Before we went through the whole menu meticulously at Cafe de Hong Kong, we quickly chose our drinks first. Bubble Tea anyone?
On the left, I had the Fluffy green tea pearl drink, and Mr. A had the ice coffee and tea mix {not sure what it's called but this is basically what it is! } (^.^)
So what are we eating today??
It's a heavy one but my other half, Mr. A, has been wanting to try some food 'from home' where he grew up and there are not many places where they offer the Baked dish with Portuguese sauce.
I believe this dish originates from Macao, which was a Portuguese colony at some point in history. Macao thus still keeps a lot of its Portuguese influence making its cuisine a very interesting one. Being just a short boat trip away from Hong Kong, the dish very simply crossed borders and also made itself known and well liked among the locals of Hong Kong.
While Mr. A went with the Baked Tender Pork Chop dish, I decided to go for the Backed Chicken one.
This is the Baked Tender Pork Chop Dish. The Portuguese sauce in this dish is from a tomato base which obviously gives it its reddish colour. It tasted nice, although I preferred mine one!
I had the 'Real' Portuguese sauce on my version of the dish. Looks a bit like Curry but doesn't taste like one ... and I was happy about that! Rich and creamy, the Portuguese sauce went very well with the grilled chicken and the rice cooked just right!
Cross-section of my very copious meal! Be warned, for lunch ... it is quite a heavy meal!
As accompaniment, we had some very freshly stir fried Kai-Lan which balanced the baked dish and also offered a different texture to the palate!
Going for the less-carb option, foodie companion Mr. D simply went for the soya chicken which is a favourite of mine, especially when the skin if so golden and crispy... yummmmmm
* Droooollll* - on my next visit I am definitely gonna go for the soya chicken!! I hope this has tempted you too!!!
Cafe de Hong Kong
47 Charing Cross Road
London WC2H 0AN
This restaurant seems to be characterised by deceitful labelling practices. I ate their earlier tonight thinking that the service charge was entirely optional, as all of the menus said "Recommended Gratuity 10%".
ReplyDeleteHowever, when it was time to pay the bill, the waitress refused to accept the basic point of the English language that the word "recommended" does not mean "mandatory". The supervisor was summoned and the supervisor threatened that if I did not pay the service charge as well, the establishment would refuse to serve me in future.
I paid the service charge, as I don't feel it is appropriate for me as a Christian to be creating a scene over only £1, but I would seriously advise anyone reading this review against visiting this restaurant: - the deceitful labelling practices when it comes to the service charge make me inclined to wonder if there are other areas in which they try to unscrupulously extract money from customers.
To my mind, the word "recommended" in this context means "recommended ONLY", i.e. optional. If the service charge is only "recommended", it should be entirely possible to simply not pay it without any loss of face.
Don't touch this restaurant with a barge pole.
Hi Graeme,
DeleteSorry to hear about your experience. They definitely didn't respond to your situation very nicely!
But something to note is that they have recently changed management and name ... It is now called Long Ji.
I still think food is nice, cheap and cheerful and if willing to give a blind eye to the service side, will still be going back...