Barbecue Galore

I never quite buy the notion that one can fully appreciate food without sharing the passion of preparing them at the same time. And hanging out with people who appreciate food and sharing the passion of preparing them (and being very good at this) brought great pleasure far beyond any delicious dishes on the table can give. I am glad to have such an occasion at a Hong Kong-style barbecue one evening at my friend's place this past weekend.

Food Experiment - 40-second sponge cake

Friends who came to my place for dinner knew I love doing food experiments with them being the guinea pigs - some of them got the better of those experiments, though most are not so lucky. But the one I did last weekend turned out to be quite decent - more decent than I expected.

I got this recipe idea from a book I flipped through which talked about molecular gastronomy. While most of the recipes inside required use of obscure ingredients or funky equipment, this one caught my eye because it sounded easy to make and no special equipment needed other than a cream siphon, which I considered as a piece of ordinary kitchen equipment - in fact I got 2 at home. Anyway it's called 40-second sponge cake, as it only took 40 second of cooking time, in a microwave. It actually came from a recipe from the El Bulli menu a few years ago - how cool is that. Now let me show you how I did it.

First in Hong Kong: Sushi Shikon

(I have changed the title of this to reflect the recent change of restaurant name from Sushi Yoshitake Hong Kong to Sushi Shikon)

It's almost surreal as I walked through the familiar sliding door of Sushi Yoshitake, seeing the familiar face of Chef Masahiro Yoshitake working behind the Hinoki wood counter - after all it's hardly 6 months ago when I walked into his restaurant in Tokyo and had the most memorable dinner there. Afterwards as I reflected on that meal in my blog, I did mention I would love to go back some time, but little did I know I would actually have such an opportunity so soon, except this time the venue changed from a non-descript commercial building in the neon-lit back streets of Ginza 8-chome to a boutique hotel in a quiet corner at Hong Kong's Sheung Wan district.

Holy Crabs! - Man Wah and its hairy crabs

Autumn morning breezes reminded me that it's the time of the year when hairy crabs showed up in every Shanghainese restaurant menus in town. Well, that and the invitation from Mandarin Oriental Hong Kong for a preview of Man Wah's seasonal hairy crab menu which runs for 2 weeks from end of October.

The wow meal at Kikuchi

There's little doubt in my mind that the omakase sushi meal at Sukiyabashi Jiro Roppongi was epic, but if I have to name my favorite meal during the 10-day stay in Tokyo, that belongs to the dinner at Kikuchi, a restaurant in Nishi-azabu which specializes in kappou gomi - which literally means the culinary art of cutting and cooking.