Korea - Seoul Shopping + Eating Trip

Korea - Seoul Shopping + Eating Trip
18 - 20 Jun, 2011

Flight: Asiana Airline

Hotel: PJ Hotel

I have not been to many place in Korea, but below is my 3 days trip Itinerary for your reference! Hope it helps :)

Day 1 Schedule

Morning:   Airport > PJ Hotel > Sauna (汗蒸幕)

Afternoon: Myeongdong Shopping > Yoogane (柳家鐵板雜炒雞肉店) >  Doota Shopping > Red Mango

Night:        Red Tent Street Stalls (紅帳幕大排檔) > Doota Shopping PJ Hotel

Day 2 Schedule

Afternoon: Jung Sik Dang > EWHA Uni Lane > Egg Pancake > Baskin Robbins

Night:        Dongdaemung > Yoogane > PJ Hotel

Day 3 Schedule

Afternoon: Myeongdong > Ginseng Chicken Soup (百濟蔘雞湯) > O'sulloc Tea House

Night:        Krispy Kreme > Mister Donut > PJ Hotel > Airport

[Korea] Yummy Korea Street Stall

★★★★★

$$

If you watch Korean drama, you will see the Koreans often go to those street stalls under the red tent along the road. These red tent food stalls serve similar functions as Hong Kong's Dai Pai Dang, where nice convenient fast food is served.

The ambiance is one of the main selling point in this red tent stalls. Cosiness and crazily nosy ambiance are what people like about this street stalls. Although the tables were tiny, we had a great time dinning and chattering in there.

[Korea] Red Mango

★★★☆☆

$

Since the first day I knew the word Froyo, I have been told about Red Mango. While the American says Red Mango tastes so much better than the froyo in HK, Red Mango has no branch in Hong Kong and I could not try it or compare it to any other froyo store in Hong Kong. When I spotted this branch at Doota, I immediately ran into it and had my cup.

[Korea] Yoogane - Pizza-like Cheese Seafood Fried Rice

Price: $$
Cravingness: ★★★☆☆1/2

 

Last year when I was shopping in Myeongdong, I passed by Yoogane and saw a pizza looking fried rice on an iron plate through the restaurant's window. I dined in and absolutely like it. So this time I went back again for their lovely Chicken Galbi Fried Rice!

Yoogane worked by choosing the main ingredients on the menu, then ordered sides such as rice, noodles, dokboki (rice cakes) according to your choice. What's more, you can mixed different main ingredients together if you have a big group dinning in. It looked it is a DIY frying house, but no worries as the waiter will cook it for you. (I guess its because we are foreigners?)

Mooncakes Tasting Event | 新口味試食報告

Thank you Openrice.com for the invite to join the mooncakes tasting event, so I could have the opportunity to taste different interesting mooncakes.

Creativity and Newness are always desire, particularly in Hong Kong where you can always find interesting elements everywhere at anytime. It could be in the form of a product, a painting, a window display etc. When it comes to food, creativity exist in the form of presentation, a new twist of ingredients and a merge of cultures. In today's event, we were asked to try 10 different kinds of creative mooncakes from 9 different stores, and to comment on the creativity as well as the taste of those mooncakes

The editor categorised the mooncakes into four categories, as follows.
1) 朱古力系 Chocolate - Vero Chocolate, Coco
2) 花果系 Floral - 美心, 東海堂
3) 甜品系 Dessert - 大班, 聖安娜, 榮華
4) 傳統系 Traditional - 君蘭, 鴻星
1) 朱古力系 Chocolate

Freshness Burger - Bad Burger

★★☆☆☆

$

My last encountered with Freshness Burger was a LONG time ago. My mum gave me a buy 1 get 1 coupon, so I figured I should come back to try it again. To be safe, I got the Cheese combo.

Froyo Race - Stop 15 ♥ The Fru:yo Factory

★★★☆☆

$

Weeks ago when I was walking from Causeway to. Tai Hang for lunch, I found this cute little froyo store with an eye-catching elephant icon opened right next to the Central Library. Today I got a free tasting invitation from the Fru:yo factory and so I went again.

The location is not a convenient one, except for students or the people who are living in Tai Han. The interior decor is very vintage style and the furniture mimic a children playground with little stools and benches. The ambiance is very chill with yellow lighting and english pop music.

