A taste of Taiwan at Tainan Mr. Bean

To be honest, I am not keen on Taiwanese food because the Taiwanese food you get in Hong Kong is probably bastardized.
The decor was quite different from other Taiwanese joints in HK.

I have never been to Taiwan so I don't know how authentic this is but the variety was good with an English menu.

The pricing was quite good and the portions were quite big.
Knowing that I don't like the noodles and rice with marinated meat, I didn't choose them and ordered other stuff.
Here was what I had.
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Bittermelon and pineapple soup:

The soup was clear without oil and it had a nice bittermelon taste but I couldn't taste any pineapple even though there were chunks of it.
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Ribs and herbs soup:

I loved this soup because it had a strong herb flavour and tastes exactly the same as buk kut teh.
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Black fungus in vinegar:

The black fungus had a lovely texture because it was thick but the vinegar was too sweet that I can't classify it as a vinegar.
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Crispy chicken rice:
Compared to other places I have tried, the coating is definitely different and it was so much batter.
The chicken pieces were huge and the batter made it monstrous!
Surprisingly the chicken tasted really soft and tender so I think the batter protected it when it was in the oil but I didn't eat the batter because it was just too thick.
It would be good if they could slice the chicken into smaller pieces.

The rice that came with it was Pearl rice.

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Salted egg bitter melon:

The bitter melon is a must order even though it doesn't look appealing.
It was lovely the way it was thinly sliced coated in starchy salted egg yolk, yet the whole thing was not too salty.
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Hsinchu vermicelli:

The vermicelli was quite al-dente and tasty.
I was expecting the silver thread vermicelli but it wasn't.
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Herbal jelly latte:

Finished off with a herbal tea latte which tasted like Taiwanese style tea with lots of herbal jelly in it.
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Tainan Mr. Bean

G/F, 19 Lan Fong Road, Causeway Bay

New Sharing brunch at Aqua

There is a new brunch #justbecause at Aqua which is designed for sharing.
The basic brunch at $448 lets you sample their Japanese & Italian instaworthy starters, share mains & dessert.
At $598 you can indulge the golden goblet cocktails, Veuve Clicquot Champagne and more free-flow options.


Brunch menu:




Bread basket with creamy asparagus mayonnaise.

Golden goblet cocktails which you would literally want to put on your head and take a photo!
I didn't do that but someone did.
Normally I can't drink cocktails but the ones here are quite light and you can't taste the alcohol.
My favourite was the Aqua queen because of the cranberry.

Aqua King:


Aqua Queen:


Kowloon park:


Unlimited Japanese share platter:
As soon as I posted this, people kept asking me where and how much!!


Italian starter also unlimited.
I loved the prawns, smoked salmon, pickles and the mozzarella cheese.


Ravioli filled with spinach and ricotta cheese topped with Parmesan and wild porcini sauce.
It was nice and cheesy so it satisfied my cheese craving.


To be honest I was quite full from the starters and they were good so you will end up ordering more.
Here were the mains, on the Japanese side there was crispy Hokkaido fried salmon, Wagyu beef skewers and foie gras.


The Italian option has huge grilled King prawns and juicy grilled lamb chops.
The roasted baby potatoes on the side were a killer because it was fluffy in the middle and tasty.


The brunch ended with a sweet platter of desserts and the crispy mango rolls and icecream were fantastic.


The options above were good enough but you can also upgrade your brunch with tataki sushi and burrata cheese.

http://aqua.com.hk/

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.

++++++++++++++

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