Shenzhen tour day 1: third time is the charm

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I'm in Shenzhen for a couple of days, tagging along with My Favorite Cousin and her parents as they explore the city a little bit. Having gotten a tiny little taste of the city's dining scene in the last 2 years, I'm actually eager to expand my horizons.

Thanks to a prior engagement, I missed out on lunch at a restaurant I was curious about. I did make sure that I arrived at Futian Station (福田站) via the High Speed Rail by late afternoon, and from there it was just a short walk for me to check into the Futian Shangri-La, Shenzhen minutes later.

We took a short stroll around the mall at UpperHills (深业上城), mainly for me to show the elders all the EV makers displaying their models at just one corner. There were lots of people strolling around at dinner time, but My Favorite Cousin noticed that there were very few people browsing inside the stores.

For dinner tonight, I took the family to a place I've become somewhat familiar with. I have dined at The Bay by Chef Fei (东湾 - 由辉师傅主理) at Mandarin Oriental Shenzhen on two previous occasions, and I'm happy to return any time for their refined Chiuchow cuisine. Given that the others had already dined at a Chiuchow restaurant for lunch, this would be their second Chiuchow meal today...

As usual, there was a welcome drink.

Family in the 'hood

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A mere 3 hours after my big, 9-course lunch, I found myself seated at the same table as My Favorite Cousin at Neighborhood. Her parents have come into town for a few days on their way to spend some time in Taipei, and she wanted to take them out to dinner. Knowing my aunt's bird-like appetite and accounting for the fact that Foursheets and I would still be full from lunch, I asked My Favorite Cousin not to pre-order anything. In fact, I didn't tell The Man in White T-shirt that I was coming... because the last thing we needed was extra dishes...

Boiled artichoke / liver mousse / truffle - not surprising that My Favorite Cousin asked for this given her fondness for artichokes. Always happy to have chicken liver mousse to go along.

Grilled piparra pepper / Hokkaido salt cod - the first pepper I picked was pretty spicy! The others were more manageable but there really was a big variation in terms of the heat.

The Man in White T-shirt walked in and did a double take when he saw me. So now the jig is up...

Sea snails - the first of the dishes that the boss decided we should have. These were much smaller than the ones I saw him prep later for other tables...

Grilled local baby squid - always a crowd favorite, and My Favorite Cousin was really happy. Of course, we had completely forgotten about my uncle's gout condition...

Always happy to put these on bread...

Bone marrow / potato / caviar - another staple on the menu that warrants ordering.

Another dish that's more delicious on bread. Love having the melted richness get soaked up by the bread. So delicious.

Buffalo wings / Roquefort salad - another dish that the boss decided we should have. Always happy to have chicken wings and have the "Chicken Wing Beat" pop into my head again...

White asparagus / morels / trotter - these spears were pretty damn big! It's wonderful they came with young sugarsnap peas and a couple of sunny side up eggs.

The morels were stuffed with diced pig trotters, which is always fantastic! So happy!

Brown-marbled grouper head - Shirley had recommended this to My Favorite Cousin, and given how much my aunt likes fish heads, obviously we took it.

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Thankfully The Man in White T-shirt offered to disassemble it for us, because I'm not sure we would have done it properly.

It was sent back into the kitchen and came back as a paella. Unfortunately they also roasted it a little more, and the skin and other bits got too chewy for the elderly folks.

Tarte tatin - nice to see it back on the menu. Very tasty.

Mille-feuille

Canelés

I'm glad My Favorite Cousin brought a bottle of bubbly, because I had just the perfect wine for this crowd...

Krug Grande Cuvée, 168éme édition, ID 319031 - nice and toasty nose as expected. Good acidity balance on the palate, and obviously another couple of years' of aging meant the wine developed some maturity, so the palate got a little softer and rounder.

2010 Lucia, en magnum - started drinking about 1½ hours after double-decanting. Still got the fruit on the nose, along with minty, woodsy, and cedar notes. Drinking well.

Very grateful to The Kitchen NaziMan in White T-shirt for letting us get away with a small menu, as we really did not have the appetite tonight.

