Lunar New Year puddings: 2017 selection

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I'm back home in Taipei for the Lunar New Year celebrations, and as usual I carried a few Cantonese puddings that are customary for the season.  After testing out several outlets for each of the last few years, this year I've decided to be lazy and just stick to the tried-and-true.  Basically, I just went back to Fook Lam Moon (福臨門).

As is traditional for us, we get to have these puddings for lunch on New Year's Day.  Mom patiently stands over the stove while she pan-fries slices over low heat, while dad and I just wait for the plates to be served...

Fan Cook x Tak Lung Restaurant radish pudding with dried scallops (飯局 x 得龍大飯店 瑤柱蘿蔔糕) - my friend KC very kindly gave this to me as a gift.  This was made by the famous Tak Lung Restaurant according to Fan Cook's recipe.

3-some in the Valley

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CK's in town from Chili Crab Land and wanted to catch up, so in spite of my Diet 2.0, I agreed to meet up with an old foodie friend.  It was obvious that he preferred Canto - even though there were only 3 of us - so a reservation was made at Hong Kong Cuisine 1983 (壹玖捌叁).

I had only been there only once, and looked up my blogpost to see which dishes I enjoyed.  We ended up repeating one of the dishes.

Snake soup with chrysanthemum (菊花燉蛇羹) - over the last few years I have been completely spoiled when it comes to Cantonese snake soup, and this one fell far short of my very high standards...

Interesting to see black sesame seeds in the deep-fried crisps that they provide as one of the condiments.

Droning Boy: the virgin flight

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Hello Kitty surprised me this Christmas with a present.  I had briefly talked about my curiosity in drones, but didn't think that a guy who sucks big time at video games and can't handle a joystick would be able to operate one properly.  I never gave it much thought.  Well, I suddenly found myself with a DJI Phantom 4, and frankly I was a little overwhelmed.

But after doing extensive homework and thinking about the circumstances under which I would most likely use a drone, I decided to exchange it for the brand new DJI Mavic Pro - which can be folded down and is incredibly portable.  It was backlogged and I had to pre-order it on New Year's Eve when I decided to return the Phantom 4.

This week I finally got the call I was waiting for, and picked up my drone.  I was eager to take it out for a test drive, and coordinated with Fergie - who had picked up his Mavic Pro a few days earlier - so that we would go and fly our drones together.

After an unexpected delay, we finally met up at the South Entrance of Tai Tam Country Park.  Fergie brought the whole family out - down to the dog.  After reaching the rest/barbecue area, the two of us set up our drones and launched them into the air.

After getting it up in the air and making sure I've gotten the hang of the basic flight controls, I sent the drone over the Tai Tam Reservoir towards the Tai Tam Tuk Reservoir Dam and filmed the journey.  I was still a little clumsy with the controls, which resulted in me spinning the drone around a little too quickly.  By this time the drone was obscured by the trees around me and I no longer had line of sight, and since I started without a full battery, my remote controller started beeping when battery level dipped below a preset threshold of 30%.  I hit the "return to home" button, and in a couple of minutes the drone flew back to my location and landed without a hitch.

The seal claps still

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We were graced by another visit from the King, who is in town for a few days for an event.  A few of us were around to catch up with him, and guess who got to pick the restaurant?  Well... I was trying to pick something interesting without a lengthy tasting menu, since there would only be three or four of us - which pretty much ruled out Chinese.  I was already visiting two of my favorite restaurants earlier in the week, so I was forced to pick something else.

As the King was staying in Wanchai, the idea of revisiting Serge et le Phoque popped into my head.  I had heard that these guys were gonna close up shop, which was surprising given that they had managed to retain their coveted macaron back in November, but hey... what the hell do I know?  It's no secret that lots of restaurants in town were having a hard time, what with ever rising rents and other costs.

So I was kinda surprised when someone actually picked up the phone when I called.  The person on the line was equally surprised, upon hearing me inquire whether they were closing.  Well, I guess that means they ain't going nowhere...

I do have to say, though, that I was remiss in not giving out instructions on getting there to the others.  I was the only one who had visited the restaurant before, and the others all had some trouble finding the rather non-descript space, walking back and forth on the street a few times before suddenly seeing the small neon letters above the door.

The gang even left it up to me to decide whether we would order à la carte or take the chef's menu.  As much as I was tempted to cherry pick exactly what I wanted to eat - and be able to take the dry-aged Galician cote de boeuf - in the end I chickened out and went back to the chef's menu.

Our amuse bouche was half a cherry sitting in a bowl of cherry juice.  The acidity certainly helped whet our appetites, and the toasted buckwheat was a real nice touch.

Cult Burgundian evening

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Champagne Princess is in town, stopping by for a few days on her way to her true homeland.  She wanted to get together with Rice and I at Neighborhood, so I found myself back there after a 2-week absence.  I did check ahead with the Man in White T-shirt, and made sure to reserve something specific ahead of time.

Dutch Pacific oysters - pretty crunchy and briny.  This particular seemed malnourished, so the kitchen sent us another one that was fatty and huge.