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Hong Kong restaurant reviews
LifestyleFood & Drink

Alvin Leung’s newly opened tapas joint Plato 86 in Wan Chai – still a few kinks to work out, but has potential

At innovative restaurateur’s latest venture, focused on Spanish cuisine, the Iberico meatballs were flavoursome, but the small mains and jawbreaking chorizo mean there’s room for improvement

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Iberico meatballs from Plato 86, chef Alvin Leung’s new Spanish restaurant in Wan Chai. Photo: Nora Tam
Bernice Chanin Vancouver

In the last few months, chef and restaurateur Alvin Leung has been keeping busy, adding new places to his stable of dining establishments. He recently revamped Bib n Hops in the old Bo Innovation location (which has moved to a space nearby), and has plans to open a place in Times Square serving his version of Peking duck called Forbidden Duck. With his newest, Plato 86, he’s ventured into Spanish cuisine.

It’s located in Causeway Centre, Wan Chai, in the cluster of buildings near the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

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We visited about a week after it opened and there are still some kinks to be worked out. The menu lists an extensive selection of tapas and mains, though the portion size of the latter isn’t that much bigger.

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From the tapas selection, we ordered steak tartare (HK$138). It looked like a small round tart covered in a thick mayonnaise-like sauce topped with a dusting of truffle bits. The mayo overwhelmed the chunks of beef underneath.

Chorizo with red wine. Photo: Nora Tam
Chorizo with red wine. Photo: Nora Tam
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We enjoyed the texture and flavour of the Iberico meatballs (HK$45), but one required jaws of steel to bite into the sausage pieces in the chorizo and red wine (HK$48) because they were so hard. Another tapas dish, fried artichokes, was not too oily, but didn’t have much taste.

Suckling pig salsa de pimiento del piquillo. Photo: Nora Tam
Suckling pig salsa de pimiento del piquillo. Photo: Nora Tam
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