The enchanted forest

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A couple of months after playing the 'plus one' to my A-lister friend, I was invited back to the Mandarin Oriental for another dinner with my friend - this time at the Krug Room.  Since dinner at the Krug Room is meant to accommodate a large group, we were encouraged to invite a few friends along.  So we each invited a friend or two and I roped in My Favorite Birdbrain Cousin.  I was happily looking forward to another feast.

I arrived very early to meet my friend for a drink, and happened to run into Chef Uwe Opocensky downstairs while he was having a quick dinner with his family.  Once again I asked him "not to kill me" (with too much food), as he was fond of doing.  He promised that tonight will be "light", but somehow I never believe him when he tells me that...

We gathered in the bar section of the Mandarin Grill + Bar and sipped on some Krug Grande Cuvée while we waited to assemble the troops.  Once we were ready, we made the usual trek through The Chinnery, but were led on a detour first...

Each of us picked up a candle lantern before we entered a dark room.  I immediately recognized the decor - it was similar to the way Uwe and the team decked out one of the function rooms for the hotel's media Christmas party.  We were in an ENCHANTED FOREST, and this is where we would find our first nibbles.

Slices of beef jerk were hung on tree branches, made from A7 wagyu.  There were two types and mine was made with the addition of black pepper.  Really yummy, and I wish I had the stomach for a few more of these...

There was also beef tartare, together with reindeer moss.  These were spread on different surfaces - some vertically on tree trunks...

Birthday Season

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It's the first week of the year, and that means time to get together with a certain group of friends to celebrate a couple of birthdays.  Our regular organizer suggested that we check out Seasons by Olivier E., whose chef Olivier Elzer was in the headlines recently (or rather, on the front page...)  I had been biding my time for the right opportunity to visit, having heard very mixed feedback over the last few months, but I guess it was finally time to do it...

Olivier doesn't remember me from a hole in the wall, but we were dining with a VIP, so we were very well taken care of.  While the rest of the group asked Olivier to do as he saw fit, I had to be the troublemaker and pick out my own dishes... and I ordered 3 from the à la carte menu, but chose dégustation portions.

I made the mistake of kinda starving myself during the day, so the minute I saw the bread baskets I grabbed the fattiest thing I could find - the buttery, layered roll with rosemary.  And then I inhaled a second one.  Before the first course even showed up.

French pink radish, Guérande salt and homemade butter - the tips of these radishes are dipped in butter before being placed on ice.  I didn't dip them into the salt but chose to eat them "as is".  Unfortunately for me - and this was possibly an issue with my own palate tonight - I thought the radishes were extremely bitter.  In fact I had to drink water and eat some bread to get rid of the bitter tastes left on my tongue.

Pork cromesqui, "Sotchu" style - pretty nice with that hot and liquid salpicon made with trotter... and herbs.  Of course it's always nice when something's deep-fried, innit?!

(Girls are) Back in Town

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An old friend is back in town for a few days and demanded asked that I have dinner with her.  I tried to think of a non-fine dining, non-Michelin star type of place for a casual meal, and for some reason Town popped into my head.  After my quick review of the restaurant for the South China Morning Post a few months ago, the Great One had eaten there and raved about Bryan Nagao's pasta.  So I figured I'd go back and check it out...

I've been putting on the pounds in the last two weeks, so I'm doing my damnedest to limit my intake this week whenever I can.  I debated between having a chowder and a salad to start, but in the end I decided that some veg couldn't hurt...

Hawaiian hearts of palm, red quinoa, endive, figs, pumpkin, black garlic - creative presentation, but on second look it was a little messy and sloppy.  Lots of different ingredients, but I struggled to see how they were supposed to work together.  There was the sweetness of the figs, the acidity of black garlic, and the lack of bitterness from endives was a little surprising.  It wasn't that the elements clashed with each other, but I guess it wasn't a case of 1+1=3...  Oh and it was also a very, very small portion..

Taste-off dinner

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In the 11 years or so that MNSC has been running our blind-tasting format, we've had a couple of instances with two people tied for last place - necessitating a "taste-off" - but we've never had a tie for first place... until 2014.  As Dr. Poon and Lord Rayas ended the year with exactly the same score, we needed to hold a tasting to determine the ultimate winner.  We took the opportunity to kick off the year with a "spot tasting" where each of us would bring a bottle according to a theme - going back to the original format of our gatherings.

As I've never had the opportunity to have dinner at Duddell's, I suggested that we do our dinner there.  I figured that going there with the boss certainly couldn't hurt!

We kicked off the evening with a pair of young Bordeaux which had garnered perfect scores from wine critics.  It was a tough tasting, as the wines were simply too young to extract much information which could differentiate them - even after being in decanters for more than 2 hours.  We were initially accused of serving the champions-to-be supermarket wines...

2010 Pontet-Canet en demi-bouteille - very young, alcoholic, ripe, jammy, with a little leather.  Very tannic, naturally.

2010 Vieux-Château-Certan en demi-bouteille - nose was more open than the Pontet, with cedar notes and a softer palate.  Tasted even better with the second pour, and was definitely sweeter on palate.

After the taste-off was done and the winner determined, it was finally time to get some food in our bellies!

David Lai x2

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My beloved On Lot 10 is closing, so a bunch of us are trying to go as often as possible in the little time we have left.  The Specialist has complained on more than one occasion that she never had a great meal at On Lot 10, even when she went with me - which was absolutely BS since she chose to only remember one particular meal that didn't work for her.  In any case, she insisted that I organize one last dinner there for her, so we rounded up a few accomplices and settled on the first Friday (and also the first working day) of the year.

While we waited for a few late arrivals, the kitchen was kind enough to send us some iberico ham to nibble on.

With the main courses already set up for us by David, we decided to order a few starters...