Hiroshi (宏)
Owned by a Japanese tea specialist, Sato-san,
Hiroshi offers both Japanese cakes and noodles, with a bit of French sweets on
the side. The shop / café was an instant hit in HK. Their forte is green tea;
Hiroshi uses prestigious “first tea” (the youngest tea leaves of the season)
for a selection of their desserts. Mister bought me their matcha chiffon cake
when he picked me up at the airport; and various swiss rolls for dessert.
Swiss roll: Coffee, Green tea, Strawberry and
original
The sponges were soft, airy and moist, not
too sweet, but deliciously eggy. Green tea was particularly well done, leaving
a delicate fragrance trailing as an aftertaste; coffee had a smoky, roasted
aroma. That said swiss rolls are not my first choice of cakes, but these are
worth trying.
Lab
Made Ice Cream
The little ice cream shop claims to serve
‘molecular ice cream’. Well, it’s just made with liquid Nitrogen, exactly like
Chin Chin Laboratories in London. There are more gimmicks in the flavours they
offer here, mostly traditional Chinese desserts, like glutinous balls with
crushed peanuts or sesame rolls.
I thought it was extremely disappointing.
Unlike Chin Chin, there were 4 staff crowded in a workstation, routinely
dumping masses of liquid nitro into a mixing bowl and mass produced each
flavour. All looking extremely fed up and not wearing goggles!
The result is that the ice cream doesn’t
have the smooth, soft gelato texture, as the masses of nitro froze the mixture
without getting enough air in. Flavours were pure gimmicks – mine was pathetic;
boring box-standard vanilla with chopped peanuts and coconut shreds sprinkled
on top. It tasted like a coconut cornetto, for £3.50 too!
Xiao
Tian Gu (小甜谷)
Just opposite the unsatisfactory Lab Made,
is the dessert shop that triggered much talk of town a few years back, partly
because it was opened by a celeb and hence for a lot of support from bigger
celebrities; partly for their ultra rich steamed milk pudding with Japanese
Hokkaido milk.
It’s pretty good.
Holly
Brown
This coffee shop has opened up 5 branches
in less than 2 years, serving good coffees and ice cream.
The ice cream toppings and combinations are
mixed on a cold metal board. I had 'Rock On! Vanilla' - Mediocre stuff if I’m honest.
Barista
Jam
Coffee culture has grown in HK too. A small
population of coffee geeks have settled in and they blend and roast their own
coffee.
I love this hidden gem in the older part
near Central.
Knockbox
This place was serious about their coffee;
Mister said on a quieter day, the baristas would happily chat about their
specialty beans and offer you to taste various methods. It reminded me of a
mini Prufrock.
Happy
together (甜蜜 蜜)
For some reason, this street is lined with
dessert shops, and more interestingly, each shop is swamped with people and massive
queues. I can’t comment on others, but this shop failed on every level.
Their signature puff pastry tofu pudding
was disgusting. After a 10min wait, the pudding was lukewarm, watery and oddly
swimming in chocolate water. Mister’s deep-fried pancake was oozing with oil,
spoilt further by cheap cheap mango ice cream. Mum’s baked banana was oddly
wrapped undercooked filo pastry and Dad’s mango pudding tasted of cheap,
artificial flavourings. Gross.
I skipped all the new French patisserie and chocolatiers; I know Eric Keyser has made his name here, but I can have that back in Europe. In addition, there are too many small cake shops with very young pastry chefs who trained briefly in Paris, opening their shops in more suburban areas to avoid the insanely expensive rent. I don't know if they are worth the trek, I mean 2 years training in a French cooking school... maybe I'll wait.