Ku-Suya Rakuen

Welcome to Okinawa.

Pisco stopped in for a quick meal at this Okinawan restaurant in Causeway Bay and was instantly transported back to Naha, surrounded by hundreds of bottles of awamori in the dimly lit space.

The goya champuru and tofuyo were excellent, and every bit as good as the dishes I tasted in Japan.  Several more visits will be planned to explore the rest of the menu along with the vast selection of awamori.

Tang Lung Street seems to have a lot of restaurants on it, and one establishment has 30 tables lined up on the side of the road, filled with people eating and drinking – another good option to try, from the number of smiles I saw on the patrons’ faces.

Two dishes and one otoshi ran around 150 HKD.

Ku-Suya Rakuen
12/F, Circle Tower
28 Tang Lung St.
Causeway Bay, Hong Kong [map]
+852 3580 8858

Yachiyo

Anytime I visit a ramen house and enter a little on the late side, in darkness, when the buzz of the dining room is still present but the crescendo has passed, and I sit alone tucked into a corner, my laptop by my side, still warm from the day’s tribulations, I feel a certain kinship with the thousands of salarymen whose nightly rituals I only share infrequently.  Tonight was one of those nights.

And the shio ramen at Yachiyo was delicious and restored my strength for the evening.

Note that Yachiyo will move to a new location on Lyndhurst Terrace in the next few days.  Call ahead to ensure you visit the correct establishment during the transition.

Kiyotaki

Pisco dropped into Kiyotaki on Gough Street for a late dinner, and arrived just as last orders were called.  The small room was nearly empty but the bar was full with four or five drunk locals enjoying their Friday evening.  It is a very loud and festive place when the bar is full, as it’s always been during my visits.

Here’s what we had:

• Large sushi plate – around seven pieces of fish, all excellent.  I wrapped the shiso leaf around a piece of albacore.  Delicious.
• Grilled chicken with basil – superb.  There was some umeboshi on the line of sauce on the skewer, which might have included red miso.  An excellent combination and the best dish of the evening.
• Cold vegetables – a few pieces of asparagus lounged over small rolls of vegetables.  The asparagus were delicious on this hot night, but the rolls were a little large for my taste – too large to fit in one’s mouth comfortably, but they would fall apart if you tried to divide them.
• Yaki-Onigiri – good size, crispy exterior
• Grilled squid – one whole squid, nicely grilled, some kind of dark, thick sauce on the plate, with shredded ginger on the side.  Very tasty.
• Soba noodles – a plate of cold noodles, with dipping sauce on the side.  It came with what appeared to be a tiny duck egg, open at the top, which we poured over the noodles.  Delicious!

The group at the bar drank all night, getting louder and louder – they were having such a good time that it really added to the ambiance.

The bill came to around HKD 480 for two people.

Kiyotaki Japanese Restaurant

It seems like it’s been forever since I’ve had a meal out; of course I’ve eaten out but several business trips and a somewhat difficult 2-week sugar detox have kept my focus from Hong Kong restaurants.

I won’t go into the sugar detox in detail here, except to say that a zero-sugar, low-carb regime is extremely difficult to follow.  Your body will have some very interesting reactions, and you may learn a lot; I did.  I’m glad I did it, and I’m thrilled it’s over.

So it was with fresh eyes and an open heart that I wandered around the neighborhood looking for a place to eat.  A friend had mentioned that Gough Street had several cool restaurants, so Pisco and K wandered down that way.

Gough Street, where have you been?!  What a beautiful stretch of restaurants, design shops, and more restaurants.  French, Japanese, Chinese, and other random western-style eateries abounded.  Al fresco tables under awnings.  Wine bars.  Add some well-styled patrons and it was a nice environment without being a scene.

We ducked into Kiyotaki Japanese Restaurant and sat down near the door.  The room is small, seating for 20 at tables and four more at the bar.  The bar was in fact full with four regulars, who were loudly toasting each other with sake and pouring glasses for the chef.  The room, being severely decorated, was extremely loud from the drunk bar patrons; this can be a nice atmosphere or just overwhelming, depending on your point of view.

The order:

• Sushi – B+, strongly above average.  The star was red snapper (I think), which we ate wrapped in the freshest of shiso leaves.  Astounding.
• Grilled chicken skewer with wasabi – very tasty, and the wasabi was very strong
• Grilled squid, rolled with a shiso leaf, and brushed with umezuki (sour plum).  This was the star dish of the night – solid texture from the squid, brightness from the shiso, and sour from the umezuki… it was an amazing combination, and it’s worth returning for just this one delight.
• Yaki onigiri – smaller than what I’m used to eating (at Maekawa), they were golf-ball sized and delicious.  Crunchy and almost charred on the outside, they have become a kind of comfort food for me.

Service was competent, quiet, and unfussy.

The plates are small, so go with a light appetite or heavy wallet.

A light meal for two ran around 440 HKD without drinks.

Kiyotaki Japanese Restaurant
13 Gough Street
Central, Hong Kong [map]
2877 1772

Honjin

Another day, another Japanese meal in Hong Kong.  This time, it’s dinner.

Pisco and K walk by Honjin in Sai Ying Pun… it’s raining, we’re starving, and even though the resto looks a little fancy for our taste that night, we drop inside.

I don’t remember much about the decor, save that it was (too) well lighted and filled with black lacquer tables and chairs.  They had a set menu for dinner so we both opted for it.  Here’s what we ate:

The first course was two slices of hamachi sashimi served on a shiso leaf.  The hamachi melted in your mouth, and the shiso leaf was the perfect accompaniment.  I’m not quite sure about the orange-colored sashimi on the right – it tasted a little like octopus, but had a much lighter texture.  This was a very auspicious start for the meal.

Second course: a decent frisée salad with shrimp.  The lemon dressing was slightly too acidic, but the shrimp were soft and delicious.

Third course: grilled foie gras, on grilled sausage.  This was a heavenly dish and the high point of the meal – the foie gras was rich beyond belief, smoky from the grill and ever so slightly charred.  The pork sausage was fatty and salty; I would not have picked this to go with the foie gras – it was altogether overkill, but the very tastiest kind.

The fourth course: grilled eel with ginger and eggs.  This was a standard-issue unagi fillet, served in a bowl over a couple eggs scrambled over sliced planks of ginger.  Pisco is again impressed – it is not obvious that these flavors would go together at all (and perhaps they don’t completely) but it’s interesting and it works.

The fifth and final course was a couple of packets of mochi ice cream.

Total for the meal was around 160 HKD per person. Service is not their strong suit, but the food is high quality.  The set menu is quite good value and I think we’ll be back soon for more of that foie gras.

Honjin
Shop 2-3, G/F
356 Queen’s Road West
Hong Kong
[map]