Kwong Wah Convenience Store 光華士多 (Hong Kong)

One word: Awesome! Thanks for the introduction and organization by @g4gary ! While it is named as a convenience store in Chinese, this little store front is a truly a wonderful neighborhood eatery solely operated by a single woman whom she likes to be called "Fat Mama." She cooks every single dish, take all your orders and act as the faithful cashier on your way out even when she is busy cooking. Diners grab their own soup, get their own rice and make themselves home by getting beer right from the fridge whenever you feel like. Frequent diners even help out by serving other patrons. That is one charming characteristic of this joint I truly love. Yes you will be seated plastic or even wooden stools, floor may be slightly wet, but you get air conditioning as well as TV while you enjoy the food. You can even bring your own wine (and glasses as well in our case, thanks @g4gary!)

Classified - Tai Hang (Hong Kong)

Like butter, there is never too much cheese! After my previous visit to Classified - Wan Chai, I have been thinking about the Oven-baked Mont d'Or a bit too often, perhaps once every other day? Once upon a sunny day, perhaps soon after Christmas I think, a few of us picked Classified - Tai Hang outlet to spend a relaxing early afternoon over some cheese and hearty food. Many would consider Christmas as a time to share love and catch up with each other's happenings, but I say this can be done anytime, anywhere as long as we are in the mood to do so. That was exactly what we did on this day because we felt like it, just because ... no reasons needed! A very close friend once told me his definition of friendship which often can be applied to relationship as well is when two (or more people) can sit there on the same table and able to withstand (or even enjoy) long moments of silence then the friendship / relationship has reached (or beyond) a point of love and caring in its rightful categories; familial, platonic (friendship), romantic and religious love. Do you agree? In any case, my love towards cheese would be ... sincere love perhaps? George Bernard Shaw once said, “there is no sincerer love than the love of food.”

WunSha's Kitchen 浣紗廚房

Based on the name of this place, I thought it was a traditional kind of Chinese restaurant or private kitchen without much renovation or so-called decor, but I was wrong! Floor to ceiling window occupies its entire front and the interior ceiling is more than 10 feet high. Decor is definitely contemporary with conformable lighting and seating. Lesson of the day, never judge a restaurant by its name.

Cherry Garden 小白屋

Based on its decor and dishes being offered, I consider this place a neighborhood restaurant. When I arrived, it was almost full house and the first thing that triggered my sense of smell was the strong garlic taste all around. I said it was a neighborhood favorite because the staff address many of the customers by their first names. The atmosphere and decor is clean but their seats / benches are made entirely of wood, including the seating platform. Not the most comfortable seats you would expect. According to many, this place is well known for its pizza, pasta as well as pork ribs.


(1) Caesar Salad
The dish looked very simple with a few large lettuce leaves and large garlic bread over the top. Beacon bits were sprinkled all over with rich salad dressing. However, the dressing seemed to be all over the top few lettuce leaves only with very little left for the bottom few. In other words, dressing was not applied evenly. Aside from the dressing issue, I liked the fact that it used big un-chopped leaves instead of chopped lettuce because this is one of the ways to keep them fairly crisp. (the other way is to place them on / around ice before serving.)

(2) NZ Green Mussels in White Wine Garlic Sauce
The mussels were fresh but the sauce was the very disappointment part of this starter. Very disappointing indeed. It was utterly salty with very rich garlic taste. I might have exceeded my daily sodium quota with just a spoonful of the sauce. Although the mussels were fresh, they were slightly over cooked in my opinion. They became rather difficult to chew. Disappointing dish indeed.


(3) Carbonara with Angel hair
Pasta is supposedly another famous serving at this place it did not disappoint. The Angel hair was al dente and the sauce was not overly creamy while rich in flavor. There were plenty of diced mushroom and bacon bits as well. Not the traditional type that uses raw eggs but it was well prepared in my opinion. I really enjoyed it. There are many mix and match options to make your own pasta and I think I will come again to try the different combination when I am in the neighborhood.

(4) Hawaiian Pizza
I like my pizza thin, meaning thin crust. Here they prepared it semi-thin? Well, it was not terrible thick or "bread-y" / "dough-y"; it was actually very puffy. A very interesting texture indeed. The staff politely advised us to eat the pizza as soon as possible in order to get the best out of it. We followed the suggestion but I wonder why. Would it be soaky or overly chewy very soon after due to the puffy nature of the dough? Maybe next time I will try to leave it cold and see for myself. Anyhow, back to the pizza. In addition to the dough, the pineapples were sweet (canned of course) but the ham was again a bit too salty in my opinion. The cheese was not cheesy enough to create the web of cheese string when taking out the slices. Overall a fair homemade pizza worth trying if you like semi-thick pizza crust.

(5) Pan-Fried Rib Eye w/ Mustard Seed Sauce
When the steak was served, I was surprised because it was all covered with the sauce. The steak was pan-fried and not grilled so one has to use a different judging criteria in order to be fair. We ordered medium rare and to our surprised it was indeed medium rare. The steak was of high quality, quite tender and soft. Humm ... but rib eye should be chewy right? I wonder if baking soda was used to soften the texture of the steak. I wonder indeed. I did not realized it was a mustard sauce at first because my tongue did not taste such flavor at all. The sauce was cream based and there were plenty of it; but I am not too used to having so much sauce over a piece of steak. I like my steak the simple way.

(6) BBQ Back Back Ribs
It was a full rack of baby back ribs with fries on the side. The sauce was very good exactly, very tasty that I just licked them off for a few ribs. The meat was tender and very strong pork taste which likely means fresh pork ribs being used. Thumbs up on the back ribs but thumbs down on the fries. One more thing, I wish the back ribs have more meat than bones. There were only a few bites of tender pork on each rib.

(7) White Wine & Vinegar Jelly w/ Mix Fruits
The presentation was interesting and so was the taste. It was sour due to the vinegar but thankfully the fruits helped counter-balance the sourness. I tasted a bit of white wine flavor in the jelly but mostly of vinegar (likely apple cider vinegar in my opinion).

Likes:

• BBQ Baby Back Ribs
• Pasta
• Interesting puffy pizza crust (it is interesting but I still prefer my thin and crispy pizza crust!)

Dislikes:

• Super salty white wine garlic sauce (mussels dish)
• Overly sour jelly
• uncomfortable seats

Avg Spending: HKD 100 - 200 per person

Cherry Garden 小白屋
7 Wun Sha Street, Tai Han
Tel: 3528 0852