Alize Noire de Nova has potential

For brunch and Western fare, Central and SW are the places to go.
The first time I had brunch in East HK was a disaster and that was at the newsroom.

Anyway the brunch and dinner menu looked good so decided to try the brunch first because it was more captivating.
For dinner they have really cool stuff like pasta, yabbies and spinach risotto and purple milk latte.

To be honest, the price range is quite good because it costs $7x per brunch and the portions are big with two eggs but this is East HK and the fact they used to have a restaurant in Tsuen Wan.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Potato pancakes:

The potato pancakes were tasteless but after adding rock salt, pink salt and pepper is was amazingly delicious.
The pancakes evidently had pieces of potato in it but it didn't have a strong potato flavour but I liked the pieces of cherry tomatoes in it which gave it some flavour.

But the great thing is that the potato pancakes were not sweet because some weird local places like to sweeten savoury things.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Ham and ricotta cheese strudel:
It didn't quite look like a strudel and I was expecting the ham, ricotta cheese and egg to be inside the pastry.
I think it is a HK obssession that a typical brunch has visible eggs in it hence the two poached eggs on top.


Anyway, the ham and cheese strudel was divine because the cheese was cheesy and the ham was thinly sliced tasty soft ham.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

Captivated by their Chiuchow style fried rice

Came here because the previous review had pictures of delicious fried rice which had Chinese pickled olive vegetables 欖菜 in it.



When I got there, it was NOT ON THE MENU
LUCKILY I showed them the picture from openrice and they were able to ask the chef to serve it
Decided to get the set which had soup.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Fish maw and whelk soup:




The soup tasted ok but the ingredients were crap especially the fish maw which was fishy and the whelk was a bit mushy and didn't taste fresh.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
潮式欖菜炒飯:

The fried rice was good because the rice was al-dente and loose with tasty pickled Chinese olive vegetables in every spoonful.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
PLEASE NOTE that pickled Chinese olive vegetables is name made up by me because I couldn't google the English for 欖菜!!!!
◎ⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓖⓘⓡⓛ◎
The bill: $78

Hu's Kitchen:
Shop 2, Food Republic, 2/F Hennessy Apartment, 48 Percival Street,Causeway Bay
◎ⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓖⓘⓡⓛ◎

Tulsi stretches to West Hong Kong

Ever since I dined at the North Point's award winning Tulsi, I have fallen in love with their curries because they are just like the ones in the UK.
There is a branch in Quarry Bay which is good but the location is troublesome and there are always crowds because there are no Indian restaurants around.
After checking out HKU MTR station I stumbled upon this branch of Tulsi which is quite different to the other two because they serve Thai food and pasta dishes.

Anyway, dined there because they had curries.


★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Chocolate lassi:

This was a special request because chocolate milkshake was too heavy so I asked them if they could make a chocolate lassi and as expected it tasted how I like it because I loved the yoghurt taste with a hint of cocoa.
For people who like this, you can buy chocolate yoghurts but not in Hong Kong.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Aloo Gobi:

This was fantastic as expected because it had an appetizing tomato base with curry spices with juicy cauliflower florets and silky potatoes.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Beef curry:

A mildly spiced curry with a great curry sauce to go with the rice.

★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Mushroom rice:

The mushroom rice was similar to the other fried rices that they serve.
Each grain of rice was tasty and the portion was surprisingly big!!

★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

Tulsi and Wine:

G/F, 10-11 The Bonham Mansion, 63 Bonham Road, Western District
◎ⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓖⓘⓡⓛ◎

Zalora nightmare

Nightmare shopping experience with Zalora Hong Kong

Normally I purchase my clothing from retails or ebay but I won a Zalora HKD$500 cash voucher.

On my first attempt, I ordered the wrong size so I called Zalora within minutes of submitting the order to change it but they said once the order has been made online, it can only be cancelled.
Hence they cancelled the order for me.

On the second attempt, I made the order successfully and the parcel was delivered quite fast and I was quite satisfied with the clothes I had bought.

A few days later, the courier came back to ask for payment even though I used the coupon.

I made a call to Zalora and they said the coupon was not used in the transaction, so I gave them my coupon code which was useless because they said it could not be applied after the online order has been placed and the ONLY solution was to return the parcel and order again.

Ok, so I sent the satisfactory parcel back to Zalora with a letter enclosed but no one followed up.

Then I made a third order and confirmed with Zalora that the coupon was used.

However only one of the items arrived because one of them was out of stock.

I was really furious at that point because I had to contact Zalora again otherwise they would not have contacted me about the transaction so they agreed to issue a partial cash voucher because they did not know when the other item would be in stock.
I also had to reason with them that I shouldn’t need to pay another delivery fee on the next order because they were out of stock forcing me to order again when both items should have been delivered in one go.

Bad points about Zalora
Does not allow you to change size after you submit
Does not allow you to settle any monetary disputes after the submitting.
Zalora does not have constructive follow ups

Good points about Zalora
The courier fee is free when you send the parcel back.
The shopping interface is user-friendly with functions to filter by colour, price range etc.

Hopefully Zalora will improve on these issues otherwise I will not shop there again.

3rd space needs improving

Came here because the pancakes looked attractive.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Earl grey pancakes:


Not fluffy enough and the earl grey flavouring was a bit too artificial but the blueberries in the pancakes were nice and gave a burst of blueberry juice when you bit into them.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Pineapple and banana smoothie:

It was very bland and watery lacking pineapple taste and it was quite sweet as well.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Breakfast tea:
I wanted to order the Earl Grey but it had lavender so I chose the breakfast tea!

When it came it was black as coffee and they put way too much tea leaves in the teabag that it was sufficient to make a huge pot of tea.


Anyway, it was extremely bitter so had it diluted many times to make it drinkable and I was told that it is normally served in a pot so why did they use a cup!





★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Overall, I felt that it was a bit overpriced because the quality did not match the pricetag.

Time for chili con carne at Tallore (灣仔)

I have been meaning to try the chili con carne but everytime there is a new soup or new salad I have to try~~
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
chili con carne:

The reason I love this Chili con carne so much is that it is made with lean beef which does not have these fatty bits and stringy chewy bits.
As well as the beef, the chili con carne sauce was delicious, it is not that spicy but the flavour is there and goes with the fluffy warm rice beneath it.
The portion is a bit big though coming from someone with a big appetite like me.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
◎ⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓢⓤⓟⓔⓡⓖⓘⓡⓛ◎

Beef offal treats from 新記牛什魚蛋

I was lured to this place by the lovely smell of five spice powder and a beefy smell.




There were lots of skewers to choose from such as octopus and tofu puffs.
I liked their skewers but their attitude could be nicer!
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Beef tripe:

The beef tripe was lovely and soft with a rich taste of five spices, msg and whatever they put in it!!
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★