Good old-fashioned fine dining is alive and marinating in Hong Kong
THE BEST FOIE gras concoction I have been served and the oldest fine dining cliches ? these are the things I remember most from eating at nine of Hong Kong?s most celebrated and expensive restaurants.
By quite a margin, Gaddi?s came out on top for me. It is the full package ? a terrific dining room that tables excellent to sublime dishes. Service ? something of a problem in Hong Kong, even in pricey eating places ? is good, and the Gaddi?s ambience is luxury itself.
Chef Philip Sedgwick told me he just wanted people to have a great night out and feel relaxed and at home in The Peninsula?s world-renowned eating space. Gaddi?s had to be good, he laughed, because it did not have a view.
I would rank the ?raw-marinated? goose liver (foie gras), described below, as one of the greatest dishes ever. But a ?cappuccino? of peas ? a small bowl of sweet and delicious bright-green pea foam over a denser puree in which small pieces of dark-fried sweetbreads and truffle bits cavorted ? was almost as good. And two slabs of long-cooked beef cheek in a rich brown sauce, creamy foam and bits of baby aromatics (such as turnip and carrot) were wonderful.
Fine-dining cliches? Hong Kong must be their last bastion. It must be 15 years since I was served my main course hidden under a silver cloche (and then watched in embarrassment the theatre of simultaneous lift-off).