A golden milestone in your journey

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I still find it amazing that it was about 10 years ago when I first walked through the doors of Ta Vie 旅 with a few friends. We were very excited about Chef Sato Hideaki (佐藤秀明)'s new French restaurant, which would be a big departure from the modern Japanese fare of Chef Yamamoto Seiji (山本征治) he oversaw at Tenku Ryugin (天空龍吟). Over the years I've been a big fan and continued supporter, watching the restaurant gain its first Michelin star in its first year of opening, followed by a second in its second year. I was so ecstatic when I witnessed the restaurant's promotion to 3 stars two years ago, and now they are celebrating their 10th anniversary.

I returned to the restaurant after a long absence for a special lunch today. Kang Mingoo (강민구) of Mingles in Seoul and Kawate Hiroyasu (川手寛康) of Florilège in Tokyo are joining Sato-san and their teams for a collaboration on this special occasion. Having missed out on many of Sato-san's previous collaborations, I decided that I wasn't going to miss this one.

My previous visit had been on the last day before the restaurant closed for renovations, so this was the first time walking into the space in quite a while. I'm grateful that our gift is still proudly displayed in a prominent spot. We took note of the slightly different look of the dining room, although the biggest change would have been inside the kitchen.

Besides his kitchen team, Kawate-san also brought along Takada Shinnosuke (髙田真之助), the mixologist behind Sodden Frog that is due to open just upstairs from Florilège. Takada-san created two cocktails for this collaboration, so Foursheets and I each ordered one:

Celery / rum / melon / grapefruit / irizake - with all the fruit elements in this cocktail, it wasn't surprising that I would find it to my liking. The presence of irizake (煎り酒) added a very Japanese touch.

Paprika / mezcal / tomato / guava / rhubarb - this was very smoky, as advertized. The guava made this sweeter than Foursheets had expected, so this wasn't really what she would have wanted. Pretty interesting nonetheless.

A real ducking surprise

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Juve Fan has, apparently, been developing a new dish that he wanted me to try. It wasn't quite ready when he first told me about it a month ago, but he was confident that he would get it right soon enough. So this is how Foursheets and I came to dine at Estro tonight during the long Easter weekend while many of our friends traveled outside Hong Kong.

But besides the new dish, I was actually more excited about something else. I recently discovered that Juve Fan is, in fact, kind of an ex-tifosi. As I was ordering some funny stuff from Taobao, I decided to add to my order so I could give him something that is perfectly suited for him. Tonight I would have the opportunity to give him the gift and also grab a photo op for this gag gift that only current F1 fans would understand...

Another rainy May night

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We haven't had a night out with DaRC and Ro Ro in some time, and decided to catch up during the short window that they were both in town. I suggested Jean May for a casual night out, and as it turned out, our friends have never had the chance to go. So we took the early seating tonight, as I have done in the past.

This was a rainy night just like my last visit, but thankfully it was already getting better as we arrived at the restaurant.

Chicken liver parfait, red onion compote - this is always a reliable choice, and the onion compote is a nice touch and helps lighten things up.

Hanwoo on the Darkside

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Having decided to skip the festivities for Asia's 50 Best Restaurants in Seoul this year, I missed out on the big 10th anniversary party put on by Born and Bred. Thankfully, I got an invitation for dinner tonight at Henry in the Rosewood Hong Kong, where 30K brought together chefs from both Born and Bred Seoul and Busan to showcase their dishes based on Hanwoo - in collaboration with the in-house team at Henry.

I had a very quick catch-up with 30K, and remarked to him that I noticed a marked improvement during my recent visit to Moo-lah. It was also good to see Chef Min again.

Chef Min introduced the six different cuts of beef that would be used for our dinner tonight.

Dry aged beef tallow, Kristal caviar, grilled sourdough - tallow on bread seemed like an upgrade from butter on bread... The garnish of Kaviari Kristal caviar with diced chives added salinity, but the shavings of green lime zest added a wonderful fragrance that instantly lightened things up.

