Early Dinner in a Chalet

Call this either a late lunch or early dinner, we made a booking to eat at Chesa at 3pm just as we checked out from our room at The Peninsula. The ambience of the cozy dining area, hidden in one side of the floor just above the lobby and resembled a Swiss chalet completed with dark wooden furniture, dim lighting and traditional wall décor, has always been my favorite part and it did feel like we were transposed to another part of the world once stepped in. Barring the rowdy family who sat right next to us with the parents treating the restaurant like their own (dysfunctional) home with lots of screaming and running around, it was actually quite nice. 

Staycation at The Pen

With no travel plan in sight in foreseeable future, we thought we would wrap up 2020 with another weekend “away” at The Peninsula known for its timeless grandeur. And there's no better time to stay-cation at this legendary property than in December, for they arguably have one of the best festive decorations in town during the Christmas season. 

Long Lunch on Boxing Day

At our last outing to Ando a few months ago I did tell myself we needed to go back soon when dinner service was resumed (we went on the first week the government banned all dine-in after 6pm) Turned out 5 months on we were back to square one in terms of dinner lockdown, but at least we did make it back to Chef Agustin’s restaurant for another meal on the Boxing Day. Call this part of our holiday celebrations with friends. 

Night of Glamour

For the past few years, Michelin Gala Dinner has been one event that I am particularly excited about during the festive December. There's everything that makes this the perfect evening - the excitement, the drama, the glam, the chance to dress up, to mingle, to chit-chat and gossip, and of course, the wine and food that's served.

The Pit-iful Smokehouse

Last week, I went for dinner with a very high expectation at a private barbecue kitchen inside an industrial building quite literally in the middle of nowhere on the island side as our group's pre-christmas celebration. Some friends of mine loved the turkey they made at a pop-up event during the thanksgiving weekend, and from the pictures on their Facebook page everything looked good and proper. Maybe after all these years Hong Kong finally got a legit "artisanal smokehouse" as the place claimed to be, or so I thought. Well sadly from what I have tried on that night I reckon it was quite a far-fetched statement, and it's more like another living proof that just by putting "artisanal" in your logo doesn't mean you are necessarily any good or know what you are doing.

Belated holiday recipe: Pecan Pie

With a Christmas Eve dinner to host at home and another party at a friend's place a few days later, I decided to bake a couple of pies for dessert, something I could prepare in advance. While many associated Christmas with panatone or stollen, it's more an American tradition (especially those from down south) to have pecan pie as part of the celebration meal (more so for Thanksgiving but also for Christmas too)

Double Celebration at Spring Moon

For cheapskate like me, a freebie coupon sometimes works wonders. I have been offered free champagne and cake for dining at The Peninsula as part of the "birthday presents" offered by one of the credit cards I carry, so we went back to Spring Moon for dinner at the end of November, conveniently forgetting the horrible experience we had last year at another restaurant of theirs. At first it seemed a bit silly to celebrate a birthday more than a month late - after all, I did celebrate with not one, not two, but three gorgeous meals already - and then I realized the date we set for the dinner was actually closer instead to both my parents' and our wedding anniversaries (both in early December), so I figure we may as well use that as an excuse for a double early celebration instead of a belated, meaningless one.

Cooking at home: Christmas stollen

Well, it is probably too late for this recipe to be any useful for this Christmas season, but I found this quite easy to make and could probably turn this into a normal bread or fruit cake by cutting down on sugar content. Not a lot of kneading required and so didn't leave my kitchen counter-top with gluey, messy leftover dough to clean up.

I was inspired by my friend Wilson in his recent article in the WOM Guide featuring our chef friend Gregoire (of the Four Seasons Hong Kong) for a cooking demonstration of this traditional German Christmas bread - it's similar to the Italian Panettone or English Christmas pudding as they all involve raisins and some kind of winter spices (cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves etc), but I love the firmer texture and less sweet taste of a Stollen, far better than the other Christmas pastries.

Anyway, unfortunately Wilson's article didn't include a recipe nor ingredient list, so I went around found a couple easier ones on Google which I used as reference, and basically just improvised along the way to suit my own taste and preference. It yielded a big loaf good enough to serve 6-8 people.

Winter Wonderland

I feel like walking into the Platform Nine and Three-Quarters as I was being led into The Chopsticks, "the restaurant that guests never see" at the Mandarin Oriental. I was invited by my gracious friend at MO to join their Christmas Media Party held at their staff canteen aka The Chopsticks this year, and of course, seeing this as a cool opportunity to step into a place not usually open to the public and me being curious to see what's behind the scene at this well-run hotel, I simply cannot refuse such an invitation.

Merry "Yummy" Christmas

Well most people made their christmas cards with the pictures of themselves, their spouses, their babies, their kids, their dogs, cats, squirrels, rabbits, goldfish, plants or whatever. We decided to share with you some of the wonderful food we have enjoyed over the past year.

Have a great holiday season, my friend, and all the best (food) in the year 2011! Just remember: a man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work! (a quote from here) Amen.