油局蟹 – oil or butter baked roe crabs

was with a few friends in hong kong over the weekend 27-30.9.2013, mostly just hiking & makan & some shopping. 🙂

a friend booked rainbow restaurant at lamma island which i had also wanted to try. the restaurant offered a private ferry pick-up at central pier no. 9 & also tsimshatsui star ferry pier where we boarded (usually at the private pier no. 5 this time at no. 6). it was quite a fast boat & good fun 30mins ride sitting on the deck level feeling the night breeze & looking at the string of pearl-like lit coastlines & beautiful night skylines of central & repulse bay. 🙂

we were debating how 南丫岛 get to become Lamma Island but soon realised that 南is lam & 丫is ah in cantonese so its like lamah or Lamma Island. 🙂

rainbow seafood restaurant @南丫岛 lamma island hong kong

rainbow seafood restaurant @南丫岛 lamma island hong kong

small lobster at HK$28/tael about S$125/kg kind of ex

geoduck (pronounced gui-duck) & razor clams

rainbow restaurant occupied the shop lots left & right of sok kwu wan pier. we went to the one on the right (view from pier).

pickled jelly fish & cucumbers

seaweed egg littleneck clams soup

steamed sea prawns

2 large mantis prawns in salt & pepper 椒盐濑尿虾

we were served (and charged) a pickled jelly fish & cucumber plate, which was good. the seaweed egg littleneck clams (la la) soup was quite good though 1 friend said it was not as good as before. the steamed sea prawns was excellent, really sweet & fresh. the mantis prawns (2 large ones) in salt & pepper 椒盐濑尿虾 was good too. most friends liked this, some felt a bit salty. i was ok with it – meat was sweet stuck a little to shell. the last one i had at chung cuisine at times square was much better though, and the ones we had at Keong Kee the next day was small but also good & a lot cheaper. 🙂

the 油局蟹 (oil or butter baked roe crabs) at the top photo. we had wanted 黄油蟹 yellow roe crab famous in hk & south china. there weren’t any & the stall recommended this which was a poor substitute roe-wise, the crab meat though was very sweet & compact – i liked it but price was ex.

spicy fried razor clams 聖子

garlic steamed venus clams with tanhoon 蒜茸贵妃蚌

garlic  fried kailan

we had wanted the larger razor clams 蒜茸蒸garlic steamed. unusually, the seller was more insistent than us that it was better fried & we should have the venus clams garlic steamed instead, so we picked the smaller ones, feeling that it was a waste for the large clams. i quite liked this dish, though would have preferred large ones garlic steamed. it was still better than the garlic steamed razor clams at Keong Kee the next day though this was a lot more ex. so far in HK, we had not had the same excellent razor clams that we had commonly in any singapore seafood restaurants, probably because we didn’t know where to go to have them. btw, i also did a good steamed razor clam in garlic oil myself.

i not much into the garlic steamed venus clams with tanhoon 蒜茸贵妃蚌. it was quite good but never a favourite with me, should have insisted on large bamboo clams. 🙂 a friend loved the garlic fried kailan (just like me, i like all vege in hk). 🙂

very sweet pineapples & melons

ginger syrup tau huay

the fruits, particularly the pineapples, were very sweet. a friend went over to the neighbour stall to get ginger syrup tau huay. it was very good & smooth. 🙂

the dinner came to about HK$2300 for 7pax = HK$330. i felt it was rather ex for the food we ordered in a hk seafood restaurant. another friend said he had much better at lei yue mun 鲤鱼门. anyway it was a very pleasant, relaxed & enjoyable evening, night breeze in the hair, string of pearl-like litted coastlines & beautiful night skylines, great company & food. i will definitely come back but, as with any restaurants, will need to pick the right dishes. 🙂

c.h.e.f andy