Summer Truffle Set Menu at [Cobo House]

Shek Tong Tsui is now a hip place with the MTR and Instagram Pier nearby.
I was here again to visit COCO House which is located right outside B2 exit.
COBO means Community of Bohemians.

At COBO HOUSE, they strive to let people experience the world with Bohemian style of living.
The restaurant is designed by Mr Adrian Cheng, Founder of K11 Art Foundation, and every object inside COBO HOUSE is collected and sourced by him from around the world.

They are now serving the Summer Truffle Set Menu which is in collaboration with the famous Italian truffle brand BOSCOVIVO.
(Available from now to 26 August.)
During the Summer Truffle Promotion period, BOSCOVIVO truffle products can also be purchased at COBO HOUSE.

Here are the dishes that I had in the Truffle set menu:

Hokkaido Scallops with Rainbow Tomato Salad and Summer Truffles
[Rainbow Tomato salad, beets, mango, green plum vinaigrette, summer truffle]
It was impressive how they presented this dish from the placement of the cherry tomatoes to the layering especially the way they managed to put different colours on each tomato stack.
The pan-roasted Hokkaido scallops are sashimi-grade hence the silky texture and it was refreshingly complimented by the black vinegar.

Truffle Scrambled Eggs with Wild Mushrooms and Parma Ham:
[Wild mushroom, baby spinach, crispy parma ham, truffle toast, summer truffle]
The second starter was a bit more filling as it was scrambled egg, there was a good layering which can be seen on the side of the glass.
At the bottom was fried wild mushrooms and black truffles, in the middle is Italian baby spinach, at the top is truffle scrambled eggs surrounded with Italian Parma ham crisps.
It was all in harmony as scrambled eggs, truffle and crispy parma ham can never go wrong.

For the mains, there is a choice of Cod or Beef.

Cod Fish with Braised Fennel
[Braised fennel, asparagus truffle pasta, lobster emulsion, summer truffle]
This was a lighter main compared to the beef but I loved the paring of fennel and the fish.

Lobster Emulsion and Black Truffle and Beef Fillet:
[carrot puree, beer onion, finger potato, truffle jus, summer truffle]
The beef Fillet was just how I liked it, perfectly pink and juicy in the middle complimented with my favourite root vegetables and mash.

Truffle Marsala Tiramisu dessert:
Jasmine rice sorbet, chocolate wind, summer truffle
As well as a good beginning, the end was good especially the Jasmine rice sorbet which had a fragrant strong taste of rice contrasted by the bitterness of the coffee bubble.

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COBO HOUSE
Address: G/F & 1/F, 8-12 South Lane Sai Wan, Hong Kong (HKU MTR Station Exit B2)
Business Hours: Lunch 12pm – 3 pm; Dinner 6pm – 11pm (Weekdays)
12pm – 11pm (Weekends)
Telephone: (852) 2656 3088 Email: info@cobohouse.com Website: www.cobohouse.com
FB: @COBOHOUSEHK (COBO HOUSE HONG KONG)
IG: @cobohousehk @ac_kaf #cobohousehk

White diamonds of ALBA at 8½ Otto e Mezzo Bombana

As the weather is cooling down, I took this opportunity to go Macau to experience the Grand Resort Deck at Galaxy.

8½ Otto e Mezzo Bombana has launched a white truffle menu as it is the season for white truffle so how could I not try it.

The white truffle menu has five courses which is available now until the end of January so I suppose you could book Christmas dinner there and spoil yourself with a White truffle Christmas dinner.

8½ Otto e Mezzo Bombana couldn't be a better place to go for white truffle Italian dishes because chef-owner Umberto BOMBANA is hailed as "Best Italian Chef in Asia" and "Worldwide Ambassador of White Truffle".

With a talented chef, it is not surprising that the newly opened Macau branch rapidly gained one Michelin star while Hong Kong holds Three Michelin stars.

I definitely agree with Umberto BOMBANA that less is more with white truffle and the five courses on the white truffle menu are just that.

On the white truffle menu, there is a scrambled egg with white truffle, risotto, homemade Tagliolini, poularde de Bresse and truffle icecream.

This was such an amazing dinner I had three choices from the White truffle menu.

Started with a good selection of bread with olive oil and sweet balsamic vinegar.

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Amuse bouche was a colourful mix of Heirloom tomatoes.
The yellows are the best because they have a fragrant sweet taste.

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Scampi carpaccio was a match made in heaven because it had my two favourite elements scampi and sea urchin and the green apple and celery made every mouthful refreshing.

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Now to the star of the evening, the first of the truffle dish was Homemade Tagliolini.
The White truffles were shaved in front of you and it was evidently generous.
The sauce made of butter and aged Parmesan (36 months) was full of flavour but not too over powering to go with the delicate aromatic white truffles which had a strong earthy musky aroma that worked in harmony.

The Tagliolini was soft yet springy and hung the sauce well, so each mouthful was joyful.