Wing Lok Yuen - Gluttony Dog

Price: $
Cravingness: ★★★☆☆

Passing Central during one lazy afternoon and thought of Wing Lok Yuen's infamous hot dog. Went to check out their menu and found out they offer double sausages in one hotdog. I got a bit disappointed as the sausage was rather tiny and the sauce was not magnificent. The bun however was toasted crunchy and served hot.

For the price of HKD11, it was actually quite a bargain. If you are around Central and feeling hungry, grab one dog to go!

Milk Top - Cute Bear Donut

☆☆☆☆☆

$

When I went to the mooncakes session at Sogo Basement, I found a cute white bear box in the display window at Milk Top. It was on sale, so I got a box home which contains 3 donuts.

Daruma Ramen House - A Wish On Tai Hang Road

★★★★☆

$

After Butao and Yukitei, i am growing to love Jap Ramen. Jap Ramen to me before was nothing but Ajisen Ramen, but now I can see why people could get so crazy about them. I have also tried Ramen Santouka (山頭火), Ippei-An and 魔麵 etc, but I still love Butao the most. G. says there is another store she reckons is better than Butan in Gough St. , better go try it sometimes.

Chocolate Library | Chocolate Indulgence for Sweet Tooth Friends

Price: $$

Cravingness: ★★★☆☆1/2

Seems like the popularity for the renowned Ritz-Calton the Chocolate Library has never gone down since the day it grandly opened, the queue is still crazy even on the weekdays. We went today at 1.30pm and were informed to be seated at around 4.30pm - 5pm. Since we have been here, we'll go shop around before dinning in.

Despite the queue, there is strict dresscode at Chocolate Library.

Panda | Hip Curry Resto But Would Not Try Twice

Panda Japanese Homestyle Curry
G/F,94 Tung Lo Wan Road, Tai Han
☏ 2503-5888
Date of Dinning: 25 JUN 2011 (Sat)
Price: $100 - $150

Saturday 3pm we were planning to late lunch at Daruma Ramen House at Tai Hang, but found it was closed (idle hours). Under the hot sun, we decided to go anywhere that would take us instantly, and here we go at Panda Curry. There weren't any lunch/ tea sets available so we had to order a la carte at menu price.

The interior decor was pretty cool and modern. There was a huge panda figure hanging on the ceiling which didn't seem very safe and seemingly would fall any minute. The sofa booster was extremely uncomfortable, overly soft and u felt sinking the minute you seat down. We changed to another table with wooden chair.

Yukitei Ramen | Ramen Digging in Wanchai

Price: $

Cravingness: ★★★☆☆

I read supergirl's review one day and was excited hearing there is an okay ramen place at Wanchai! I soon got upset getting to know the place is nowhere close to my office. I tried once dating my friend to go, but I thought Yukitei is those street ramen store which has no air-conditioning so we changed venue. Good news is, they actually have air-conditioning!!! The place was truly small, the seating are mostly outdoor but there are around six stools inside the block with air-conditioning! We arrived today on 7-1 at 2pm and found only a pair of couple having lunch.

Ginza Bairin - Bad Tonkatsu at Sogo!

★☆☆☆☆

$

With a drooling aroma, i brought take away from this little shop at Sogo basement for Lunch today. While planning to cut down spending, I realised my lunch costed $96. Such a failure.

Ruth's Chris Steak House - Best Steak in Hong Kong

Price: $$$$

Cravingness: ★★★★★

I had always considered Ruth's Chris as a fancy steakhouse given its price, but found they aren't going the fancy style but a happy cosy steakhouse style. In several localised steakhouse in HK, you will find 'black pepper sauce' along with the steaks, but in Ruth's Chris Steakhouse the best sauce to go with your steak is Butter, Salt and Pepper. A topnotch steak does not require any sauce as itself can already provide the best taste and mouthfeel that one could get.

VERO Chocolate - Cakes with Complexity and Creativity

★★★★★

$

Environment (4/10)

An open display windows to showcase all their lovely pastries. There were also a fancy looking Chocolate Brewing Machine. The name tags of the pastry are extremely small, so it was rather difficult to spot their names. It was also pretty weird to dine in the cake shop as there is no seats in the area.