Yukhoe: Korean style beef tartare with green chili bugak - this was something that I had in Seoul last year. The yukhoe (육회) was made with chuck tender and mixed with oi gochu (오이고추) peppers, which added flavor without much heat. The touch of soy sauce was nice, too.

Glazed pork belly: Kurobuta pork, trout roe, butter lettuce wrap, mint, coriander - the pork belly was VERY fatty and jiggly, and that melted fat was so nice. There was heat here but on the mild side, and the mint turned out to be a nice touch.

Gamja jeon: potato pancake stuffed oxtail with chamnamul salad - it's a good idea to balance the heavy dish with a topping of chamnamul (참나물) salad.

I don't remember ever having Korean gamja jeon (감자전) before, but it's not dissimilar to the potato rösti I love. Well, what's not to like about shredded potato that's been fried till crispy and golden brown?! This version came stuffed with some shredded oxtail, which were delicious. However, I felt that the flavors of the oxtail weren't strong enough, and it wasn't all that easy for it to stand out against the delicious potatoes.

Mandu guk, mussel mandoo with seaweed 'gamtae' oil, bone marrow and mussel broth - at the bottom of the bowl we find julienned carrots, zucchini, and egg, along with gamtae (감태) oil that reminded me of aonori (青海苔).　The bone marrow broth was nice and definitely added some beefy flavors here, but the flavors from the seaweed oil were just a little more powerful. Pretty interesting combination, though.

The little mussel was stuffed with beef short plate, but retained its natural flavors.

Grilled Norwegian scallop, bacon and smoked cabbage broth, sea asparagus - the scallop tasted very sweet, perhaps more so because it contrasted with the salty, thick broth.

The scallop came on a bed of cabbage and smoky diced bacon, some of which were just cubes of pure fat (YES!). We also had some skinny sticks of salicornia, but as there was already enough salt here, it was difficult to taste the salinity in the plant.

Hanwoo short rib agnolotti, ragout reduction, Parmigiano Reggiano - the ragout reduction was viscous and pretty heavily-seasoned.

I love agnolotti, and the short rib stuffing was very lovely and tender, and also tasted sweet compared to the ragout.

Next came 4 different cuts of beef, which were served on the same plate. While this looked impressive, it also meant that the cuts which were thinner - which turned out to be the ones we tasted last - got cold quickly...

Tenderloin - good charring on the outside. Meant to be paired with some gochujang.

This was very tender, indeed.

Striploin - paired with a sauce made with onions and soy sauce.

The texture was, of course, on the firmer side compared with the tenderloin, but the strip of fat down the side was nice.

[Outside] Skirt steak - paired with ssamjang (쌈장), which was very tasty and made it better.

Nice and bouncy texture with more bite, but the fat congealed as it got cold, so in the end the experience wasn't as good.

Oyster blade / Flat iron steak - this was my favorite cut from Born and Bred in Seoul, and in fact one of the best dishes I had in all of 2024, so I was really happy that I got to have it again tonight.

I really love it with the marinade, and it was pretty tender but also got some crunch. I didn't think we needed the pickled mustard seeds as condiment.

Perfect potato - dunno whether these were "perfect", but they were definitely very tasty.

Crispy baby corn - surprised at the spicy kick, and also surprised at how much sugar was in the sauce. But hey... pretty tasty.

Ssiat hoeddeok, muscovado sugar, cinnamon, toasted seeds and nuts with vanilla ice cream - we have the warm ssiathoeddeok (씨앗호떡) at the bottom made of sticky rice and flavored with cinnamon, topped with lots of seeds like sunflower seeds, pine nuts... etc. There was a ball of vanilla ice cream, then a very fragrant sesame tuile at the top.

B Bestie made sure that our glass was rarely empty tonight...

2022 Felettig Bourgogne Pinot Noir - initially the nose wasn't very open. The palate was still kinda tannic since the wine was young. Later there were notes of leather and blueberries, then a bit of dried herbs and eucalyptus with more aeration.

Very happy to have made it to dinner tonight, and always good to have the chance to enjoy the beautiful Hanwoo from Born and Bred. Hopefully I can make another visit with Foursheets later this year!