6 days 5 nights in Hong Kong－Day 4

Remember I mentioned about stressing out eating in Lin Heung Tea House for Dim Sum, it’s still worth the experience for first-timer. Sitting with perfect strangers at the big round table, the uncle serving you tea with a straight face and at a speed where the cups go clinking around and knocking on the glass table. You don’t get to eat unless you go chasing after the lady who pushes the Dim Sum cart around the restaurant. If you’re lucky enough you might get the Dim Sum you had in mind. We noticed someone who does not speak Cantonese/Chinese attempted to ask the aunty about the kind of Dim Sum served on the cart. Don’t even bother doing that because she doesn’t know how to respond to you and she probably will not even respond at all. The portions though are pretty big; so if you still want to try as much as you can for whatever Dim Sum comes your way, eat with a larger group of people.

Lin Heung Tea House

Address: 160-164 Wellington Street, Central (5-min walk from Exit E1, Sheung Wan MTR Station)

You can hardly miss this shop at the corner due to the crowd

We managed to grab the popular Lotus Seed Paste Bun, and lo and behold, it is indeed very rich in texture and fragrance.  Beside it being huge which could easily fill up half of stomach for small eaters, this would be the only dish that stood out for me among the rest. 

Rice noodle roll (known as 'Chee Cheong Fun'), because my partner go chasing after each cart and we are lucky enough to get pretty standard Dim Sum dishes to try out.

This is again another filling portion of lotus leaf rice and I am nearly full by then

Afterwards, we headed to Lan Fong Yuen for their reputable milk tea. I am going to make a comparison between the milk tea from Lan Fong Yuen and the one we drank at Kum Wah Cha Chaan Teng in Mong Kok. The one in Kum Wah is much richer and thicker in taste even without adding sugar. You go give it a try!

Lan Fong Yuen

Address: 2 Gage St, Central, Hong Kong

I simply find it fascinating to have these hand gloves as water filter.

Milk tea in-the-making

It’s not challenging to spot this mural because where the crowds are, that’s where this mural is. If you stand there long enough you’ll know it’s actually not easy to capture that ‘perfect’ shot after all. Like the one in Choi Hung Estate, except that you have cars, cabs, and trucks driving up the slope in a fast speed constantly. And of course you do not want the others in your photos so there’s automatically a queue to cross over the street for your turn.

We reached PMQ (Police Married Quarters) rather early and the shops remain close as they mainly open from 11am onwards. We hang around for a while and dropped by Goods of Desire (G.O.D) for their funky local designer’s products. There are plenty of designer’s goods and are costly as expected.

PMQ

Address: No.35 Aberdeen Street, Central, Hong Kong

Garden Meow Café

Address: HG01-HG05, G/F, Block B Hollywood, PMQ, 35 Aberdeen Street, Central, Hong Kong

This café at PMQ however has a really pretty ambience decorated with vintage items, books about cats, and uniquely collected rare items. I won’t be able to review the food as we did not dine in but you may check out from here.

We walked down the lane after leaving PMQ towards Cat Street (Upper Lascar Row) and you’ll find cozy café along the way. According to a local friend who had breakfast at Grassroots Pantry, the food and drinks there is moderate and pricy.

It’s Christmas and many stalls I supposed weren’t opened. But this 200-meter road is where you will find affordable junk-store knick-knacks and Chinese Communist Propaganda items.

You simply cannot miss eating at “Dai Pai Dong” in Hong Kong. The hygiene around the area is better than I expected but I wouldn’t look into the details when eating here. Hah!

Sing Kee

Address: 9-10 Stanley St, Central

Anyway, the food recommended turned out to be really good! We ordered Pepper Salt Squid, Claypot Chicken and just a bowl of rice to share. Both the dishes were very flavourful, though a little too salty after a while, but I am glad we were here.

The food hunt doesn’t end here. I included this specially designed Starbucks outlet in my to-go list, as it is known to have collaborated with designers from G.O.D. We waited for a short 15 mins to grab seats at the Bing Sutt corner surrounded with nostalgic signs, toys, tiles, and lamps, savouring and experiencing the fusion of food and ambience from both Eastern and Western culture.

Duddell Street Starbucks

Address: Shop M2, Mezzanine Floor, Baskerville House, 13 Duddell Street, Central

Later in the evening, we walked over to see if we could have an evening view from Victoria Peak. After seeing the extreme long queue, be it for the ticketing counter or to board the tram, we’ve decided to give it a miss today and we went to Harbour City instead.

We ain’t shopaholics and after window shopping for a bit, we went out of the building to enjoy the evening breeze and the harbour view.

We headed straight to Temple Street, a short walking distance from our hotel, and spotted Hing Kee Restaurant.

Hing Kee Restaurant

Address: 19 Temple St, Yau Ma Tei, Hong Kong

We went straight for the oyster egg, stir-fried clam with chili and fermented black bean sauce, with both being sensational and the cravings came creeping in more and more. The highly recommended claypot rice however did not reach our expectation. Despite after adding on the sauce on our own, we would prefer the claypot chicken rice back in Malaysia. As you can see most of the seats were occupied, you will need to queue up to be seated or sneaked in like we accidentally did. (We did not realize there was a queue and the table was cleared on time so we sat down and ordered). You will have to wait to order, wait for food, wait to pay, but their service attitude isn’t too bad.

This would be before pouring in the sauce, it does look a little too plain?

You will easily notice this muscular uncle pushing carts of claypot rice from the kitchen to the restaurant across the streets tirelessly. 

After dinner, my partner queued for his favourite beef brisket, and he regretted not getting the larger bowl as there were more varieties scooped into the larger bowl. Small portion, less variety, and I don't get to eat because there's no white radish in it. 

Beef Offal

Address: 18 Arthur Street, Yau Ma Tei

Before I share with you that I almost threw up because I was too full. Let’s see what else we ate after that.

While walking back to the hotel, we grabbed a black sesame soybean tofu. You may already notice I am such a fan of black sesame!

Right after the soybean tofu, we went for the steam milk pudding, which was already on my to-eat list. My partner did not enjoy the strong taste of milk it has as much as I did. It was steaming hot and smooth, but halfway through the bowl I knew I couldn’t have more of it and I needed to stand up and walk.

Yee Shun Milk Company

Address: 513 Nathan Road, Yau Ma Tei, Hong Kong

In short, reserve one evening to just keep on eating around Yau Ma Tei. You won’t have to particularly find out which shop to go to because there are plenty of options for the adventurous and spontaneous eater.

More activities happening tomorrow!

Love,

Christabel