Peking Garden - Hands Down The Best Peking Duck

★★★★★

$$$

If you asked where did I have the best Peking Duck in HK, that would be no doubt Peking Garden Restaurant. We went to the one in central today which has slightly more chinese elements in it, but still furnished with a western look. The ambiance was still as jolly noisy as a Chinese dim sum resto, but most of the laughters and chatters are in English here.

In the middle of the dinner, I suddenly realised there was some passionate music playing at the background and almost everyone had turned their heads towards the same direction at my back. I turned and found a noodle master pulling noodles! I haven't seen one for long and the last I saw was at my Primary age I think. I was extremely excited about it and was once again amazed by the refine noodles that the master skillfully pulled. Such a nice show to watch! :) P.S. They don't have it in their PP branch.

小甜谷 - BEHOLD! Shaved Ice Fruit Mountain!

★★★★☆

$

Stewed Milk with Red Bean 紅豆特濃牛乳燉蛋白 (7/10)

I always ordered this dessert hot. The stewed milk has a strong and full taste of Japanese Milk which is very yum. The adding of the red bean further added colours to the stewed milk. The only downside is it is rather filling.

Kiangsu Chekiang - Best Shanghainese Restaurant

★★★★★

$$$

Kiangsu is renowned for authentic Shanghai cuisines but since it runs a membership only system, it is rather difficult to dine here unless you know someone. Hence I deeply appreciate K. for organising the dinner tonight so my family and I could have a chance to dine in here.

Kiangsu has a contemporary/ classic mixed Chinese decor - the red and white walls, the reddish brown wooden furniture but luckily they replaced the ugly and rustic carpet with tiles. I heard the hospitably was bad here, but we were warmly welcomed by the staffs.

Pork Congeal (鎮江肴肉) (3/10)

Overall the texture was on the hard side. The fat was made jelly like, so it did not dissolve on the palate which I reckon is better. Furthermore it is not cold enough.

Wooloomooloo | A Panoramic View of The Beautiful Vic Harbour

Dinning in Wooloomooloo was an impulsive decision, we did not make any reservations nor research on the menu ahead of visit. There was vacant tables on a normal weekday, but the nice spots - window seats and the roof top was fully reserved. Since the purpose wasn't for a romantic dine out as I was with my family, I decided to focus more on other aspects e.g. services and their dishes.

Froyo Race Stop 16 ♥ Holy Cow

I actually dislike Holy Cow. I regretted purchasing the coupons from the store. As restaurant may adjust their recipe, may be I can give Holy Cow another chance.

I found the interior decor had changed with more products display cupboards. Compared with the store front picture i took a year ago(omg a year already?), the tables were removed with only 3 stools left on the left side of the store. It seems Holy Cow decided to transform itself into a solely take-away shops.

Cammino | Decent But Small

My family asked me to pick a resto today in Causeway Bay. When I was doing my research, I found quite a lot of decent resto that I have not known of their existence. By then I realised while I was whining about dinning in Causeway Bay is getting boring, I was pretty much a frog in a well.

Cammino is located in a small corner in the Excelsior Hotel, which ironically my family dined here before and apparently I was left out. The restaurant is rather small but is spacious enough for privacy concern. With a dim yellow lighting and soft candle light, the resto creates a lovely romantic ambiance to dine in. The service was very nice and the servers were friendly and knowledgeable. The Manager was pretty passionate and introduced us several dishes, but we decided to order two set menus for the night.

La Balance Ginza | Non-magical Ice-Cream Cheesecake

Not if Sogo had its crazy sales week, I would not had realised the deli at the basement had totally changed! There I found a lovely shop selling cheesecake, looking closely to its menu, the shop actually sells ice-cream on cheesecake! The combination looked lovely, I held no resistance and bought one to try.

Hunan Garden | One of Best Fish Fillets

I have already fallen in love with Hunan Gardne's Fish Fillets with Fried Minced Beef 豆酥魚 since I was young. Back then, the dish was comparatively pricey, but not any more after inflation kicks in.

