Mandarins in Hong Kong

For some reason, I often feel as though Hong Kong's dining scene is dominated by hotel restaurants. This is silly of me, since some of my favourite restaurants are in hotels, and one of the best dishes of my entire existence was Anton Edelmann's courgette flower with scallop mouselline at the Savoy. I think that part of the problem I face here is that because of the dearth of affordable middle ground restaurants (burger dates here seem to cost seventy quid for two, double what they cost in London), I often end up in a higher end restaurant since that way I feel (marginally) less ripped off. This is contrary to my general belief that eating, drinking and making merry should all go together. Starched tablecloths, judgmental European waiters, immense wine mark ups, whispering or condemnation for a lack of whispering and sacrificing taste for style doesn't really go with this ethos. Still, when in Rome...

In the last 24 hours I have been to eat at the Mandarin Oriental, which I normally only go to for Eve Lom facials, twice. First the Hubs took me to dinner at the Mandarin Grill. I am shamelessly linking to the site of someone who takes great photos here since mine were unbelievably poor and iphone based. Here is a link to someone who had most of the dishes I had, in better light, and with a better camera. Today, I had a lovely ladies lunch (none of whom were ladies of leisure, all of whom were ladies of extensive food knowledge and expertise) at Pierre, where the Fairy Frogmother was kind enough to do the photographic honours.

Mandarin Grill

The Grill is infamous in Hong Kong for being both businessy and expaty. I don't think I could challenge that. We arrived at eight thirty after I had been enjoying cocktails at Otto e Mezzo with the Frogmother. Given my tendency to favour prohibition era cocktails (links in descending preference order, in case anyone fancies buying me a drink one day), I was pretty warmed up and not in the mood for much more drinking when we arrived. This, however, meant that I was less able to block out the initial impression that I was at work when we walked into a room that was filled to capacity (probably around fifty covers), but only had three women in it.

The Hubs and I both opted for a tasting tour. I am growing increasingly bored and frustrated by menus that tell me nothing. For example, if I see "SEA" as the name of a dish on a menu, I often envisage myself sucking brine out of a piece of driftwood. If I'm feeling generous, or in a restaurant like the Mandarin Grill, which has a fairly stellar reputation, this impression may be extended to edible yet decorative garnishes like samphire. It was for this very reason that I wasn't able to contemplate Tour 3, with it's MILLIONAIRE (aren't you meant to marry them, not eat them?) and FLOWER POT (don't you cook in terracotta, not eat it?). I eat an awful lot of beef these days and so "SIRLOIN" didn't appeal, knocking out Tour 1. Tour 2 it was then! To be fair to them, the menus we were shown at the table did have slightly more information, which I've included in the descriptions below. It is always such a gamble with these menus though, because there's no real way of understanding what you are ordering, and it would have been quite a task for the waiter to rattle through each and every dish. One day I might actually test this.

To kick us off, there were three mini amuses. The first was a cookie of parmesan and basil, which looked a bit like a hot mess in a mini cupcake case, and remarkably like something I had made once that went wrong that I then covered with dessicated coconut in the hope of pulling together a passable disguise. Second was an olive oil macaroon with a home made olive on top (I may have misheard this because it tasted nothing like olive). It was exceptionally unexceptional. Finally there was the blob. A molecule of what was called olive oil, but which tasted suspiciously like a teetotal version of the Frogmother's dirrrty martini from earlier in the night. I felt slightly cheated that there was no Gray Goose or Ketal One in this. All in all, quite a poor start. That is, until the bread basket was put in front of us. There were about six choices of bread, of which I became obsessed with what turned out to be called the "butter roll". Oops. The Hubs and I destroyed this in record time. He liked the red pepper roll, which was good because the waiters brought back two more double portions. The double portions manifested because there was ongoing confusion about the one I liked, being the butter roll, an extra serving of which found its way to me on attempt three. All of this bread was served with a selection of olive oil. Oh dear God. Olive oil snobbery was a private vice of mine. How did it become publicly acceptable? As a tribute to a HK uber-girl, I opted for the Lambda oil, which was a little more flowery than I ordinarily like. Either way, as my new favourite HK food blogger would say, fat die me.

