First suckling pig of the week...

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Tonight was my colleague's birthday, and we had a casual dinner at Fook Lam Moon (福臨門) to celebrate, since the roast suckling pig there is my colleague's favorite. Yes, I had dinner here exactly 2 weeks ago and I also had the pig then. As it turns out, this would be the first of 2 roast suckling pigs I would enjoy this week.

We brought a bottle of 2007 Ostertag Riesling Epfig since we weren't going to drink a lot. The wine was OK but I don't think my body was in the right condition to drink much...

We started with a simple order of century eggs and pickled ginger (皮蛋酸薑) as our appetizer. The century eggs were very delicious, and the sour ginger certainly helped whet our appetites for what's to come.

The roast suckling pig (脆皮乳豬) was presented to the table, and we each picked up crunchy pieces of the skin that struck our fancy. The skin was as good as ever - crunchy and wafer-thin. I also chose to munch on one of the legs as well as other meaty and fatty bits. Yum...

Deep-fried frogs' legs (椒鹽田雞腿) came next. It's been a while since I had this here, and it's the total opposite of what one finds at Tien Heung Lau. The legs here are small and more "dainty", and are not served whole but rather in pieces. The addition of a bit of diced garlic and chili pepper is a nice touch. We find ourselves nibbling away in a civilized fashion - rather than tearing off chunks of meat with our teeth as I would at Tien Heung Lau.

By this point I am feeling a little full, and this becomes the turning point of the dinner for me. I was a little fatigued because I didn't sleep well the night before, and having a few sips of wine when my body is not 100% will make things worse pretty quickly...Or maybe I just had too much of the roast pig.

I found the thick tofu soup (八寳豆腐羹) reasonably enjoyable, but was even more stuffed after a bowl of this. There were a lot of ingredients here - roast duck, shrimp, conpoy, tomato, kale...and the fact that this is a 羹 meant the presence of a good amount of starch. I start to feel a little ill at this point.

The deep-fried prawns (基圍蝦) were delicious, even though I only ate one. The shells were still attached but part of the prawn had been butterflied. Lots of garlic to provide flavor. I wish I had the room - and the appetite - to take in more.

I knew I could probably fit in some pea sprouts blanched in ham broth (上湯浸豆苗) because it was light. The veggie was so delicious because it was in season, and again I felt a little bummed that I didn't have more room for this.

I was only able to nibble on a few strips of stir-fried beef with scallions (乾蔥爆牛肉), and it tasted OK to me. Should have tasted the scallions, too, to get the full flavor. Oh well...

For the finale we had fried glutinous rice with preserved meats (生炒糯米飯). Now this was really delicious and done the way I like it, with the rice grains sticking together. But in reality, this was the last thing I needed at this point...nevertheless I thoroughly enjoyed the half a bowl that I allowed myself to have.

The birthday boy loves his sweets, so we had a mango mousse cake brought in from his favorite cake shop, and the restaurant steamed up some birthday buns (壽桃) filled with egg yolk and lotus seed paste. It was good to finish on a sweet note, and I made sure that I didn't have too much of either dessert.

I was really glad to have returned to Fook Lam Moon for dinner tonight, but wish that I could have enjoyed it a lot more... Oh well. Let's see how I do with the other pig on Friday.