Hunan Garden's image had changed a lot in these years - from traditional looking chinese resto to a modern fine dinning place. The dinning utensils were exquisite too - pearl white porcelain plate with a Chinese antique horse painting and finished with a golden edge. Servers and Manager were all dressed up to portrait a professional image. However the dinning room looked rather small as the dinning tables were all packed together. Yet even the place were packed, the area was fortunate not noisy at all.

Lao Shanghai | My Shang Hai Kitchen

Hong Kong Lao Shang Hai Restaurant
UG1, Novotel Hong Kong Century
238 Jaffe Road
Wan Chai
☏ 2827 9339
11:00-23:00(Mon-Sun)
Date of Dinning: 4 Jun 2011 (Sat)

Hong Kong Lao Shang Hai Restaurant is one of my family favourites for dinner. From causal dinner to birthday celebrations, we have had a few memories there. Being a Shanghainese descendant, both of my parents reckon Lao Shang Hai did indeed offer authentic Shanghainese cuisine. That's why we keep on spending our time here. To be honest, I think my grandma did a better job than them, taste wise. Some of my specialties dishes aren't bad too :)

Wing's Catering | Just a BBQ-alike Chicken

I had been longing to dine in Wing's Catering for long, and finally I had my chance tonight. Wing's Catering was just right next to Mackie Kitchen on Caroline Hill Road, which I was excited to find out upon my last visit to Mackie Kitchen.

There wasn't much people dinning on a Monday evening, lots of tables were vacant. The waiters were having their dinner at the customer's table (isn't most staffs usually eat in the kitchen?) and the waiter gave me a weird look when I entered the restaurant. The elder waitress was very friendly and eagerly introduced their dinner sets to us, so we took that without much thoughts.

Sabah | Lunch Wasn't As Good

One of my new colleagues wrote a list of restaurants that she wanted to try in Wanchai and showed me during lunch, Sabah was at the top of the list. Coincidentally I read that Sabah's Buk Kuy Teh (Meat Bone Tea) was quite nice but I still had not tried it once, so I suggested going there.

Lunch hours was so much packer than weekday's Dinner time. There was several tables waiting, but the wait wasn't that long, I guess we waited for 5-10 minutes max.

Apple green | Brunching & Bagels!

Craving for some pasta, so we went to Apple Green for brunch. Brunching at Apple Green is never lavish, but was pretty chill and relaxing.

Tonkichi | Heavenly Made Tonkatsu!

Keeping away from all the lovely fatty foods for a while, I was quite elated to dine at Tonkitsu tonight. I had ordered as much as I want to fill my long awaited stomach, SCREW THE FAT!!! lol

There wasn't as much people waiting to dine in as it was years ago, I guess its because we now have more as fascinating options around. Still we had to wait for about 15 minutes for our table, but later I found out there was actually a few available seats in the restaurant. I hope they are not trying to create an illusion of popularity here.

1) Kimchi Tofu

It's not the first time I had this and it's also not the first time I wondered why a Japanese restaurant would offer Kimchi dish. Kimchi and tofu doesn't seem fusion to me. Anyhow, the kimchi was good. The combination of spiciness, sourness and sweetness were almost perfect, just if the spiciness could tune up a bit. The tofu was on the other hand quite disappointing, the texture was rather rough.

Trusty Gourmet | Crazy Gimmick Disappointing Soup

My friend highly recommended this restaurant for its soup and noodles bowl, so we went to try it out today and see if it was that great.

Apparently the most brilliant aspect in Trusty Gourmet was its soup - there were about six soup choices on the menu, while the noodles was additional sides that you could add in to your soup accordingly to your preference, just in case you won't be full solely drinking the soup.

There was an ad on the wall, promoting a private kitchen styled dinner by a Chinese chef called 'Brother Peter'. Another glance over the cashier, you might find Br. Peter managing the cash counter. There was several dishes stating they were especially prepared by Br. Peter, then shouldn't Chef Peter stayed at the kitchen? I kept wondering.

NamDaeMoon | Renowned Zha Jiang Mian?

Walking along the renowned Korean street on Kimberley road, not only you will find solely Koreans restaurants/Kiosks, you will also see queue at every single Korean restaurant, proving the popularity of Korean food in HK. Among the Korean restaurants, there was one particular restaurant at the end of the road that you will see no queue. The restaurant was newly established, the decor was pretty simple in comparison to its competitors nearby, the menu choice was rather limited, the place was small and crowded - all these combined might result in its unpopularity, but I do reckon the popularity will build up pretty soon.

