[Clockwise: Beef ball with bean curd, Pai gwat (steamed pork), beef cheong fun - beef rice noodle (we also had BBQ pork version), vegetarian dumplings, ma lai go (steamed sponge cake), cha siu bau (pork bun)]
I arrived in Hong Kong last night to visit my brother and have a getaway over Easter. I had not had much time to settle in before he and my aunt announce we are going to try to eat at a Michelin star yum cha place the next day - the catch is we have to go early to queue! If you go after the early morning rush you could end up waiting up to 5 hours!
Hmm, I was thinking is it really worth it?!
And so we arrived about 9:30am and the queue was already about 50 people deep and almost starting to wrap around the corner. After the first siiting was let in (the restaurant only fits 28 people at a time) we were allocated number 20 - that means there were 19 other groups before us. Given this is my first day in HK and I was open to seeing where my brother would lead, I went with the flow of things and we wandered around the local area until our time was up.
I can't say I would wait 2.5 hours again to eat there, let alone 5 hours. But at least I can say I've eaten there! Between the 3 of us we agreed the highlight was the beef balls with bean curd and the steamed sponge cake was also pretty good. The pork bun was not your average steamed floury or flakey pastry pork bun. It had an unusual spongy but light casing with a slathering of BBQ port inside. Interesting but not fantastic.
For the 3 of us it cost HKD194 which is approximately AUD28 - very good value considering yum cha in Sydney would normally cost AUD25 per head!
What was crazy, was that a woman dining on her own next to us ordered 2 sticky rice, 3 servings of spring rolls, 1 serving of har gow (prawn dumplings), eggplant stuffed with mince meat, steamed lettuce with soy sauce, a serving of pork buns. She ate half and took the other half away! My aunt spoke to her and she was from Repulse Bay. She said she was going to heat up the spring rolls in the oven at home.....To me, the phenomenom of the restaurant blew me away more than the food. Tim Ho Wan 2-8 Kwong Wah St. Mong Kok
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