Hong Kong: Big Binding Crab/ Big hairy crab 大閘蟹

I know I was raving about this last year here, but after my Big Binding Crab 大閘蟹 this year, I think I might take a break next season.

This year, I had the opportunity to try the full set meal consisting of 7 courses from one of the more famous Big binding crab restaurants in Hong Kong, East Ocean. This set came to $260 HKD per person (before gratuity), which is a steal, as buying just the raw crab and taking it home to cook would cost around $200 HKD per person.

The first course was a Chinese soup with Shark's Fin (魚翅佛跳牆). You name it, it basically had everything in it, from veggies, to dried scallops, mushrooms, pork, chicken leg (eeks), bamboo shoots and even a decent sized piece of shark's fin (Shark's fin is a fine delicacy to the Chinese, it's pretty much flavourless but with a good soup base, it turns it to gold).

Second course was the Crab miso soup dumplings (2 pieces per person) (蟹粉小龍包). A little bland in flavour, the flavour of the crab miso was taken over by the pork.

The third course that came was a little fusion; French garlic toast served with crab miso dip. I was quite happy with this. The dip had a very strong aroma and taste, unlike the crab soup dumplings, however as heavy as the crab miso already was, there was a thick layer of oil on top.After carefully scooping the oil out, I piled on the crab miso dip on my toast and was on my way to ecstasy. Yuummm...

The crabs came next, two per person. There was an abundance in crab miso; strong in flavour, served very hot, tasted especially yummy with our chinese wine pairing.  The restaurant provided a special sweet vinegar that essentuated the flavours, it worked, we polished our first crab inside out and onto the next.

Veggies came next. Just blanched veggies, needed something to wash my system out after this feast!

Dried shrimp udon came after. I swear, this was a neverending set dinner. I had a bite and gave it up. The hand-made udon was made extremely well; the soup base was sflavourful yet not heavy.

Finally, a dessert drink was served. It is a ginger tea with multi-colored sweet dumplings, supposedly this is  to make you feel better after the huge heavy crab set. This was a bit too sweet, not enough ginger and I think I need about 8 more cups of this to even be close to cleaning out my system (ulgh so heavy). The soup dumplings were multi-colored starch balls.. I just took it all out and drank the soup alone. Colored starch balls aren't my thing.

I fell sick for a week after this meal.  Although this is expected to happen when you have too much crab miso (which I did); and not enough ginger tea (which is also true), I can only bare with feeling like crap once a year. 

Overall, East Ocean has executed this ingredient quite well, I admire how they tried to add a little bit of variation with most these dishes and incorporating a mixture of light and heavy flavours.

East Ocean Seafood Restaurant

http://www.eastocean.com.hk/

SHANGHAI: Soup Dumplings Xiao Long Bao 小籠包

World Famous Nan Xiang Xiao Long Bao!
I believe the most famous place for these Soup Dumpling

s are at a temple in Shanghai called the City God Temple (Cheng Huang Miao). The name of the restaurant is called NanXiang Man Tou Dian.
I love how this restaurant is all about bribery.
As you enter ground level of the restaurant, there are queues that go all the way out of the restaurant nearly to the next block(Approx. 60 people). If you go past the crowd and go up the stairs, you see another queue that goes all the way downstairs of about 40 people. As you go past THAT crowd and go to the third level, there is a lineup of about 20-30 people. There is one more floor on top of that, and there is a queue of about 10 people. Now the good part is, when you ask the people at the counter that you are in a hurry and HOW you can get a table faster, she will ask you for $50RMB. Immediately, you will be led to a nicer area of the restaurant and you will be seated.

And this is the index:
Ground Floor: 50% cheaper than the third level
Second Floor: 75% cheaper than the third level
Third Floor: Paying full price but you can order as much or as little as you like
Forth Floor: Paying full price and you have to order a set
Special Floor: Paying MORE, plus $50 and you have to order a set.

Isn't that awesome? And who says you can't pay to have things done?

The Shanghainese Xiao Long Bao are more well-known as this is where they originated from, however, to be honest, I like WuXi Xiao Long Bao more than Shanghainese. The soup is a little bit more sweet, the skin is much thinner and there's much more soup inside.

Here are some of the dishes we tried from the *Special Floor.

Appetizer Dishes The spinach was good, the fried stuff on the side were way too oily. The beans were decent, just like any other. The chicken was too oily and the Baozi on the top right hand corner were too dry. The Xiao Mai on the same dish were decent.

This was their soup, served in a bun. They gave you a straw for the stuff that was inside the bun. The presentation was very cute and something that seems very traditional. The taste, however was a bit on the bland side, the dough was soggy and very thick. The soup was very flavorful though.




And of course, the infamous Xiao Long Bao. Hot, gushing with soup, loved it with lots and lots of ginger and vinegar.

Now for the question: Do you the proper way to eat Xiao Long Bao? Eating Xiao Long Bao requires a certain technique, must say, eating it is an art within itself. Traditional secrets revealed:

Step-by-Step Guide to Eating Xiao Long Bao or Shanghai Soup Dumplings:
[Source: RasaMalaysia]

1. Pour some vinegar to the shredded ginger. (Xiao Long Bao's are always served with shredded ginger and Chinese black vinegar.)
2. Gently pick up a Xiao Long Bao with the chopsticks and make sure that you don't break the skin. You can do so by holding the Xiao Long Bao in the middle.
3. Gently dip the Xiao Long Bao in the ginger vinegar sauce.
4. Lift it up and place it on the spoon.
5. Nibble the side of the Xiao Long Bao and suck the soup/broth inside the Xiao Long Bao. (This is the best way of savoring the meaty, juicy, and flavorful broth/soup inside the dumpling.)
6. Add some ginger and vinegar (as you like) to the dumpling and eat the rest.
7. Savour. Hmmmm... Yummm.....

Red Chili Wontons

I've had a lot of traditional Chinese food throughout my lifetime. May it be Cantonese dishes, Szechuan dishes, Beijing dishes, Taiwanese dishes, Shanghainese dishes.. the list is never ending. Of all these dishes, I must say, my favorite is Red Chili Wontons. I can have my own order of Red Chili Wontons(RCW) and never get bored of it. Now ONLY when it's good. And when I mean "good", i don't mean alot of garlic nor alot of excess seasoning. I don't like it with vinegar nor soya sauce.

My recipe:
Ingredients:
100-150 g Small wontons (the smaller, the better)
a bit of dried shrimp
1 stick of green onions
sesame oil, red chili oil,
pepper

1. Boil wontons until they are well done. drain and let them sit for a little while
2. Mix all the other ingredients together (Feel free to add garlic if that's what you fancy)
3. Mix with wontons
4. Garnish with green onions
5. VOILA!

Keep in mind, there are two types of RCW. One is the Taiwanese-style which I love and the other is the Shanghainese style with the soya sauce, vinegar and massive amount of garlic. I have yet to find the perfect Taiwanese-style RCW in Hk. Let me know if you know of any please!