Upon my last visit to NamDaeMoon, their Chinese bean sauce noodles a.k.a. Zha Jiang Mian were sold out. I tried out some of their other dishes and they were all in pretty nice standard. Hence here came our re-visit, we also brought some more of my family members along so we could try out more dishes.

Starbucks | Cocoa Cappuccino & 40th Anniversary Dome Cake

Leaving earlier than normal from work today, I decided to treat myself with a nice cup of coffee and a piece of cake. I read a local magazine writing about a limited cake lollipop offering at Starbucks that I really wanted to try. However it was nowhere to be found in the starbucks near my office. :( I didn't ask but it was already six-ish so I guessed it was sold out.

Harbour Kitchen - Chicken Pie with Golden Brown Crust

My friend hosted a gelato booth in the food exo in the HKCEC last week, so we paid her a visit and walked around the expo at the same time. We went to the Harbour Kitchen at the HKCEC for tea before walking around.


There was a great flow of people flushing in and out of the expo at 2pm, so there was a short queue in front of the restaurant. Upon arriving the restaurant, I immediately spotted the pastry window display and had my time in choosing between Pineapple Bun and Chicken Pie.....Chicken Pie won at last.


The Chicken Pie had the perfect look - golden brown crust. I hold no resistance in golden brown pastry, they are simply a work of art. The pie crust was slightly sweet in taste and was quite light on the palette. The chicken cream filling wasn't that tasteful as I thought it would be. I haven't had Chicken Pie for a while so I could not make any comparison. I need to try the famous one in golden fung and several other Chaa Chan Tengs before I could draw any valid conclusion.

Gyu Jin | Lovely Sukiyaki Broth

P.S. Photos lost :(

This was actually my second visit to Gyu Jin. The reason that drove me to dine there was their Haagen Dazs ice-cream buffet corner, Yum Yum! The queue at the front door was actually pretty long, I waited for more than 20 minutes before the number on my ticket was called.

Gyu Jin has time limited for its buffet - Once you have ordered the broth, you would have 100 minutes to enjoy your buffet. There are more timed hotpot restaurants nowadays which I dislike as it makes dining rush. Well some restaurants didn't really implement it for real but just stating it on the meal and hope some caring customer would obey this lovely rule themselves.

Sala Thai | Bad Food Nice Decor

It was almost 2 months since I last posted anything, sorry about that. My sister is getting married too soon that I have to keep up my shape, so I have been slimming my ass off lately. Anyway I do occasionally eat out, I was just a bit lazy to update my post. (Oops, busted!)

I went to Element today as I got rather sick hanging around in Causeway Bay. I need some walking space and less Chinese travelers. (Sadly there are lots of them in Element too.) Finally we went to Sala Thai.

Absolute Burger | Horrible Service

Absolute Burger
B1, Capital Building, 6-10 Sun Wui Road, Causeway Bay
☏ 2808 0530
11:30-21:00(Mon-Sun)
Date of Dinning: 30 March 2011

My coupon from Bee Crazy is expiring at the end of this month, so I decided to use it today if not I am gonna waste it. I thought Burger would be my great get away, since I have been eating healthy for a while without my best friend - fatty food. However the dinning experience wasn't particularly nice, and you could see it why from below. :(

I was thinking about not calling for a reservation, but fortunately I did as there was around 4 groups of 2-3 people waiting outside the restaurant. It was difficult to locate Absolute Burger as firstly it was in the basement and secondly, there was no clear signs signaling the restaurant at all. I search the restaurant up online and I immediately figured it was just next to Mist - where I dine yesterday!

Katte Shabushabu | Selfish Shabushabu

When you get older, you somehow look back time and think about all those happy and funny memories and moments you had when you were still young. Somehow you started to miss your childhood friends and then it came to a time when kindergarden mates reunion.

Our lunch gathering began in a small Japanese restaurant, which is famous for shabu shabu. None of us actually interested in hotpot in the middle of the day except the one who proposed it. Anyhow, it is quite interesting to dine in this restaurant since we can have our own pot of shabu shabu.

