This morning, we ventured 0.2 miles downhill to eat at Dragonking Dim Sum for breakfast. Most dim sum restaurants open at 12, but I found a couple that open early. This place is very small and just after opening, there were a lot of old and young people inside, all eating alone!! It was very quiet.

We got carried away and ordered a whole spread for ourselves even though we knew e wouldn’t be able to finish it all. We figured we were on vacation and wanted to try everything here.

Everything feels a bit bigger and tastier and the pricing is definitely cheaper than in 626.

We got:

Siu Mai with Whole Abalone

Steamed shrimp dumpling

Steamed shrimp and pork Siu Mai

Sticky rice with chicken in lotus leaf

Pan seared stuffed green bell pepper Steamed flour roll with fresh shrimp

Steamed flour roll with duck breast and scallion

Steamed salted egg custard buns

Vince really loved the duck breast rice roll. He said he thinks that’s the best thing he’s eaten so far in this trip. I really liked it too. It was just fattier than our goose from last night. There was a grainy texture that I liked too.

My absolute favorites were the shrimp rice roll and the shrimp dumpling. The shrimp was just so plump and juicy and glistening!!

What disappointed me was the siu mai. It was small, not so juicy and firm.

The salted egg custard buns did not disappoint and gave me so much joy to eat!!

Then we crossed the street and accidentally stumbled upon Lungo, a cute coffee shop that sells beans and does pour overs for Vince.

Then, we had an hour to rest and relax before our 11am HK walking tour, meet up at the Central Station.

During our free Walking Tour from a volunteer group we found online (which was super informative and good), we stopped by Tai Cheong Bakery and got our first dan tat of the trip!! How lucky am I to be led to the one bakery I wanted to go to!!

We got two types:

Egg tart

Puff pastry egg tart

Both egg tarts were good! They were just 11 hkd each. The puff pastry ones were more sweet and flaky.

Afterwards we visited Man Mo Temple, which is a Lao temple. It was very cool to see the extra long and circular incense. They believed that while the smoke was going up, the communication channel to the priest was open.

After the tour, we decided to go on the Starbucks hunt. I’m not going to lie.. I was feeling pretty defeated from my search for Seoul. I tried soooo hard and still no mug. Apparently the Seoul mug has been sold out for 6 months.

During one of our bathroom breaks in a very nice looking mall, Vince was checking out a menu for a restaurant and saw that they had shark fin soup. He showed it to me and I just had to get it. I couldn’t pass it up! The restaurant is called Shanghai Min.

I ordered the Superior shark fin soup, which was about $50 in USD. It was so delicious. I’ve never had this extra expensive version of shark fin soup before. There wasn’t additional other protein to supplement it and there was a good amount of actual shark fin in the soup. There were other textures of the shark fin than what I’ve had before. I could tell it was just the expensive version I’ve always seen other tables get as a kid. It was simple, flavorful and yummy. I am so happy.

Vince got the tofu and minced pork in spicy sauce. He’s always wanted to try the legit and restaurant made mapo tofu. He’s only had the home cooked version and loved it already. Well, it did not disappoint him. He moved it. I had some of it and I thought it was super good too.

Afterwards, we found the Starbucks mug!! It took a couple of more stops and I secretly felt discouraged but Vince said they’re all so close to each other that it would be a waste if we didn’t look. And we found it yay!

So then we went to Peak Tramway, which is a pretty cute tram that took you up Victoria’s Peak to get a nice view of Hong Kong City.

Then we walked around Central Market shopping area for a city stroll.

We saw that Mak’s Noodle House had no line and was like.. why not??? It’s just a small bowl that they serve anyway and we had such a small lunch. It was like a snack!

Signature wonton noodles (2). In hindsight, why did I not pick the pork and shrimp version. Ugh, that’s the one my mom always make but I was too excited and didn’t read the menu carefully. It was good too!! The noodles were extra thin than back at home. The shrimp wontons are so flavorful and perfectly cooked and plump. The broth was deeply flavorful yet light at the same time.

The reasoning why the noodles were displayed on top of the wontons (instead of the traditional showing off of the toppings on top) was because it was thought to not let the noodles sit inside the broth for too long.

Right across the street was a boba shop place called Silk. With a period! It is Hong Kong style milk tea. Which means they used condensed milk instead of milk. We both got the boba milk tea to go because I was craving boba and milk tea and Vince was like, why not whole I’m in Hong Kong.

The HK tea was pretty good! We ordered at no ice and 70% sweet. It was different yet good. Because they used condensed milk instead of actual milk, the milk tea wasn’t milky but still sweet yet had a slight bitterness from the tea. The boba was also perfectly chewy. I am so happy!!!

For dinner, we went to a HK cafe but a lot of their items were sold out so we decided to find another dinner option. Just half a block down, we spotted this Hainan chicken takeout stand and was like.. why not? Vince did joke he wanted Hainan chicken here even though I told him that’s Chinese food; not HK food. But since a lot of Chinese immigrated from China, let’s say it counts! 🙂

Hainan chicken and rice. Rice was served warm. The soy sauce was also marinated with kind of oil and ginger and sugar that made it extra tasty and syrupy and sweet. The ginger onion sauce was delicious too! I wish I remembered to ask him for extra of that. The Hainan chicken itself was served cold but still maintained its softness and tenderness. It was still flavorful and we enjoyed it a lot.

Oh, and dinner was takeout!! So far we are 2/2 for eating our dinners in our hotel room, but we had good reason and it was more comfortable. Last night was because we didn’t want to wait 2+ hour for a seat at the goose place. Tonight we got it from a takeout stand! Living that HK life.. lol JK