The first official course was "FOREST WALK - foie gras, truffle, mushroom, leaves", which led me to expect something along the lines of Heston Blumenthal's oak moss dish. Bo'innovation's sex on the beach would have been closer to it. It was essentially a creative take on foie gras on brioche. In this case, the foie was moulded into the shape of girolles and the like, served with a cylinder of brioche toasted to look like a log. I loved what they had done with it from a presentation aspect, but from a taste perspective it was decidedly average. In fact, I prefer the foie gras with girolles from Monsieur Chatte especially with some fig paste).

Next up (and with no more bread passing our lips for the rest of the evening) was "ONION - french, organic, consomme, egg, cheese, gold, tea bag". So, really, french onion soup. A rice paper "tea bag" of chives and god leaf was put in a teapot and covered in consomme (why not have dehydrated consomme in the tea bag too?). This was then poured into a cup with a dollop of egg and cheese in it. This was delicious though I do like the cheesy crouton and almost gravy like texture of the onion soup that I associate with bistros. I realise that I am a heathen. Amusingly, the wrapper for the tea bag said "Decaffeinated". Phew.

"LAMB - welsh, rhug estate, organic, shoulder, stew, natural jus" was next, with no threats from Gwen Stefani. This really told me nothing about what to expect, but I imagined a large Welsh R(h)ugby boy when I read it. The reality was a cellophane wrapped chunk of meaty goodness. When I saw it appear in its gift-wrapped glory, I thought it was sous vide. Eating it, I think it was actually braised. Either way, I really enjoyed this. From my perspective this was the turning point in the menu, where the focus became the food. The meat was tender and had that slight stickiness that I associate with dissolved collagen. The vegetables, served in thinly sliced discs, were perfectly al dente and of flavours that complemented the lamb and its "jus".

The star of the evening was next: "LOBSTER - brittany, rose, caviar, beetroot, fennel, lobster oil". This was heavenly. Absolutely perfect and easily the best lobster dish I have ever had in a restaurant, apologies to Scalini's spaghetti. Until this moment, I genuinely believed that lobster is best served fresh off a bbq and with garlic butter. Now I know better, though I will never be able to replicate it, which is frustrating. The texture of the lobster changed depending on which section you were inhaling, which I consider to be the hallmark of perfectly cooked shellfish. The flavours worked perfectly, though I don't recall rose. I would go again just to have this dish.

Sadly, it was hard for anything to come after that dish. The "WALNUT - hazelnut, raspberry, armagnac, snow" seemed very ordinary in taste, though I liked the idea of cracking through the shell of the "walnut" to get to the jelly-like filling. I suspect my tastebuds were overwhelmed after two old fashioneds, a G&T and all that food, so perhaps I am doing this dish an injustice. Similarly, the petit ones (a truffle. To me, it only counts as petit fours if there are four of them because I am literally minded and I don't care if it actually means something about an oven, this is actually the best ever juxtaposition of French and English and should be respected) actually didn't taste pleasant to me. All in all, I would say the pleasure of the meal was normally distributed, with an element of skew. Sometimes I hate the impact working in Finance has had on the way I think. At least I didn't say kurtosis.

So, having mentioned the cost of dining in Hong Kong, what was the damage from the dinner for two on a school night? HK$4,253 or GBP350. Not austere. This included four glasses of mid-priced wines (an Alsace unpronounceable for me, a Slovakian something for Hubs, two passable but forgettable reds). Reading back this post, I realise that I sound fairly negative, but the reality is that it was a very good meal. It just wasn't good at that price. If I put myself back to London standards, I would compare this meal to Marcus Wareing at the Berkeley, and I loved that restaurant. I just balk at the price.

Pierre experience to follow.