Just opened: Le Garçon Saigon’s southern Vietnamese fare in a bistro setting

For this column, we had originally planned to check out Cima, a curious restaurant in Wan Chai serving Japanese and Western cuisines.

When we arrived, we were told that since the restaurant was in its soft opening stage and they were only serving set menus, so we headed to the Star Street area to check out Le Garçon Saigon.

It was busy when we arrived, and the hostess told us we’d have to wait a few minutes as we hadn’t made a reservation, but within minutes, we were taken to our table, where unfortunately, the air conditioning was blasting down on us.

The staff turned it off and we had a relatively enjoyable evening in this latest offering from Black Sheep Restaurants (the group behind Ho Lee Fook and Chôm Chôm). Our friendly waiter told us that chef Bao La serves food from southern Vietnam in a French bistro setting.

For starters the shredded cabbage salad (HK$68) was light and refreshing, with nashi pear, Vietnamese coriander, yuba sheets that didn’t have much taste but added a crunchy texture, and soy-garlic vinaigrette.

Next came two skewers, wagyu beef (HK$138) and sugar cane prawns (HK$148), served with herbs, lettuce, rice paper, vermicelli topped with peanuts, fish sauce (for the prawns) and peanut sauce (for the meat).