滿記甜品 Honeymoon Desserts

滿記甜品
旺角亞皆老街8號
朗豪坊4樓409號
Honeymoon Desserts
Langham Place
8 Argyle St., 4th Fl. Shop 409

MTR: Mong Kok

courtesy openrice.com

A few years back, if you asked anybody in Hong Kong what was the dessert place of Hong Kong, you'd probably get 許留山 Hui Lau San for an answer. They've got yummy mango desserts and delicious drink mixtures to die for, including ingredients from strawberries and mangoes to grass jelly and aloe, a sure bet to quenching your "healthy dessert" craving and to chill you out from the Hong Kong humidity.

But if you ask the same question these days, more and more you might get Honeymoon Desserts as the dessert destination of choice instead. With a feel-good artistic decor to make you feel right at home (or at a quaint sip-a-cup-of-coffee bookshop because of the fake books stacked on the fake bookshelves), Honeymoon Desserts boasts a darn good variety of desserts including mochis topped with peanut butter, or mochis stuffed with sweet black sesame served in a sweet ginger soup, or different flavors of ice-cream bathing in coconut milk with pomelo or smooth delicious grass jelly. Even lovers of durian will find themselves at home here, and haters of durian need not worry, because there are specific durian-eating areas (no, they don't ask "durian or non-durian" when you enter the shop) so you won't be inhaling any second-hand durian smells (this is only at some outlets though, I can't say for sure if this specific one at Langham Place has one or not).

芒果白雪黑糯米 Thai Black Glutinous Rice in Vanilla Sauce

With a distinct vanilla flavor permeating the sweet purple sticky rice, you get a mouthful of heavenly goodness with an interesting looking, albeit plastic, spoon. Soaking within the vanilla goodness are little sheets of shaved-ice, giving an ever-so-subtle ice-crunchy texture to an otherwise empty soup. The Mango was just a bit sour, but not enough to put a dent really on the overall experience, which is a tasty dessert with a delicately harmonious balance of ingredients.

楊枝甘露 Mango Pomelo and Sago Sweet Soup

Pomelo is a kind of fruit very similar in texture as grapefruit, but not in taste because pomelo is a whole heck of a lot better in that it's sweet, never sour or tart.
A good companion with sago (little glutinous rice balls) in this sweet soup served cold, they're a pleasant sensation to bite into because although they're small, they're packed with little bursts of juice that just give a great smooth, but not boring, texture for the sweet juice. The centerpiece to the juice is of course the mango (it's in there! don't worry, I just didn't get it in this picture =( ), which combines to make a truly simple dish, yet one that surprises with a memorable, and for many a favorite, taste.

The menu at Honeymoon really seems quite endless, so this is really just the tip of an iceberg of dessert goodness. Honeymoon Desserts is a chain that did have its humble beginnings. I had my first taste actually right after the first hike I did in Hong Kong, of course in Sai Kung where the original honeymoon shop is. If you get a chance, check it out there because it's a lovely place. Otherwise, keep your eyes out and you should be able to stumble upon one in one of many places in Hong Kong.

又一店: 京川滬名菜 Another One： Beijing and Shanghai Food

紅磡火車站國際都會商場743-744號舖
Hung Hom, Metropolis Mall, Store #743
KCR: Hung Hom Station



If you've got a craving for some Shanghainese - looking to get your xiao-long bao fix, you want a different persuasion of scallion pancakes, or just plain looking for good food - you can't go wrong with Another One. Contrary to this restaurant's name, its dishes are packed with flavor that stand out from most cuisine you'll find in Hong Kong. Just seeing these dishes again and blogging about it is making both my mouth and my stomach water.

白肉粉皮 White-meat Chicken Noodles Salad

If you like chilled salad type dishes, you'll love this one. It's got a kind of peanut sauce over it, not chunky and clunky like peanut butter, but smooth, flowing, and savory. Thrown over thin strips of cucumber, strips of white-meat chicken for a complimentary tougher texture, and chewy flat noodles, they all combine for the most interesting celebration of 4 different textures in your mouth, and a delicious cool dish.

一品霸王雞 First Imperial Chicken

This one is marinated with more flavor than your typical Hong Kong chicken. It comes bathed in a sauce that seems to include vinegar and wine, but with a subtly sweet flavor. Topped with several red seeds (don't worry, they're soft and chewy) this dish is not only plenty flavorful, but easy on the eyes as well.

蔥爆羊肉 Onion Bursting Lamb Meat

These strips of lamb meat were thin, but bunched together for a satisfyingly juicy mouthful, it was probably the heartiest dish of the meal. Onions and scallions thrown in with pepper also made it the most flavorful as well - a fiesta for your taste-buds!

And here of course are the classic Shanghainese xiao-long bao. They come out piping hot, with a hearty texture of a dumpling skin, wrapping an explosion of amazing saucy soup and pork from within. Dipped in a vinegar sauce with strips of ginger, xiao-long bao really is an impressive ensemble of nicely complimentary ingredients for a culinary masterpiece.

招牌小龍爆 Specialty Xiao-long Bao

蔥油餅 Scallion Pancakes

Scallion pancakes in Hong Kong and the US tend to be flatter and tighter, so it's nice to try out this Shanghainese version. The outer-most layers were very thin and flaky, but biting into it more reveals a chewy and flavorful core, with a bundle of scallions making for an oily core with that signature scallion zing. I appreciated the subtlety of the scallion flavor, although my three dining companions didn't like that it wasn't as flavorful.

