Friday, January 14, 2011

Kimberley’s (君怡閣中菜廳) - ♕♕♕♕ 1/2

  My first knowledge about Kimberley’s famous Roasted Suckling Pig with Two Rice Stuffing comes from reading Peech’s blog @ Diary of a Growing Boy.  And thanks to everyone organising I finally had the chance to meet fellow foodies & bloggers - TomEatsJenCooks, Mochachocolata Rita, Supercharz, @ Stegersaurus, @ Dimsumdiva and also reuniting with Jason Bon Vivant whose review can be found HERE.   Nice meeting you all!   *Pls Note that the Pig requires 24 Hours notification and a prepayment of $500 Deposit, so thanks to @ Stegersaurus for taking her time to organise all of this beforehand and also ordering the lovely food!


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Appetiser and X.O. Sauce ($50)


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石鍋金勾攬菜豆腐 (Stonepot Tofu with Preserved Olives) -
This came sizzling hot, and remember to keep stirring the contents whilst taking turns snapping photos of it, as it’ll stick to the bottom and get burnt!  I thought the Tofus and mushrooms were spot on, enhanced by a few Dried Prawns, but there’s hardly any Preserved Olives taste? ~ 7/10



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香茅汁炆牛脇骨 (Lemon Grass Braised Beef & Bones Stew) -
This was huge, and thank god there’s hardly any traceable lemon grass flavour in the beef gravy below, which I prefer confined to Thai & Vietnamese dishes only!  The tendons were the highlight here followed by the meltingly tender briskets.  *I was a bit shocked that the bone marrows were hollow like a tunnel though, where had all that lovely marrow fat gone?  As a side note, it seems not many restaurants in HK still sell those steamed strips of marrows anymore –
the ones which looks kind of like Korean sticky garaetteok? ~ 8/10



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古法瓦罉鹽焗雞 (Whole bird of Claypot Salt-Baked Chicken) -
This was initially pretty good, but somehow the crispy skin deflated and it wasn’t as salty as some other versions out there that I’ve had.  I also thought the presentation suggested that it was chopped up hastily very unevenly by the kitchen ~  6.5/10

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Extra Spiced Salt (淮鹽) and Ginger with Spring Onion (薑葱茸) sauce, so that’s where the salt went!  
But I thought Salt Baked Chicken by default always comes with 沙姜汁, sort of like a grainy galangal-like paste.  But I am not 100% sure, just thought it was weird at the time !


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金陵全豬烤香苗 (Roasted Suckling Pig stuffed with Glutinous and Long Grain Rice) -
Our little piglet looked slenderer than some of us had expected, and it was still smiling from the tan!  Deceiving visually, but it is actually big and filling and we had some left overs in the end ..


Stuffed Suckling Pig at Kimberley’s



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This was just AMAZING!  The sticky rice mixed with another bitey rice was firstly par-cooked by frying before it’s then stuffed and baked together with the pig.  And this was cooked to perfection, as it definitely absorbed all the oily flavour and fragrance!  The Skin was crackling like a thin croquant.  I think my only comment can be - that I don’t mind the rice to be less ‘spiked’ with herbs & spice, and the pork skin-wrap to actually carry some real meat to give it some more meaty other than just lard oily flavour, but that’s trying to be greedy !!  ~ 9.5/10

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I love Fried Pork Ears as a dish, but after seeing TomEats giving it a go and concluded that they’re not at all crispy, I thought I will skip this part.  In hindsight, I would request the restaurant to help us re-fry the ears next time, just like when you eat raw prawns and fish & then fry the bones and head after!

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There’s 2 accompanying Sauces and 1 Sugar for eating with the pork, almost everyone on the table unanimously agreed the English mustard does the trick the best !




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豆醬炒唐生菜 (Claypot Fried Chinese Lettuce with Beans Paste) -
I think on the spot we were thinking why it carries no detectable dried shrimps paste and aroma, but apparently we didn’t order the 啫啫唐生菜煲 version. In that case, this was fine but the veggies were a bit too soggy rather than crunchy ~ 7/10



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Red Bean Soup -
Not sweet enough or grainy enough in consistency, the best one I’d had was at Yung Kee, pity their other food items are hit and miss! : P   I still prefer this restaurant than the experience over there!

