adjusted the price to fit how many pieces that you wanted to order.   I also did not have an MSG headache.  This seems like a good deal.Photos from Dim-Sum Photos from Dinner With no MSG headache I could eat here more than once a week.…Read More