Friday, December 11, 2009

Pizza Express/Ship Street, Wanchai, Hong Kong

If any of you walked on the Central Escalator at the junction of Lynhurst Terrace 擺花街, you would get obsessed with a mysterious cheese/garlic aroma from the Pizza Express shop there. I tried going there several times but it was so crowded that I gave up finally. So this branch on Ship Street Wanchai is not as busy as their Central shop and good for me to give it a try finally.

1/2 the shop inside.

3. Open kitchen is almost like a standard in many restaurants. 4. Wild mushroom soup with a few drops of white truffle oil - HK$48. Actually I don't like cream soup much but this one is really surprising. Most important of all, it's not salty at all. You can taste the original flavour and the freshness of some very selected wild mushroom. The chef didn't make it salty because he needs to let the white truffle oil blast the aroma. The warmly baked mini cheese buns (forget the original Italian term) are so good! The cheese in it is at a very balanced amount. Must try!
5. Green salad HK$55 - all the veggie are very fresh and selected. Can't find any rotten part, and more mini buns! 6. Roasted chicken pizza HK$110 - I am really impressed they preserve the tomato with some tabisco-like and some herb, which turned on your appetite. Besides, they made their own tomato sauce with a slight touch of black olive aroma - so good! The first time I didn't care about manner in fighting for the last piece.. :)

7. Mushroom fussili in white truffle oil HK$108 - more surprising! The only thing I can complain about this restaurant is that they served all the food altogether on the table. So the food would be a bit cooled off and this one got a bit soften when we took it though it's still pretty good. 8. Iced tea HK$35 with unlimited re-fill - the first sip of it woke me up! They used some very fine tea and it's made at a perfect temperature. Tea can't be soaked at a very high temperature boiling water (better not over 95 degree) so as to avoid the tea leaves getting bitter dry. The tea isn't bitter dry at all with a very nice tea aroma. I seldom drink tea but I took 4 glasses of it! So HK$35 is a very good bargain for unlimited re-fill.
9. the shop entrance. 10. This cake shop on Ship Street looks pretty nice.

11. Ship street is now with quite a lot of restaurants due to the hip-apt. building J Residence and the renovated trendy place "The Pawn". 12. J Residence.

13. Another corner of J Residence. 14. back behind the pawn, there is another mansion for several restaurants and pub.
15. Another restaurant serving burgers and sandwiches.

10 comments:

Stella said...

Wanchai is like Lan Kwai Fong now. It has changed a lot and is not the old Wan Chai in my memory.

Anonymous said...

seems now truffle oil is a must in HK restaurant scene, even on CN dishes!

anyway, myself i like this little drop of devil a lot, it just enhance the taste of my fried rice, and also work well on fried eggs, making my simple brunch became 5-star NYC gourmet

TC

in the sea said...

Yes, truffle oil is now a must in many restaurants. Even some dessert is put with a little drop of it. Next year, we may see something like "moon cake with white truffle", "white truffle rice dumpling" and "BBQ pork in truffle glazing...etc. BTW, the news just told Stanley Ho bid a big wild white truffle at US$195k...

Arthur said...

I also like this restaurant. Their pizza is very good. Iced tea is also very nice.

Thailand Club said...

yes, Mr. Ho got the first bid for a consecutive of 3 years, of course this time he couldn't do it by myself so having mistress #4 did it for him!

Anonymous said...

Is the Pawn Shop the same as "War Chong Da Huet"?

in the sea said...

To Anonymous 11:55am, yes, it's the that shop you mentioned 和昌大押. Now that pawn shop has 1 restaurant and 1 pub. I took a look at their menu. The least expensive appetizer is at around HK$90, menu course at around HK$150-250. There is a good deal for a 3 course lunch set at HK$150. I'll see when I can go there for a try.

Anonymous said...

Pizza express is quite nice. their pizza is not very oily. Do you know there is one shop in Taikooshing? please try the chinese restaurant on your photo no. 11 if have time.

in the sea said...

Thanks Anonymous 1:23pm. Will try that Chinese restaurant next time when I pass by. The Pizza Express shop in Taikooshing is just opposite to Island East.

Stella said...

Yes. The Pawn Shop was mentioned in other post of SEA earlier, with photos of the inside and the stairs.