生煎鍋貼 Shanghainese Pot-sticker

We ended the meal with these pot-sticker dumplings that had some sort of sweet filling inside. I can't say what it was, none of us knew! It was just good, not great, but you have to appreciate the aesthetic contrast between the black filling and white bun, I think.

Overall it's a great restaurant, with great Shanghainese food that would not hesitate to recommend!

天澄閣 Crystal Harbour Restaurant (Reprise #1)

Crystal Harbour Restaurant was literally a stone-throw away from where I lived in Hong Kong. After seeing the positive feedback from its first showing here on TungChoiSt., I decided that this superb dim sum place should get an encore! First, I will show some great standard fare Hong Kong dim sum dishes, including a dessert bun that is so simple yet so melty-satisfying to the tastebuds. Then I'll show a few tasty treats that, just like all of Crystal's other dim sum, rewards customers' patience with the most simple ingenuity and delicious elegance that Hong Kong dim sum could ever offer.

四寶滑雞扎 - seibou waaht gaijaat ("4 treasures" bundled Chicken)

脆皮燒肉 - cheuipei siuyuhk (roast pork with mustard)

Ordering a "4 treasures" bundled chicken at your dim sum experience will surely satiate the hungriest of your party. The hearty "4 treasures" usually includes Chicken and fish maw as the 2 essential standard treasures. For those unfamiliar with fish maw, it's the fish's air bladder that let's them float contentedly through the waters, and it's a common ingredient in Cantonese cooking mostly because its texture absorbs tasty (and fatty!) juices, giving your tastebuds a pleasant treat of flavorful bursts of juices released with every bite! The other two "treasures" of this gai jaat are a big meaty chunk of ham, and a big stalk of baby corn. Overall a filling dim sum, the "4 treasures" chicken bundled together in a thin chewy tofu wrapping is a perfect hearty foursome of delicious magnitude. The second dish pictured above is the ever familiar siu yuhk, or roast pork. With a crispy yet moist skin over a tender and juicy chunk of meat, why haven't American Chinatowns thought of pairing this already flavorful delight with some mustard? This is the standard sauce of choice for roast pork in Hong Kong (unless you're at a Chinese wedding banquet which will serve more traditional fare). Actually, no sauce is really necessary because the pork is so juicy and flavorful, but the mustard does give a zesty zing to spice things up a bit. Definitely recommended.

And what better standard dim sum dessert would one get in Hong Kong than the ever so wonderful egg custard bun.

流沙奶皇飽 - lauhsa laaiwohng baau (egg custard bun)

One bite into this yummy treat will send melt-in-your-mouth egg custard into your mouth. The Chinese translates literally as melting/flowing sand milk king bun. In other words, watch the melting creaminess ooze out from the soft and moist bun.


There's not much original that Crystal Harbour Restaurant can do with these three standard dishes above, but for the "4 treasures" chicken as well as the egg custard bun, Crystal prepares these in top-tier fashion. You usually wouldn't get such a full and meaty "4 treasures" at other places, and as for the egg custard bun, I personally rank this as the best one I've had in Hong Kong, but tied with the ones they've got over at 牡丹庭 Mu Dan Ting Chinese Restaurant, which I'll be blogging about here on TungChoiSt. sometime later this summer (for now you can find Mu Dan Ting at OpenRice).

But what one really comes to Crystal Harbour Restaurant for is the creative dim sum delicacies they create. Here are a few neat and tasty ones:

千絲蘿蔔絲酥 - chinsi lohbaahksi sou

紫米香芒卷 - jimai heungmong gyun

I can't seem to provide meaningful translations for these dishes. I take it as a good sign that these creative concoctions are unique beyond meaning! A character-by-character translation of the first dish is: thousand silk/threads radish silk/threads crispy. Basically, one bite into the core of this tightly packed crispy pastry will break open a "thousand" threads of piping hot baked Chinese radish that are themselves soft on the outside and subtly crunchy on the inside. The second dish pictured uses "purple rice" (the same used in this dessert I previously blogged about) for a mochi outer wrapping, a fresh mango inner core, and a dusting of shredded coconut to top it. Aesthetically pleasant, it's a nice, but not stellar, dessert.

Finally, I end with one of the most traditional desserts of Cantonese cuisine, 豆腐花 - dauh fu fa, literally tofu flower. Usually anytime you order this you'll get it in a personal bowl. But Crystal Harbour being Crystal Harbour, this wouldn't do of course! No, they prefer to give you the entire wooden vat that is traditionally used in making this dessert, a mini one of course. This basically transfers the responsibility of scooping the tofu out of the vat and into your bowl from the restaurant over to you, and this may seem like a sour deal to some, but personally I like it this way. It brings the food-appreciator in on one more bit of the food process, and the "tofu flower" itself is really good - bland by Western standards, but the soft tofu is smooth down the throat, and you get a combination of two subtle flavors, tofu, and ginger. A pleasant and simple way to end a meal.

Here are some other recommended dishes:
蘋果叉燒酥 - pingguo chasiu sou (apple charsiu crisps)
葡式木糖布甸 - pouhsik muhktohng bouhdin (Portuguese Pudding...similar to the one I blogged about from O Porto Interior, but not as good, although this one at Crystal uses vanilla ice cream rather than cream)

九龍 紅磡灣 紅樂道 12號
海韻軒酒店 3樓
3/F, Harbourview Horizon All-suite Hotel,
12 Hung Lok Road, Hunghom Bay, Kowloon
East Rail Line: Hung Hom Station