 



Price: $230-$250  + 10% Per Person
Score: ★★★★★


Opening Hours:
Mon to Sat - 11:00am - 23:00pm
Sun             - 10:00am - 23:00pm 
Address: 尖沙咀金巴利道28號君怡酒店M樓
M/F, The Kimberley Hotel, 28 Kimberley Road, Tsim Sha Tsui
Phone: 2369 8212

8 comments:

  1. Hey K,

    Guess what? I was one of those "piggies" who chowed down the 2 stuff pigs with Peech! (^o^). I have had this pig quite a few times before, but never in my life had 2 pigs in one dinner for just 8 people!! It's indeed a piggy feast!

    But you know what? In the past (about 1 year ago) the cooked dishes were a lot better. Then the chef (the one who cooked dishes, not the roast pig chef) left and (rumor said) went to Sun Tong Lok! That's why the dishes went downhill, but the pig is still good.

    I didn't think we need to pay for deposit though?

    Thanks
    Little Meg

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Little Meg,

    Sorry haven't replied your email as yet, but guesswhat, I bought this week's DrinkEatMenWomen and saw the Sydney section Part 2, but it was too late to secure last week's. Yet tonight I saw it in a cafe in Tai Hang and finally read that section! Interesting about Sydney. :)

    So the normal non-roasting chef goes to Sun Took Lok and all of a sudden gained them 3 Stars? hahahaha... oh hold on, according to Tom, it was the 3 Star waiters cooking on a gas stove. 堂煎 anyone! : )

    I think may be because Peech is a regular customer? We actually needed to pay $500 cash in deposit. If we ordered 2 pigs like you guys did, we'd need to pay $1000 :( Anyway I think 季季紅 has since copied this idea, but the rice is stuffed from the top slit - kinda looking like a 焼きそばロール!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hey K,

    I have tried all 3 versions - 季季紅, Kimberley Court, and Sherton's Celestial Court's stuffed piggy and Kimberley court's is the best. 季季紅 was the most inferior among the three. I think for both 季季紅 and Sheraton I actually did write about the dinners on Openrice, may be a year ago. Never wrote about Kimberley despite had dinners there several times already.

    I did an extensive "throwdown" review to compare the 3 piggies side by side, rating from pig skin, pig meat, fillings (rice and other Stuffing), rice to meat ratio, etc, of the 3 different versions on Facebook a long time ago.


    Too bad you didn't use FB as most of us post our albums and brief reviews on Facebook now rather than on OR or public blogs.


    We almost instantly upload our food pictures WHILE we are dining! (like I uploaded the 2 piggies as soon as they were rolled out on the cart to our table during the meal!)

    Little Meg

    ReplyDelete
  4. Oh, about the deposit. It has nothing to do with Peech being regular customer as our dinner wasn't reserved under his name and we paid the total in the end without any downpayment.

    Little Meg

    ReplyDelete
  5. Got your link from Boo_licious (masak-masak).

    The roast pig looks divine. I first heard of it from Chunkyhubby's post some time back. He claims the pig was the best thing he's ever eating. Of course of all us here in Malaysia and Singapore can only salivate at that right?

    It'll be a pity that I wouldn't be able to give this a try when I pop by to HK in february with my partner. I don't think two people would be able to finish all of it.

    Will continue looking out for more places to eat on your blog. Thanks for sharing in advance.

    Cheers

    ReplyDelete
  6. Dear qwazymonkey,

    Nice to meet you and thanks for dropping by :)

    When are you visiting in Feb? I definitely don't mind tagging along to have another go at it - except I need to leave Hong Kong for around 1 month sooner rather than later (haha, no confirmed dates yet).

    Feel free to contact me here or offline at hkepicurus@gmail.com and I'll ask if other friends want to come and share too. I think this pig could be polished off by around 5-6 people if they don't mind the grease! :D Have fun while you're here!

    ReplyDelete
  7. how much is the stuffed pig?

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hi,

    The whole pig is $800 from memory. But if you go search for this restaurant on www.openrice.com , they have some kind of $100 voucher ! Hope it helps :)

    ReplyDelete

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