Once more for old times' sake

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Mr and Mrs Locust are doing a tour of Asia, and came into town today for a few days.  We were debating about which restaurant to visit, and somehow in the end Catalunya came out on top.  I had been very happy with my first visit last month - even though the focus that evening wasn't on the food itself.  I was pretty excited about going back, as it would give me a chance to see how the restaurant would do on a "regular" evening.

I left the ordering to Mrs. Locust, not wanting to push them into ordering anything in particular… other than a couple of things I really enjoyed from last time.  We ended up doing tapas only, which I think is fitting given the positioning of this place.

Pa amb tomàquet - a.k.a pan con tomate, which we had with slivers of Cantabrian anchovies on top.  Perfect balance of flavors.

Déjà vu on Mother's Day

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So... it's Mother's Day, and I'm 500 miles away from my mom.  Since I'll be seeing her for the next two consecutive weekends, I figured I'll be forgiven for not spending today with her.  Maybe.  You just never know with Shanghainese moms...

I did spend a few hours with two moms today - one of whom is the lovely mother of my adorable godson.  Just a week after our last visit, we found ourselves back at Man Wah (文華廳) for some dim sum.

Vermicelli, garoupa, fish broth (魚湯斑粒米線) - the little tyke was having his usual noodle soup, so we decided to order extra and shared with him.  Very tasty, I must say… simple comfort food.

It's your birthday… It's your birthday...

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I was invited to a dinner tonight jointly celebrating the birthdays of a happy couple.  We gathered at Wagyu Kaiseki Den, one of my favorite places for kaiseki cuisine (懐石料理) in town.  There would of course be wine, and our thoughtful hosts had not only wines from their birth vintages, but also those of the attending guests.  The last time I had a similar theme at dinner was when Frédéric Engerer hosted us at Château Latour…

While the wines were being decanted and we waited for everyone to arrive, we had some snacks to nibble on… edamame (枝豆) was an obvious choice…

…as was grilled dried puffer fish.

TEDxVH 2013

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Last year I had the honor of speaking at the first TEDxVictoriaHarbour, and trying my damnedest to throw some inspirational messages out there.  I'm not sure at all that my feeble attempt met with any success, but I'm real happy to have been part of the event.

One year later, I have moved myself back to Hong Kong, and naturally found myself supporting the event in its second year.  I decided to go with a couple of friends and collectively take in the inspirational messages.  I'm not exaggerating when I say that I had been looking forward to this for the last 2 months, waiting for this day to arrive.

The venue this year was the Sunbeam Theatre (新光戲院大劇場), a theater with a 40-year history famed for being one of the last performance venues for Cantonese opera.  The place has faced multiple threats of closure within the last 10 years, but has received a temporary reprieve until 2016.  It's my first visit to the theater, and I'm glad that there are efforts from the community to preserve a part of Hong Kong's cultural history.

The theme this year was "E-Motions in Travel and Tourism", and an interesting roster of speakers came up one by one to talk about their personal experiences, to try to inspire us to do better.  My memory is a little hazy in my old age, but I don't recall watching pre-recorded segments at the event last year.  This year there were a few of them, but they certainly were inspirational.

Playdate with Uwe

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It's been a while since my last dinner with Fergie, and I thought it'd be a good idea to arrange another get-together.  This time, though, I pulled in a couple of mutual friends to make the party a little bigger... in the hope that it would be even more fun.  I think that turned out to be a pretty good call, if I may say so myself!

I had been wanting to go back to the Mandarin Grill + Bar for a proper meal, and my lunch last month provided a glimpse of what such a meal would be like.  Thinking that we should do something a little special, I called on my VVIP friend Tigger to set me up with Chef Uwe Opocensky, who very kindly arranged a special tasting menu for the evening.  I think we'll all remember this meal for some time to come.

We started with a few nibbles:

Ketchup cookies with shaved Parmigiano - I must confess that I found the Parmigiano shavings really yummy and full of flavor.