We were at Hu Tong (at their Prahran location) for Chinese New Year Eve dinner with my parents, and S, G, and E. There had been a lot of talk previously about Hu Tong from B and Em and others, and how delicious their dumplings were, so we were all definitely looking forward to the evening's food! This is a newer location of their two - the other one is in Market Lane in the city. Its all dressed up, sleek wood with decor totally unlike what you'd find at your standard Chinese restaurant, which I guess fits in with its location amongst other possibly hip and happening places. Turns out that X was quite scared of the Lion doing the dancing (a change from last year when he was into all the noise and kerfuffle!), so while he enjoyed the food, he went for a walk with various people while the Lion was doing its thing. I've put the pics after the jump, cos there's a bunch of them!
First up, we had a bunch of cold dishes for starters.
Pickled carrots - these were crisp and refreshing.
Drunken Chicken. This was silky smooth, and X ate a bunch of this.
And here's an action shot!
Spicy Toothpick Beef. X really really wanted to try this one, because everyone else semed to be enjoying it, but it was probably going to be too spicy even for X, so we just shared it around so it was finished before he asked again *grin*
Spicy ... Vegetarian Meat Substitute! I actually don't know what this is, it could be a gluten flour creation (like seitan or something. It was just as spicy as the Toothpick Beef, the texture was kind of like compressed fried tofu. X also wanted to try this one, because we all looked like we were enjoying it (:
Cucumbers with sesame and garlic - I want to say that they're pickled but I'm having a memory blank here!
Smoked fish - tasty and savoury meaty - X accepted this in place of the spicy things we didn't feel game to let him try *grin*
War Tip (or Jiao Zi) - O.M.G - these were the best I've had since when we had Yum Cha breakfast in Vancouver when Decay and I were there back on our honeymoon trip. These were tender, juicy, and nothing like the solid lumpen balls of meat we usually get at Yum Cha at various places. Davids do a reasonable rendition, but I don't think they had the delicate lacy crust that comes from steam-frying the dumplings and not moving them til they're ready to be slid onto a plate for serving.
And here's a shot of one of the dumplings, separated from its pan-mates.
A steamer basket full of cute little Xiao Long Bao ... mmm... delicious ... X would've eaten a whole bunch of these if we'd let him, but we were trying to pace his eating so he wouldn't be all full before the end! These were super-soupy, with the perfect thickness of dumpling skin to be strong enough to hold everything in, but not so thick that it gets all gloopy in your mouth.
Duck Slicing, in preparation for Peking Duck! You can see in the background the window in to see the roasting ducks, and also, the window into the kitchen to watch people churning out trays full of all sorts of dumplings.
Tasty Peking Duck! The duck was definitely not dry, and had heaps of ducky flavour. They asked whether Mum wanted to take the remaining duck carcass home (of course!), which got turned into duck rice porridge. Mum said that the duck was very clean on the inside - no marinating ingredients to be found at all. We reckon that the duck was instead brined to help with the juiciness and flavour, instead of having random spices thrown into the cavity during the roasting.
Lobster and Noodles. Tasty enough, but by the time it was all dished out to us the noodles and lobster were cold. Probably because the server decided to portion the dishes just outside the open door, which was letting in a cool breeze. Still tasty, just not at the right temperature.
Fried fish, with colourful vegies and sweet and sour sauce. I have no idea why we ended up with sweet and sour sauce with fish. I know why we had fish - that's something that's part of standard Chinese New Year menus for all the punny Cantonese reasons.
Spicy Beef with Snow Peas - this was good - tender beef, spicy, but not so much that X couldn't handle it!
Beans with Pork Mince - another tasty dish - we ended up taking the leftovers of this dish home with us, and had it for dinner. It's something that invariably gets ordered when we're out for dinner with my parents (:
Red Bean Pancakes with icecream wedges. I don't know what the drizzle over the icecream is - could be honey, maltose, golden syrup, caramel ... The odd thing about this dessert was that it was just plonked on our table without any serving dishes or additional cutlery. Icecream isn't one of those things you can eat with chopsticks in a bowl with your rice and other dinnery things ...
Overall, I'd say I enjoyed the first half of the Chinese New Year set menu a lot more than the second half - the dumplings and cold starters were definitely the standouts, and what I gather this place is known for. The second half while OK (nothing wrong with it besides some serving temperature issues and teething issues related to being a newish location with newish staff who mightn't know what shoudl be done), we could've had at many other places, just not in the same ambience. I know that my parents are plotting a return to this place just for their dumplings, hopefully we'll be along for the visit too!
Wow, great pics. I feel full just looking at them all :)
While I am indeed a Hu Tong regular, I rarely venture past the dumplings so I've never seen how good their other dishes are!
Are a lot of those dishes specially for Chinese NY, or are they on the menu all year round?
Now the secret is to keep it quiet and don't spread the word cos Hu Tong is getting too darn popular...
I think the cucumbers were not pickled? or maybe lightly pickled?
Em: The lobster and the fish are generally CNY dishes though usually the fish is steamed with soy and spring onions or cut into fillets and deep fried. The other dishes don't have anything particularly punny about them so I think they're just generic Chinese food to fill out the rest of the banquet.
I asked Mum at dinner on Sunday night and she thought the cucumbers were pickled, and the vegetarian meat substitute was tofu of some sort. The reason we got some non-punny fod was cos the northern Chinese aren't as specific about the sort of food they have for their CNY celebrations - it's more the Cantonese who go nuts with the puns and specific dishes.