Dressed | Delicious Healthy Salad

Salad usually creates an illusion of healthy or non-fattening image, However people usually neglect the fact that salad dressings literally contain loads of hidden calories that you could not imagine. Not to mention the lovely cheese that served with your salad. So when it comes to salad, you have to be very careful at your choice.

Osho | Omakase for Teppanyaki

Recently I am in love with teppanyaki. I found this restaurant on magazine and found it interesting. Normally for teppanyaki, you either order a la carte or set combo with a variety of sashimi and yaki. In Osho, there is something called Omakase, in which the chief in charge would pick the best combination for you accordingly to your budget and taste. The customization Omaskase brings suits best for people who have choice-phobia, like me. Omakase might also bring you the freshest ingredients since they are all chosen by the chef.

[Snacks] Meiji Fran - Three Fromage Choco Sticks

Fromage is a type of french cheese made from cow's milk and have a creamy sour taste. I have not ever tried Fromage myself before, and I wonder if Meiji Fran Three Fromage would gave me any imitate taste of Fromage.

[Snacks]Nestle - 100 Grand

After the horrible experience with the Payday, I definitely need some nice snack bars. From that particular cafe Saffron in Stanley I also bought a snack bar called 100 Grand.

The bar was mostly filled with caramel with little content of chocolate in it. I would say the chocolate only exist on the coating. Since the bar was mostly caramel, it was quite chewy but also teeth sticking. The crispy crispies made the bar very crunchy to bite. The bar was nice to munch on.

Frites | The Exquisite Belgium Beer House

If you ask me what is the first thing that comes to mind when I hear Frites, its has to be KNUCKLES!  (Well, chips seems to be too obvious right?) I had already tried some delicious pork knuckles, from my last visit in Frites, so this time we are trying something new.

Today we came with a big beer fan who can't really live without alcohol in a single day. He had never heard about Frites but was elated to be this Belgium Beer house, which he then decided to come every happy hour until he had tried all beer on menu! Excited as he was, he counted the beer on the menu one by one and found there was 86 kind of beers in total. Impressive figures. Not only the variety of beer it offers are totally awesome, the special cup and coaster that goes with each kind of beer was more amazing. Frites would be heaven to coasters collector.

Sijie Sichuan Dishes - AMAZING Sichuan dishes

The Door Front

Recently there is a Sichuan madness spreading across my friend group as well as my family. Decent Sichuan restaurant had adapted too much of a localization, the Sichuan taste has distorted and I could no longer tasted that spiciness back I had in China. There was one particular Sichuan restaurant that I love, named Little Chilli, which serves authentic Sichuan Food. It was not until recently I found it is Michelln-starred. Well, the food there no doubt was delicious but the environment I doubt if it can really afford that star in the Michelin? I am not so sure.

Anyhow last time, I went to 渝川菜館 which is another Sichuan Private Kitchen located in Wanchai, the dishes wasn't spicy until you started taking in the Sichuan Peppers and Chilli Peppers, you would then started screaming, drinking and crying un-controllably. So I was expecting something similar here. These private kitchens are usually located in some residential-commercial uses buildings, Sijie Sichuan Dishes is located in a much older building which the elevator could only hold a max of 6 people. That night, a family unknown to me rushed into the elevator which it broke down the minute it went up the building! Apparently that family has more than 6 people, and definitely not small in size I presume. What a tragic but funny news!

Dumpling Pro - Delicious Leek Dumplings

I can recall this restaurant pretty easily out of mind since it has an vivid advert stands around the corner of the Cafe Zambra. I never really got a chance to visit the restaurant, not that I am not interested in it, I am, but somehow their Ad stand looked a bit too crappy. Not until Ryu_Ng brought this up, who gave me a perfect reason to dine in the restaurant.

Dumpling Pro was unexpectedly decent to what I have imagined. The decor was pretty nice and Chinese classy with wooden tables and chair. The colour mode was mainly in strong red and dark brown which create a sense of Chinese culture. I particularly like the wooden menu that hang on the walls, they were wooden plates with beautifully crafted Chinese words. Just the banner over the roof at the cashier was crappy which I dislike.