Yu-Raku

About

Yu-raku was recommended to me by a Japanese friend and is one of the only places in Hong Kong I know of that does Okonomiyaki, a kind of Japanese egg pancake.

Slide open the door of this tiny restaurant and your only option is to sit by counter which stretches along the side. Perched on a stool here, you can watch the chef fry different ingredients on the hot plate in front of you and breathe in the different smells until you are drooling with hunger.

We began with the standard okonomiyaki which was a feast to satisfy any appetite, a thick patty of egg and cabbage and onion set on top of lightly crisped bacon and then smothered with cheese and the dark syrupy sauce that has a very distinctive flavour.

The care in the cooking here was impressive. A thinner, Negiyaki pancake was crafted over ten minutes or so, with the chef pressing rice crispies and onion into beaten egg to make a firm base and then scattering more onion on top of this.

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The result was delicious, with the surfaces of the thin base browned but the centre still softer. Like the toppings of a good pizza, the ingredients scattered on top seemed to fit really well with this crisped pancake base.

Another wonderful dish used a really thin egg pancake to wrap noodles that were fried and smothered in a rich brown sauce. The combination of the frail egg wrapper’s soft, savoury taste and the richer noodles worked really well.

Overall, I’d definitely recommend Yu-Raku as a place to go in Hong Kong for an authentic Japanese Okonomiyaki experience. At about $70-80 a dish, it’s a bit more expensive than some of the other restaurants in the city, but then Japanese food usually is.

And eating okonomiyaki, packed with flavour and smothered with sauce and cheese, you really do feel more satisfied that you would many other places.

Directions

Shop E, 468 Jaffe Road, Causeway Bay

[googlemaps http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=464+Jaffe+Road,+Hong+Kong&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=35.136115,78.75&ie=UTF8&s=AARTsJpnAnUmspCD5zSp1Me2BHcJCly7Og&ll=22.280579,114.183247&spn=0.003475,0.00456&z=17&output=embed&w=425&h=350]

Notes

Tel：2838 0061
$41-$100
Mon-Sat：12:00 - 15:00;19:00 - 04:00 (Closed on Sunday)

Mainland China

About

 

When people think of Chinese food, they tend to think of diced meat and vegetables fried in an oily wok over a roaring flame. But Mainland China’s the recent Clay Pot Festival drew on Chef Ram’s knowledge to introduce a very different kind of Chinese cooking. Legend has it that dishes cooked slowly in clay pots were invented to restore the appetite of one of China’s early emperors. The cooking technique is healthier than frying, using much less oil, and allows the different aromas of the dishes to remain intact.

The braised chicken with orange and black bean at the festival which ended this past Sunday, showcased the cooking method’s potential to produce tender meat saturated with flavour. The sauce beautifully balanced the pungent black beans with the sweetness of orange. It was the slight, tingling spice from chillies that carried the sauce beyond the usual ‘sweet and sour’ combinations.

A pot of Hunan chilli prawns (Rs. 495) was a little less exhilarating. The prawns were nice and plump but they didn’t really combine with the sauce all that effectively. Although this sauce had the earthy brown colour characteristic of dishes from China’s Hunan region, it lacked that tantalising spiciness which also makes them so distinctive.

However, this was more than made up for by the drunken chicken, a legendary Chinese dish that’s virtually impossible to find elsewhere in India. It is prepared by soaking small cubes of chicken for over four hours in Chinese wine so that their toughness breaks down and they emerge meltingly tender and full of the wine’s potent fruity flavours. The dish was a good example of how Chinese food can also offer some very subtle flavours, alongside radiant sweet and sour and sizzling chilli.

Besides, the two vegetable pots were also satisfying accompaniments. The exotic vegetables in chilli basil sauce had baby corn cooked al-dente to hold their freshness. The dish was made more interesting than the standard Chinese vegetable dishes by the liberal use of fresh basil which gave its sauce an earthy texture. Similarly, the other dish, Yuling’s hot and numbing vegetables, gained added piquancy from the numbing spice of Sichuan peppercorns.

Overall, the clay pot dishes offered further proof that Mainland China, at Greater Kailash Part II, can produce some of the most interesting Chinese food in India. The restaurant’s décor matched the restrained interpretation of Chinese style shown in the food, with simple paper lanterns and smoked glass screens.