If you are not a member of the Tower Club in Tsim Sha Tsui, find someone who is and suggest they invite you to lunch or dinner there. After French chef Pascal Breant took over the club's Parkside western restaurant, the menu had a bit of an overhaul. Fresh from running the kitchens at a Caribbean resort hotel owned by Italian fashion designer Krizia. Monsieur Breant learned his trade at some of the most noted kitchens of classic French cooking: an apprenticeship at the Hotel Bristol, Paris, followed by a stint at La Tour D'Argent, a three-star Michelin restaurant also in the French capital, and from there to the famed Chantilly in New York.
'I'm trying to eliminate the heavy cream sauces, and to have more vinaigrette and lighter stock sauces,' he says of his new menu. 'There's a tradition in club food that meat should be grilled or pan-fried and there must be three or four vegetables on the plate, which nobody eats. I was not impressed with the food when I first came here.' Nor, apparently were the members: from the five to 10 diners a night who ate there a month ago, the restaurant is now serving 25 to 35.
AFTER walking through the cobblestoned back streets of Macau a few weeks ago, and working up a bit of an appetite, I came upon a newish authentic Portuguese bakery-cum-cafe right across from the marvellous Leal Senado. Alternating strips of blue and white fabric billow out from the ceiling. The walls are egg-yolk yellow. And the pastries (both savoury and sweet) are delectable. We took our little chicken parcels, rice cakes and custard tarts with us and continued our antique hunting in bliss. Bolo de Arroz is a bright spot on the Macau culinary scene. Tel: 339-089.
IF YOU have a large family, are planning a party or just can't resist a bargain, take yourself to Grand Mart in Sheung Wan, at 188 Des Voeux Road, across from Sincere Department Store. In the no-frills depths of its basement, you will find huge plastic jars of mayonnaise, mammoth bags of jellybeans, gallon-size containers of sauces, condiments and sweets, whole cases of soft drinks, nuts, snacks and crackers. All at a fraction of supermarket prices. Join its club for $150 and it will deliver. Hours are 10 am to 7 pm daily but the shop opens until 9 pm Saturday and Sunday. For further information call the hotline: 772-4477.
COOKING a curry? There is a shop in Causeway Bay (at 49 Sharp Street East), stocked with everything you may need for a Bombay banquet. You'll find bottles, boxes and sacks full of fenugreek, garam masala and rose water, coriander seeds, curry leaves and chickpeas, ready-made poppadam and wholemeal flour for do-it-yourself chapatti. The shop even has the smelly yellow powder of the asafoetida plant. The Oriental Store, tel: 891-8442.
