U.S. swimmer Mark Spitz won seven gold medals in the 1972 Olympics. He wore a pornstash. He planted the rumor that his stash was scientifically shaped to reduce drag, increasing his swim speed. Next Olympics, Russian swimmers sported pornstashes.
Will fine restaurants (gold seekers all) follow suit, every employee pornstashed? Probably. Meantime, they lure their customers with stuff no less striking. You’ve been served olive oil from olives picked at the full moon, fish caught at extreme depths, caviar from almost extinct sturgeon, beef from cows that had been regularly massaged and fed beer, hummingbird foie gras, truffles sniffed out by pigs (not dogs), bread flown in from Spain, pear cider from three-hundred-year-old trees, aged monkfish, 100-year-old salt. You’ve been served dishes so complex and delicate they were tweezer-made.
Sometimes this chow is so delicious you kneel in reverence. Frantzen’s Kitchen’s truffled French Toast would be an example of this. Other times it’s good enough but can feel manic, an obstacle course of caviar blobs, flower petals, sauce squiggles, and gold leaf like too much glitter makeup on a tween. A serious BLT from an inexpensive restaurant would be better.
Inexpensive restaurants often serve the tastiest chow of all. Poking into alleys, corners, and basements, burning up the bus lines, you’ve assiduously explored Hong Kong’s restaurants for four years now in order to winnow out the inexpensive gems. What follows are your howl-at-the-moon finds. Most are unsung, so far off the radar they’re barely reviewed, if at all. So it’s deeply pleasing to sing their praises. The scrumptiousness of much of the food served in these restaurants rivals that of the Michelin heavies. But unlike most Michelin meals that will chomp an entire mortgage payment from your bank account, these will barely dent your wallet.
1/ Liao Za Lie (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/liao-za-lie). You walk in and though you don’t know how you know, you just know. The food will be delicious. Their baby cucumbers with yellow blossoms in spicy sauce make you spasm with pleasure. You’ve eaten one bowl and promptly ordered another. Their improbably long, housemade Biang Biang noodles (which must be docked with scissors) are al dente Mobius strips of happiness. Get them with ribs or dumplings or both. Their pork-dill dumplings, either fried or boiled, are apogee, going as high as dumplings can go. If you’re scared of heights, step back. You had an excessive meal for four here at HK$1200 including an entire leg of lamb for HK$300.
2/ Lao Zhang Gui Dongbei (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/lao-zhang-gui-dongbei). Their potstickers are goddesses. Worship them. They have the best Peking Duck in Hong Kong at a fraction of the cost elsewhere, HK$425 last visit. True, it’s not carved before you by a waiter wearing white gloves. Who cares? You love their okra, their noodle salads, their boneless, deep-fried lamb ribs. You’ve eaten massive, beery meals here for four for less than HK$1000.
3/ Little Chilli (North Point). Their potstickers – thick housemade dough, crisp bottoms, luscious filling – demand exaltation. Their crispy chicken (ask for it boneless) with peanuts and dried peppers is bliss. The dried peppers impart mainly flavor, minimal heat. Their seared string beans are paradigmatic. You’ve filled your tank here many times for less than HK$200 a person. It’s open 11 AM - 5 AM daily. Finally, hours to match yours.
4/ Wing Lai Yuen (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/wing-lai-yuen). There are two restaurants by this name. You mean the one on Fung Tak Road. Their pork vermicelli is one of the most delicious items you’ve eaten in Hong Kong, lean slices of pork belly draped over mung bean noodles in a garlicy sauce. Their camphor duck, their won tons in spicy sauce, their potstickers are also apex. Their salt and pepper squid is possibly the best you’ve ever had. Four of you ate a meal here, well beered, for HK$740.
5/ Go Go Goose (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/go-go-goose). Special order their sucking pig for HK$888. Served with wrappers, cuke batons, shredded scallions, hoisin, it’s like Peking Duck. But pork has more torque. The pig skin audibly crunches when you bite down which whips you into a frenzy. Remember, if pig skin, you kin too.
6/ Hu Nan Heen (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/hu-nan-heen-1). Everything is cheap and almost everything hyper-scrumptious. The ambiance (no windows) and service (indifferent, rude, little English) are atrocious which is adorable. Like a highway caution sign, the menu has a “Warm Prompt” to warn you the food is thermal. Standouts are Simmer Bamboo Shoots Pork, Dried Turnip Fried Marinated Meat, and Tea Oil Steamed Salted Beef. You ache to return but prefer to dine with your wife and she, heat averse, won’t. Marriage is a rough ride.
7/ Chief’s Blend (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/chiefs-blend). Their sandwiches are exceptional. You particularly like their Avo-Pomsmash, an open-face avocado sandwich with lots (and lots) of pomegranate seeds and feta. You also love their Prego Steak Ciabatta: the beef is cooked medium, as ordained by God. But what really stands out for you is their dessert, Koeksisters, deep-fried dough soaked in a syrup with orange and lemon slices, cardamom pods, cinnamon sticks, lavender petals, chilled. Wunderbar! Most items are HK$100 or less. Dogs drink free.
8/ Sichuan Lab (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/sichuan-lab). “Innovative” rarely applies to Szechuan food, but it does here. Their sous-vide smoked duck is among the greatest duck dishes you’ve ever eaten, so ducky, smoky, cooked to the perfect point between medium and medium-rare. Their clear noodles in spicy sauce are housemade, chubby, chewy, like cherubs’ earlobes. Prices are on the high side of low. Apparently there are some weekend deals.
9/ Café Hunan (Wan Chai) (https://www.ardentgourmet.com/best-hk-eats-2020). Tastebud heaven. Your faves: Shrimp with Tea Leaf, pudgy shrimp fried so hot the peels crisp like potato chips. Stir-fried Sauteed Preserved Pork with Dried Radish, the salty pork is almost a jerky contrasting delightfully with the chewy-crunchy-dried radish. Stir Fried Smoked Hunan Style Beef, like a bresaola with the comforting scent of campfire smoke. So cheap it’s like they’re paying you.
10/ Twelve Flavours (branches all over). Extravagantly delicious, Death-Row- last-meal-level. Though many dishes are great, you pine for their Dry Hot Pot. Dry Hot Pot is like soupy hot pot, but better, the flavors undiluted by broth, nothing soggy, concentrated. It’s akin to a dish you learned to love in Uzbekistan called Lagman (dry-style). You get to choose what’s put in the pot. You usually get beef, pork neck, lotus root, cauliflower, rice sticks, some kind of green, and, this is vital, Wide Starch Vermicelli (or mung bean noodles). The Wide Starch Vermicelli is a force multiplier. Even the least spicy version of this dish is spicy from many different kinds of peppers and glorious Szechuan peppercorns. There is a Soy Bean Hot Pot, not spicy at all, that’s pretty amazingly good too. You can’t recommend enough. An overloaded Dry Hot Pot with more food than two can eat and a drink or three will come out around HK$350.
For some, value-for-dollar is irrelevant. Even so, the food at these cheap restaurants has a higher tastiness coefficient than many of the royals. Let your rich uncle take you to the swank spots. Slap your plastic at these places for high return and at least as much taste.
Need recommendations? Gotta tip? Email.
And for God’s sake, shave that mustache.
Oh, the hummingbird foie gras. Just messing with you.