Pisco has several friends in Hong Kong, and so my gracious host arranged a group dinner on Friday at a place illustriously called “Sichuan Cuisine Da Ping Huo”. The restaurant was special, in that it is tiny (20 seats), serves a 10-odd course prix meal exclusively, and is run by a husband-and-wife team from Sichuan province. Sichuanese food is known to be spicy, and these two have a reputation for providing a highly authentic experience. Authentically (read: insanely) hot, that is. The husband runs the front of the house and the wife is the chef; a couple other waiters help out but it’s a pretty lean operation.
Five of us met up in Central and we strolled over to the resto which was in Mid-levels. We were booked for the 7 o’clock seating and we walked in on time. The dining room is quite beautiful – all dark stone, soft lighting, and modern tables and chairs. Accessories of the eastern persuasion (paper lamps, ceramic vases, etc.) were strewn tastefully around the room, undoubtedly in a feng shui-compliant manner. Ten large paintings were mounted on the walls, and someone told me that Wang Hai (the husband) was the artist for all of them. It’s a beautiful, calm space; somewhat odd in retrospect given the fiery gastronomical ordeal that we were about to be put through. It’s what my dining room would look like in my dreams.
We ordered a few large bottles of Yanjing beer, said a couple of toasts, and relaxed. A couple minutes later, the dishes started to arrive. I’ve listed them in order, but it’s possible that a few are out of order. I’m sure I forgot a few, too, but I lost track. All dishes were served in quantities that our table normally didn’t finish. I was reminded to pace myself, since it’s easy to quell one’s hunger pangs with the first three dishes… and then be overwhelmed knowing you’re not even halfway through the meal. It’s a marathon.
Dishes
- Sweet and sour cucumber (cold)
- Rice noodle salad in spicy sauce. Clear, wide rice noodles were difficult to pick up, but they were rather tasty. Spice level 5 (on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is milk and 10 is 5-star pad thai or phaal curry. Tabasco is probably a 6 or 7 on this scale.)
- Chili, shredded carrot, and jellyfish (salad). Spice level 5
- Pine nuts and celery? A simple dish, and much appreciated as a palate cleanser. Spice level 2.
- Napa cabbage soup in pork-based broth, with shredded chicken on top. Spice level 3.
- Chicken in red chili sauce. This was heralded as the first meat dish and it was lovely. I avoided eating as many of the chopped chilis as I could, but that was still too many. Spice level 5
- Dried tofu with spring onion and large red chilis. Spice level 3, or 5 if you ate one of the peppers, which I did.
- Beef, extremely spicy. Here is where it started to get serious. At this point, you’ve eaten quite a bit, but you haven’t even gotten halfway through the meal. You’re on your third or fourth beer, feeling tipsy; tipsy enough that you can just ignore the sense that you are eating way too much spicy food, and that there will be hell to pay later. Mr Wang delivered this dish himself, and placed a new set of bright red chopsticks on the bowl. “Very hot” he said, smiling, and then he strolled off, leaving the rest of us warily eyeing the bowl. The beef was fairly dense and not particularly tender, but it was flavorful. The heat came a minute after swallowing; it built slowly in your mouth, eventually causing your nose to run and your scalp to itch. More beer was commanded. Spice level 9
- Pork. Unquestionably the highlight of the meal for me, though others disagreed. Beautifully sauteed pork, sliced around 1cm thick, with a mixture of rice and sweet potato in between each slice. The combination of the spicy pork, sweet potato, and rice was something that I hope never to forget; it worked so well together. Spice level 7
- Lettuce heart and fungus (vegetarian). By this point I couldn’t really taste anything but this dish was reported to be good. Spice level 2
- Large prawn in chilis. Rather enormous prawn. Spicy. Reminded me of a popular saying in Ibiza in 1998: “If you eat the head of a prawn, you get the knowledge of a prawn.” I didn’t eat the head. Spice level 6. At this point, you’ve ingested a very large quantity of food, most of which is incredibly spicy, and you should stop. But you don’t, of course, because you’re in the middle of an epic dinner and you just can’t say no to Mr Wang. A small voice, imperceptible through the haze of beer and chili wafting through your brain, reminds you that you will regret this later.
- Pork dumplings. Served in a sweet red chili sauce that looked more fiercesome than it tasted. Spice level 5
- Ma po tofu. Tofu and pork in an insanely spicy presentation. Spice level 87. This was, from a chili point of view, the meal’s piece de resistance. Or its raison d’etre. The mainland Chinese woman in our group (who lived for some time in Sichuan) declared it a 10 by Hong Kong standards.
- Light soup with baby pea shoots. Clear broth. Spice level 1
- Dessert: Light jelly in honey sauce. I would be lying if I said that I could taste anything at this point. My taste buds had been utterly and unapologetically obliterated, and I kowtowed to the owners. Spice level 1
After dessert, the owner introduced his wife (the chef), who is also an opera singer. She gave a short performance at the end, around 5 minutes of rather powerful Chinese opera. We all listened intently as she sang; all of us, that is, except one woman at another table who took a phone call midway through and then had a conversation that lasted much longer than “I’ll call you right back.” I shot her dirty looks but she didn’t care.
Fully satiated, we headed off to a few bars in the neighborhood, met up with more friends, and carried on until quite late. Pisco got to bed around 3am and fell into a deep sleep.
Unfortunately, that’s not the end of the story.
Around 5am, I wake up with a horrific pain in my stomach. We can debate whether the pain felt more like a knife or a hot branding iron; suffice it to report that it was indeed bad. The Sichuanese food was not making nice; after ingesting far too much of it, my body was surrendering. I alternated laying on different sides; no change. I wondered if I should go to the hospital and get my stomach pumped; this was a new and novel thought. The pain got to be so bad that I wondered if I should get airlifted back to Seattle. Not that that would do me any good, but you can see what state I was in. I decided to stick it out and spent the next two hours figuring out if my delicate equilibrium was going to explode. Luckily, I fell back asleep, but not before realizing that somewhere, a Sichuanese restauranteur and his wife were probably laughing at me.
Sichuan Cuisine Da Ping Huo
L/G, Hilltop Plaza
49 Hollywood Rd., Central, HK
Tel: +852 2559 1317
