Le roi de l'île

There was a gathering at lunch today to do a "send-off" for a friend who will be touring the US for a few weeks, and I found myself back at Island Tang (港島廳).  I've always liked this place, in spite of its reputation in some circles for being "gweilo-friendly".

Baked barbecued pork buns in pineapple shape (焗菠蘿叉燒包) - tasted good, but I wish the buns themselves were a little crispier and not as soft.

Steamed rice flour rolls stuffed with crispy dough - this is a twist on a similar Cantonese classic, but there were actually other ingredients stuffed inside the interior crispy dough.  Pretty yummy, I thought.

Honey glazed barbecued pork (叉燒) - I love the pork shoulder (脢頭肉) cut here since it's sooo tender without being excessively fatty.  Both the end cut and the middle portion were yummy.  The geeks at the table were debating and criticizing the relative lack of flavor in the middle pieces, but I was happy enough.  Honestly there aren't many places in Hong Kong that can give this place a run for its money...

Baked chicken with sesame in rock salt (芝麻鹽焗雞) - this was not bad, although once again the harsh geeks at the table murmured their discontent...

Wok-fried rice noodles with sliced beef and X.O. chili sauce (X.O.醬干炒牛河) - pretty tasty and enjoyable, even if there are better (and cheaper) versions elsewhere in town.

Deep-fried de-boned duck coated with taro crust (荔茸香酥鴨) - this is no longer on the menu, but regulars know that they can request it from the kitchen.  I love this dish so I asked for it.  This was still pretty tasty, although today it wasn't as good and crispy as I remembered.

Deep-fried spare ribs marinated with shrimp paste (海山骨) - this was perhaps the only disappointing dish today.  There was just not enough lean meat on these ribs, and you normally would never hear me complaining about my pork being too fatty so that gives you a sense of how bad this was... The use of shrimp paste was interesting.  A similar dish at Manor Seafood Restaurant (富瑤酒家) is much better.

Legolas Jr brought us our second galette de roi of the week - this one from Le Salon de The de Joël Robuchon.  This was a good bit smaller than the one I brought back from Sadaharu Aoki, both in terms of area as well as height.  The frangipane inside was pretty tasty, and the layers of puff pastry were made with a lot more butter, making them really tasty and very brittle.  Taste-wise this probably beat the one from Aoki, but Aoki delivered better value as well as being healthier...

This was a very good lunch for a Friday, and I'm glad I got to have two galettes de roi this week.  Looking forward to this time next year!