Pizza Hut, Happy Valley, Hong Kong

This is an entry on a takeaway I ordered from Pizza Hut, a fairly well established chain of pizza restaurants. There is a branch that is takeaway and delivery only that is located on the bottom of my street.

I actually bought the takeaway a couple of nights before as I chose a set meal for two and ate the pizza and soft drink that night. This blog entry is on the remaining items of the meal; the soup and pasta that I had for Saturday lunch.

They are not leftovers as such as I did not eat them and had been placed in the fridge to keep fresh.

Part of the set meal consisted of tuna and sausage penne and chicken and mushroom soup. When purchased the soup and pasta came in the plastic and foil containers respectively. I transferred these to standard crockery as shown in the photograph below after reheating both dishes in the microwave.

From Left: Pasta and Soup

The soup had decent slices of button mushrooms and small cubes of chicken. It was fairly thick but could have done with a touch more seasoning.

My pasta dish had lots of sliced sausage but tuna was lacking a bit as it seemed to have got lost with the tomato sauce. The penne was still al dente after microwaving. Again some more seasoning would not have gone astray.

Both dishes were adequate and filled me up sufficiently for lunch. When you order takeaway only you only have to wait 15 minutes so some items have been probably been pre-prepared. Pizza Hut is a very convenient place for and this meal, whilst nothing extraordinary presents good value when including the pizza and fizzy drink I ate two nights previously.

Scores:

Food: 3/5

Presentation: 2/5

Service:3/5

Setting: 3/5

Overall: 11/20

Total Bill: $138, about 5.50GBP a head for the whole 2 person meal.

I ate: Tuna & Sauage Penne.

I drank: Chicken & Mushroom Soup.

Akita, Wanchai, Hong Kong

I met my wife after her Saturday shift had finished at Akita, a teppenyaki restaurant near her work place in Wanchai.

It was not busy and we shared the cooking station with a party of three, where our chef would cook and serve for us. We sat down and were given green tea, which was continuously topped up during the course of our meal, and a small bowl of salad with oriental type dressing.

Plate Setting

Both of us opted for one of their set lunches, which I have forgotten the name of the one I chose. It consisted of about six dishes that are cooked in front of you by the chef.

First dish was steamed egg & roe where the chef had eggs still in their shells but with the tops cut off, placed some water on the hot plate and covered them with the spherical lid to cook. After a few minutes he placed some roe and served. This was a nice and cute starter, with the egg light and the roe added flavour to the whole dish.

Steamed Egg & Roe

The next dish was King prawn. It was split into three pieces after it was cooked and tasted great with the right amount of seasoning and flavour. The head of prawn was actually set aside and served later.

Prawn

Following the prawns was my Beef dish where cubes of the meat were fried until medium rare and served with deep fried garlic. The meat was tender and flavoursome with the garlic giving the whole dish some crunch.

Beef Cubes with Garlic

My wife's equivalent dish was sliced beef roll with spring onion and garlic shown below, which I have to say tasted better.

Beef Roll with Garlic & Spring Onion

Miso soup was the most disappointing. There was nothing terrible about it, it just tasted as if there was too much flavouring. It contained the usual tofu and seaweed in it as well.

Miso Soup

The fried rice came after the soup, where the chef mixed the egg, rice and vegetables expertly.

Fried Rice in the making

Taste wise it was lovely, with all the ingredients mixed and fried well.

Fried Rice

The last hot dish was Stir fried Vegetables, which consisted of cabbage, carrot and onions and probably other ingredients. This was crunchy, had good flavour and a great dish to finish off with.

Stir Fry Vegetables

The great thing about this restaurant is watching your food being cooked in front of you by a skilled chef. Every dish he cooked in front of us did not disappoint. The chef would serve us the food after cooking and the service to clear our finished plates was efficient too. Price-wise, it is very competitive with the amount of food you get. Great restaurant and likely I will be returning.

Scores:
Food: 4/5
Presentation: 4/5
Service: 4/5
Setting: 3/5

Overall: 15/20

Total Bill: $325, about £14 a head.

I ate: All of the above.

I drank: Green Tea and a Coffee, which was part of the lunch set.

I wore: Standard weekend dress of jeans and tee shirt.

Classified, Happy Valley, Hong Kong

I was here with my wife the day after my cousin's wedding on a Sunday and the place was probably 60% full at time that we arrived. It is a licensed restaurant that serves western cuisine and has a few branches dotted around the city.

Unfortunately they did not offer an afternoon tea set during the weekend as I wanted something light after the indulgences of the previous night, I therefore chose a Greek salad. To accompany it I ordered an Iced Lemon Tea as my drink.

My wife went for a sweet option and chose the coffee cake with a watermelon juice.

The drinks arrived first and mine was refreshing and cool with a small pot of syrup to adjust the drink to your desired sweetness. There was a mis-communication with my wife's drink however as they said it was freshly squeezed when she asked but turned out it was only fresh from the supplier. I have to say it reads only "fresh" on the menu.