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Following the pasta it was poularde de Bresse.
Bresse chicken is known as the best table chicken in the world.
The bird has a white coat of feathers and there are pockets of fat underneath the skin which keeps it succulent during cooking.
Simply the best paired with the best because Bresse chicken has a sweet creamy taste which works wonders with the truffle.
There were two pieces of chicken, thigh and breast but both were surprisingly tender that you would get confused but you can tell by the colour.

Before dessert came, we had grape sorbet on top of yoghurt foam.
I don't know why but I could taste lemon grass in the yoghurt.

To finish off, it was Truffle icecream and a warm hazelnut cake covered in white truffle slices.
The icecream was over whelming because the truffle taste was so strong.

The hazelnut cake which I thought was cake all the way through actually had a runny hazelnut centre.

Lastly we had tea and petit fours which ended the meal nicely.

8½ Otto e Mezzo Bombana (MACAU)

https://www.galaxymacau.com/en/macau-restaurant/restaurant-directory/international/otto-e-mezzo-bombana

Lime soda with black truffle

Went past this restaurant ages ago in the evening but they didn't serve the noodle sets.

This time I went past they were serving it.

They actually specialize in hot pots which seem quite cheap compared to other places.


As well as the food, the drinks were INTERESTING! This is probably the first place in Hong Kong to have black truffle with soda!!

The decor in the restaurant is quite nice.

They make their own chili sauce which costs $5x per jar.


★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Vermicelli with chicken in wine:

To be honest, the wine was not strong enough but the broth was full of chicken flavour and yellow chicken oil which made it rich and tasty with the noodles.
I also overheard that the chicken skin contains no fat but I did not try it because I don't like the taste and texture of fatty things.
Anyway, I will try their hotpots next time because their herbal one smelt pretty strong.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Black truffle and lime soda:



This was interesting because black truffle in the drink was quite nice with 7up/sprite with a hint of savoriness.
I would prefer black truffle with soda water because I don't really drink flavoured fizzy drinks but because it was black truffle, I had to try it.
The Chinese and English name didn't quite match because the Chinese said that it had salted lemon but in English, it just said that it was black truffle and lime soda.
Anyway, I hope to try it again with soda water and salted lemon because the salted lemon would definitely make it nicer.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

Cook Idea (Sai Kung)

G/F, 17 Man Nin Street, Sai Kung

Bikini for brunch

Loyal Dining (Central)

I was surprised they had the Bikini for Brunch.
It was one of the three options to choose from.

The other two were rather Chinesey so I just picked the Bikini which was ham and cheese sandwich with black truffle.

For brunch, the toast was a bit weak, it was more like an afternoon tea set.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Bikini:


The toast was heavily buttered which was not pleasant because they used Margerine.
Overall the toast was not that impressive because it had processed cheese inside and not natural cheese.
As for the potato salad on the side, it was local potatoes and canned fruit salad in sweet salad sauce so it was disgusting.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

Rainbow sheen on truffle oil

When this dish came, I saw this rainbow sheen glistening on the mushrooms!
I hope it was not artificial oil because you only find this on petrol and other synthetic oils.

Hot Pot @ Taste Full Kitchen

Located in Hang Hau, I was surprised this restaurant was quite nice especially the interior.

 

When I entered the restaurant, the logo reminded me of Megan's Kitchen 美味廚 in Wan Chai.
Both these places share the Chinese characters 美味 in the name and they both offer some unique items for the hot pot.
In the end I found out that this restaurant is part of the Victoria Harbour restaurant group.

I chose the broth with pork bones and when it came it was white with some sweet corns, shitaake mushrooms and chives in it.

 

I was expecting it to be tasteless but it was really strong, it was as nice as the broths at Little Fat Sheep so for people who do not favour red meat, the veggies and other items did not turn out to be tasteless due to the broth.
There were lots of spices in the broth too.
As well as the nice broth, they had nice sauces.

 

Although I am allergic to the sichuan sauce, the sichuan sauce was really nice, it was not that spicy but the taste and smell was really aromatic.
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======HOTPOT ITEMS======

 

 

 

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Dumplings with truffle:
It was such a waste with the pieces of truffle placed on top, when it is in the hot pot the truffle pieces float away.
The truffle pieces should have been wrapped inside.
The skin was really thick so the filling was hard to cook.
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Oysters in the tub:
I was disappointed with the size of these because I have seen bigger before, however I found a tiny pearl that was forming.
The taste was creamy but slightly too mushy.
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Hiroshima Oysters:
Surprisingly these taste better than the ones in tubs.
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Fish maw and fish belly:
These were nice just plainly blanched in the hot pot because the soup broth was strong but after adding the sichuan sauce it was really nice as well.
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Apart from Hot Pots I will be back for their dinners because they had some interesting items such as oysters, steamed alaskan crab legs with huadiao wine.

Truffle prawns/Truffle whelks

 

Steamed crab n HuaDiao wine