Satisfying French and Cantonese cuisine at Roots in Wan Chai
- The one-page menu lists only four snacks, five starters, five mains and three desserts, but they mostly proved as tasty as they sounded
- Shrimp toast was delicious, the cherry tomato salad refreshing, and foie gras terrine had enjoyable flavours
The menu at Roots in Wan Chai (not to be confused with the new Root restaurant in Central) is just one page long, and lists only four snacks, five starters, five mains and three desserts. But we had a hard time deciding what to order because so much sounded tempting.
A snack of shrimp toast with house pickled onions and salmon roe (two for HK$88) was up first. We loved this dish which featured crunchy toast, and about as much salmon roe as minced shrimp paste. The tomatoes in the Yuen Long heirloom cherry tomato salad (HK$88) had been peeled, and were sweet and refreshing.
Our helpful waiter warned us that the beef tartare (HK$138) was spicy, and he was right, although it wasn’t overwhelmingly so.
The meat was roughly textured and hand-chopped, and was laid in a neat disc on the plate with generous dots of Yu Kwen Yick chilli sauce. There was a raw egg yolk in the centre of the disc, which we mixed in, and it tempered the spiciness of the chilli sauce and made the ingredients creamy and rich.
Foie gras terrine (HK$198) was described as “à la Peking duck style” which referred to the serving style, rather than cooking method. It was a generous slab of cool foie gras that we spread over pieces of yau ja gwai (Chinese doughnut) and added (as we wished) thick, mildly sweet cherry jam and batons of spring onions and cucumber. The terrine was slightly grainy, but we enjoyed the flavours and creative Asian spin on the dish.
We were tempted by the main course of signature roasted French spring chicken with glutinous rice stuffing (HK$308) but were worried we wouldn’t be able to finish it (the menu said it fed three to four). But we were happy with our next choice of the rib-eye with jus, salted egg crumble and endive (HK$368).
The meat was cooked to a perfect medium-rare, and the salted egg crumble added a delicious umami flavour, while the bitterness of the endive balanced the richness.
The only part of the dish we did not like was the accompanying potato dauphinois, which was watery and tasted of too much rosemary.
A dessert of pistachio cardamom financier with black sesame ice cream (HK$68) was very nice. The financier was buttery, with just the right amount of cardamom, and went well with the ice cream.
Roots, 7 Sun Street, Wan Chai, tel: 2623 9983. About HK$450 per person without drinks or the service charge
While you’re in the area:
Wagyumafia’s luxury Japanese beef lives up to the hype
Francis serves Middle Eastern food with charm and enthusiasm
Cantonese fare so delicious it left us speechless