Iced Lemon Tea on left, Watermelon Juice on right

The salad had the usual ingredients of lettuce, feta cheese, onion and olives. It also had cherry tomatoes as well as sliced tomatoes. All of these ingredients were dressed with olive oil and presented in a nice white plate with the letter "C" printed on it to stand for the name of this restaurant. With all the ingredients combined together the salad was fresh, nice and light.

Greek Salad

I had a bite of my wife's Coffee Cake, which had a decent sponge, tasted sweet and a hint of coffee flavouring that was not too strong.

Coffee Cake

Classified is not a bad place; it is clean and fairly new and the food was of good quality and nicely presented. The waiters were helpful and our orders arrived quickly. As with most places serving non- traditional food on this area, it is a bit more expensive than other eateries serving local cuisine. It does seem to have a large selection of wine and cheese that I may try to sample next time I visit.

Scores
Food: 3/5
Presentation: 3/5
Service: 3/5
Setting: 3/5

Overall: 12/20

Bill: Approximately £7 a head

I ate: Greek Salad.

I drank: Iced Lemon Tea

U-Banquet, Causeway Bay, Hong Kong

This late lunch quest comes from my cousin's wedding reception dinner, which was a twelve course banquet held a week last Saturday. My wife and I were invited to go a restaurant called 'U-banquet' located in Causeway Bay, so not far from where we live. It was booked out with 20 tables of guests so over 200 people were attending this dinner.

'U-Banquet' caters for weddings and the restaurant hall has chandeliers and a large staircase for the happy couple to make their entrance. The hall even has fake stained class windows and church altar setting for a more European / Christian feel!

During the length of the meal, each dish was placed on the centre of the table and then spilt into the individual portions for everyone.

The first course was Roasted Suckling Pig, which is a traditional starter at these events. It was roasted well, with meat, fat and crispy skin in the right amounts. It was a bit kitschy placing the plastic hearts in the eyes, but it was a wedding after all.

Roasted Suckling Pig

Second course was sauteed prawns and scallop, where we received one of each as the photograph shows below, which can along with fried peas and pepper. Also nicely cooked but slightly small portioned dish.

Sauteed Prawns

Next we had a crab claw that was stuffed with shrimp paste and wrapped with almond flakes. It was a good finger food gimmick using the claw as the handle as demonstrated in the photograph. The shrimp paste filling was OK but the almond flake covering did not work for me.

Crispy Japanese Crab Claw

A braised Whole Conpoy (dried scallop) was served next, accompanied with Sea Moss. This was an enjoyable dish with a varied vegetable assortment and a flavoursome sauce to make it more moist.

Braised Conpoy stuffed with Marrow Vegetables and Sea Moss

We then were served with the Shark's Fin Soup. This was double boiled and had Chinese cabbage in it. The soup could have had more flavour and for double boiled, did not seem as thin as I expected. As usual the controversial fin slices did not add much to the dish apart from exclusivity.

Shark's Fin Soup

The abalone course is common in wedding banquet menus and this was a South African one, which was braised and came with a single pak choi. A very chewable dish, with the vegetable adding a bit of crunch to it.

Abalone

The last savoury dishes to arrive were fried rice and noodles, which you choose only one type after they are served (although counted as part of the twelve courses you receive). I chose the noodles hence the picture below. These egg noodles were well cooked with the flavour coming from the ginger and spring onion and topped off with abalone sauce.

Braised E-fu Noodles

The banquet was finished off with two sweet dishes shown below. Sweetened Walnut Soup had glutinous rice dumplings. It was warm, sweet and nutty and the dumplings were sweet too and chewy. The Petits Four were marshmallows, little pastries and gelatine type cakes and were a little disappointing and not as good as their European equivalents. They gave us oranges as well, which you can see in the background of the photo.

Sweetened Walnut Soup

Petits Four

There was two courses that I did not take pictures of and they were the Steamed Tiger Garoupa and Deep Fried Crispy Chicken, which to me were the best dishes of the night, unfortunately. The fish was deliciously steamed with ginger and spring onion, draped in a hot soya-oil sauce. The chicken meat was moist and skin was crispy and flavoursome.

Whilst it took long to get the first course on the table due to speeches and announcements, the service was very quick. In fact we probably received the first dish until 8.45pm and finished eating about 11.00pm so it was about 10 minutes a course. However, that is not uncommon for Chinese wedding banquets.

Anyhow, a good night was had and congratulations to my cousin and his new wife!

Scores:
Food: 3/5
Presentation: 3/5
Service: 3/5
Setting: 4/5

Overall: 13/20

Total bill: The cost of the wedding present to my cousin.

I ate: All of the above.

I drank: A beer before the meal, a few glasses of Australian Shiraz during and a few more glasses of Cabernet Sauvignon towards the end of and after the banquet.

I wore: Smart suit and shirt.