Chinese New Year company lunch: at the top of the world!
I've always wanted to visit this restaurant. The idea of eating in a slowly revolving flying saucer perched on top of a building that has a remote possibilty of flying off has always appealed to me. It's just that the dull brown building it is perched on isn't very impressive and where the heck is the entrance? Anyway, thanks for the free lunch!
It's Chinese New Year, so how can we do without out favorite local festive dish: Yu sheng! For those that have had it before, you can't possibly forget the loud shouts of hope and well wishes and frenzied mixing of the salad by all the participants at the table. The throwing of the carrot and radish strands in the air is half the fun but normally I do not take a lot of the salad as it is too sweet. But for this dish, boy was I surprised: light but not overly sweet or oily with very crispy crackers. Perfect!
Sai pang xie 赛螃蟹. Supposedly this dish got its name as it tastes exactly like crab. Let's just say the creators of this dish was taking their claims a bit far. It is made of egg white bits with scallop and fish mixed with raw egg yolk, so it has an intense egg smell with mild seafood taste. Not bad. Not really like crab though.
Yes! Finally, my nagging has succeeded in getting the soup changed from Sharks fin to another soup. Actually, sharks fin soup is really nothing fantastic but has a very negative influence on your karma. The manner in which the fins are harvested: they slice off the fins while the animal is alive and dump the finless shark back into the sea to slowly drown. And they do this to all types of sharks and the indiscriminate killing is quickly wiping out a lot of species of sharks. So please stop eating sharks fin and tell others of your stand. Together, we can make a difference! You can have fish maw soup! The one I had was a thick strong seafood broth with pacific clams and small pieces of fish maw and the taste beats sharks fin any time!
Fried grouper. The flesh was a little too firm because of the frying but when taken with the fried fish skin, the combination was quite good. The sauce was tomatoey but not too strong, so the fish original taste could still come through. A respect of the chef for the fish!
Tiger prawns in garlic sauce. The meat was a bit tough. Not nice. Should stick to the smaller prawns I guess.
Abalone and sea cucumbers with fresh shitake mushrooms and broccoli.This dish was great! The broccoli was cooked just right, retaining the crunchiness and taste of the vegetable. The shitake mushrooms were fresh and the sea cucumber had a firm yet light texture. Very remarkable. But the abalone was so so, maybe they should have used a better brand and then the dish would be perfect!
Roast duck- peking style. The one in Beijing was still be best.... Da dong, where are you?
Duck meat stir fry. The remaining duck from the previous dish was remade into this one, which we had to wrap in lettuce before gobbling it. But unfortunately, I was stuffed at this point, so I cannot judge the taste properly anymore...
More food?! Lotus leaf rice......
Finally! Dessert! Red bean paste deep fried in an egg white coating. It was ok, I was stuffed but it was really not the best that I've had. I miss the one at Crystal Jade Kitchen! Y u no come back?
