Friday, August 7, 2009

Macau Pork Bone Hot Pot


This month is fully loaded with birthday celebrations.
I guess most of my friend's parents did "it" in December...so most of my friends were born in the month of August.

Yesterday, we celebrated Ann's birthday. According to my local friends, the Chinese culture prefers to celebrate birthdays early, although they can't remember the reason. In Indonesia, celebrating birthdays after the day itself is better than earlier. Again, I can't remember why. Anyway, my friends don't care whether it's earlier or later, for as long as there's a party, involving a truckload of food. Hehe.

This time, we chose to have a summer hot pot. A few places had been shortlisted, however, since popular places are all fully booked (the locals love hot pot sessions, even in summer), we settled for this hot pot place. We were a bit weary...last minute booking and we could still get a good seat, does the food suck or something?

We'll find out soon.

The entrance's pretty impressive, full of celebrity pictures.
I don't know most of them, but recognised a couple, Vivian Chow (1), and Anthony Wong (2).
Is this an indication that the food is good, or is it an indication of privacy (which means nobody likes dining here, due to bad food?)...we were wondering.


Hong Kong's obsession with everything cute...look at these adorable little piggies...


Once seated, we assembled our own dipping sauce. Steer clear of the raw and fried garlic bits on the left if you're on a date. Even a large bucket of mint won't be able to neutralise their pungent scent. If you're not on a date, on a fight with your date/bf/spouse, or not planning to talk to anyone within 0.5 meter radius after dinner, then go ahead...they're delicious. ^_^

Now, decision making time...

All you can eat @HK$78 per person (plus extra charges, such as soup, tea, etc etc), or ala carte?
Since there were 9 of us, we decided to go for ala carte. We'd probably end up paying the same amount, for more choices of food and better quality.
If you're in small crowd, go for the all you can eat option. You'll still enjoy a decent selection of food in smaller portions.


Tick a tick tick...and soon enough...


Our pork bone hot pot arrived! It's really loaded with loads of pork bone chunks, spring onion and radish. Yum. If you had a hard time dipping food into this fully loaded pot, just like we did, ask for an empty bowl, transfer some pork bone chunks into the bowl temporarily and put them back later when you need more flavor. The soup turned super delicious at the end of the hot pot. Remember to let the soup cool down a bit before slurping it.


We ordered our favorite hotpot food plus some of the shop's specialties...beef diaphragm (1), fish skin dumpling (2), pork kidney (3), pork blood cake (4), chicken (5), sliced fatty beef (6), oysters (7), beef balls stuffed with cheese (8), and many more!


This is one of my favorite items from the selection...fried beancurd sheets! Dip these babies into the soup for a bit, into the dipping sauce, and...yum!...and this was our freebie dish!


The oysters were giant sized and they looked super juicy, but we'd probably avoid oysters next time, one of our lucky friend, Joe, got a bad piece and it was really fishy. Ew. We were prepared to take a sick leave today if there's anything wrong with the oysters (good excuse for a day off?).

What's a birthday celebration without a cake?

Ann's birthday "cake", the star of the night....this beautiful platter of beef!
Nicely marbled, fatty, lean, cubes...glorious!


...what's sweeter than a stolen kiss?
Nothing!

I put my camera back into its bag, stretched my arms, took a deep breath, and...
ready, set, go!



We washed down our food with bottles of icy cold Skol (super good deal at HK$10 for 3 bottles), and learnt to mix beer and sprite to create a "shandy" (thanks to Sinamar and Loz for the lesson).

We were super full, spent HK$135 each (birthday girl eats for free - Hong Kong tradition), and did not have to wait for no seat. It was pretty good.

正宗澳門豬骨煲
(Traditional Macau Pork Bone Hot Pot)
Address:
銅鑼灣謝斐道496號金利文廣場2字樓 (496 Jaffe Road, Causeway Bay)
Phone: 2838 5599

14 comments:

  1. awww.. that's a lovely celebration! I think a good hot pot is a nice way to eat and cook with friends!

    ReplyDelete
  2. ya! this is why we love hot pot, although it's scorching hot outside :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Rita, I thought you're not a local Hongki, howcome u had the balls to eat all those local kinky food? Pig's blood cake and beef diaphragm? Wooooohoooo, tough!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Never thought of frying bean curd sheet without filling... but they sure look very good. Gotta try it ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Kenny, I am very into exotic food...hehehe it's funny how you call some food "kinky"...i am a little "bin tai" indeed ;)

    tuty...yes, maybe dipping them into rawon or soto soup base would be good also, eh?

    ReplyDelete
  6. so cheap!!! the ingredients are superior as compared to KL's which consist a lot of processed food which i dislike

    ReplyDelete
  7. babe_kl, don't forget to try when you're in town :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. That.. is a beautiful 'cake' /tear
    Hot pot is always fun esp with good friends ^^!

    ReplyDelete
  9. First time I see this pork bone hot pot. Lots of fresh ingredients for a nice hot pot, I like!

    ReplyDelete
  10. How fun! So much food for hot pot. I have never seen garlic or the fried bean curd sheets ever before at any hot pot place. Maybe it is because this is Macau style hot pot which I have not tried before?

    Beef is a nice food for birthday cake! I have tried buns and eggs too for a birthday cake...

    ReplyDelete
  11. WOW that's a lot of meat and the soup looks so delicious with all the bones! yum!

    ReplyDelete
  12. How in the heck am I suppose to look at those cute piggies and then eat one??? But, it does all look tasty :)

    ReplyDelete
  13. As I know it's called "pamali" to celebrate earlier birthday. Hot pot, dont forget the tong ho :D

    ReplyDelete
  14. What a wonderful birthday dinner!!! I love the pork bone hot pot, I bet that was so good!

    ReplyDelete