Lonely Planet - I trust thee no more
Ok, ok, I will still trust the Lonely Planet on nice tourist sites. However, I'm going to ignore the Lonely Planet when it comes to food and restaurants.
I went to several "top five" restaurants (e.g top five in Tsim Sha Tsui, top five in Central, top five in Wan Chai etc) recommended by the Lonely Planet. With the exception of the Peak Lookout, I cannot rate any of the restaurants I've been to so far any better than mediocre. Sure, the food didn't taste horrible, but the best I can say about them is that they are edible.
Just last Sunday (20 Mar 2005), Johnny and I went to yet another restaurant called Spring Deer, a Peking restaurant, somewhere in Tsim Sha Tsui. Being a Peking restaurant, we naturally ordered Peking Duck, the specialty dish (which the waitress assured us was very good). Later the duck came. It was the fattest duck I've ever seen. I don't mean the size of the duck, but the thick layers of fat that lay beneath the skin of the duck. If I were to measure the thickness of the fat, I'd have to reckon it'd be about 1cm thick. The chef who cut the skin off the duck somehow managed to include every inch of fat the duck had. It's certainly not like any Peking Duck I've ever seen.
I only managed about half of my share before I gave up. It could be a psychological effect, but I was quite certain that my heart was beating much faster after eating those thick slabs of fat.
There! I shall stop trusting the Lonely Planet again, at least when it comes to restaurants. Instead, I am going to listen to my friend, a local who obviously knows more about Hong Kong restaurants than the Lonely Planet.
I went to several "top five" restaurants (e.g top five in Tsim Sha Tsui, top five in Central, top five in Wan Chai etc) recommended by the Lonely Planet. With the exception of the Peak Lookout, I cannot rate any of the restaurants I've been to so far any better than mediocre. Sure, the food didn't taste horrible, but the best I can say about them is that they are edible.
Just last Sunday (20 Mar 2005), Johnny and I went to yet another restaurant called Spring Deer, a Peking restaurant, somewhere in Tsim Sha Tsui. Being a Peking restaurant, we naturally ordered Peking Duck, the specialty dish (which the waitress assured us was very good). Later the duck came. It was the fattest duck I've ever seen. I don't mean the size of the duck, but the thick layers of fat that lay beneath the skin of the duck. If I were to measure the thickness of the fat, I'd have to reckon it'd be about 1cm thick. The chef who cut the skin off the duck somehow managed to include every inch of fat the duck had. It's certainly not like any Peking Duck I've ever seen.
I only managed about half of my share before I gave up. It could be a psychological effect, but I was quite certain that my heart was beating much faster after eating those thick slabs of fat.
There! I shall stop trusting the Lonely Planet again, at least when it comes to restaurants. Instead, I am going to listen to my friend, a local who obviously knows more about Hong Kong restaurants than the Lonely Planet.
