Fernando's @ Coloane Island, Macau

Located at 9 Praia de Hac Sa, Coloane Island. We saw this restaurant as we were walking towards the Hac Sa beach. Looked nice, so after our short frolick on the beach we went there for lunch. But since we did not make a prior reservations, we waited for our turn. Third name in the queue for that afternoon. 

front of the restaurant

We were ushered to the inner courtyard of the place. There is a bar inside there, and you could order your drinks while waiting for your turn. No drinks menu. Just bottles of liquor with prices shown. Not expensive. Can get a bottle of wine for MOP120. 

outdoor seats, but it was wet from the rain

probably can have a game or two while waiting

Waited for about 20 minutes before we got our table. While waiting, noticed that most seemed like regular customers and they are treated like old friends by the manager of the restaurant. There were some Japanese tourists as well.

inside the restaurant

table setting

We ordered a pitcher of Sangria (was thirsty!), grilled pork ribs, chargrilled chicken, fried rice, and vegetable soup to share.

Diners were given bread basket and butter to start their meal. Bread was served warm with nice crust on its outside and soft fluffy white on the insides.

bread and butter

Sangria~

vegetable soup

My friend was having flu, so she had the vegetable soup and fried rice. The soup tasted mild and healthy.

sausage fried rice

lots of sausage, green bell peppers

The fried rice was quite dry. Mildly salted, and good to eat with all its ingredients.

pork ribs

yummy tender chargrilled chicken

The pork ribs and chargrilled chicken were served on a bed of chunky fries with a few olives (unpitted) thrown in. Pork ribs were slightly dry and quite salty. Nice when washed down with Sangria.


The best dish for our table, would have to be the chargrilled chicken. Slightly spicy, tender and moist meat. Seasoning was about right as well. Good!


The pork ribs and chicken can be ordered in full, or half portion. Think we ordered full portion for the ribs while the chicken was half portion.


Sangria was just MOP120 per pitcher. And we shared it amongst 3 pax. About 2-3 glasses per pax. Got me a good buzz too, meaning the alcohol was good stuffs. Hahaa! Pork ribs were about 7 bones for a full portion. Can't remember the exact price but it should be between MOP120~MOP140 that range.


The fried rice portion was huge. Think it can also be comfortably shared out between 2 to 3 pax.

Margaret's Cafe e Nata @ Edificio Kam Loi, Macau

Located near Senado Square, it sits quietly amongst a backlane. If you look carefully while walking along those jewellery shops opposite the road of Grand Lisboa Hotel, you might just see the sign pointing you to the right direction.

walking towards the cafe

morning crowd on a Saturday

This is basically a self-serve joint, so just find yourself a seat. Share table if you must, or simply do a take-away. Besides egg-tarts, they also have simple cakes, pastries, and sandwiches. The menuboard is inside the shop. For sandwiches, you don't need to pay first. Proceed to the sandwich counter and tell them what you want. Then only go to the cashier to pay, order egg tarts and drinks.

If you had ordered drinks like hot coffee or hot milk tea, then you will get a queue tag and they will send you the drinks later.

queue tag

If you're ordering egg tarts (like half a dozen or more) to take-away, then the kitchen will prepare the order for you. If you're eating in, then remember to collect the egg tarts from the staff manning the egg tarts counter before going back to your seat.

take-away box

some more charred...

huge egg sandwich

egg tart

soft, and moderately sweet with flaky buttery crusts

milk tea

Egg tart sells for MOP8 per piece, while milk tea costs MOP7. The egg tarts tasted best when eaten fresh. Packed some to take home and its crusts turned chewy instead of flaky when it was reheated using a toaster.

Hei Wan @ Yau Ma Tei, Hong Kong

Was feeling rather tired after walking around countless of alleys and shops. Passed by this dim sum place called "喜運", so we decided to go in and try (part of our to-do in Hong Kong was to eat some dim sum...). The lady asked us to wait for 5-10 minutes for a table.

shop front with menu board

take-away area

While we were waiting, we saw people coming in and ordering "鸡饭" or chicken rice. Not the hainanese chicken rice but the dim sum/soup restaurant type of steamed rice with chicken. The chicken pieces looked succulent and tender. Very fragrant too!

Soon, we were called and seated inside.

table setting

A flask of tea was immediately placed on your table as soon as you sit down. Next came the cups, plates and chopsticks. The waiter will also place a bowl for you to rinse the utensils with the tea. The tea from the flask is also our drinking tea for the night.

We ordered a variety of dim sum such as quail's egg siew mai, har gao, custard bun, century egg and lean meat porridge, soup of the day, salted fish meat cake with steamed rice, fried beancurd with mushroom fillings, fried springrolls, charsiew cheong fun, dong po beef balls and chicken feet. All are just single orders, so some of the items I did not get to try.

century egg, lean meat porridge

yummy porridge, flavourful

salted fish meat cake (pictured without the rice), nicely fragrant and not too salty

charsiew cheong fun, with rather thick layer of skin

assorted dim sum

quail's egg siew mai

har gao

har gao

chicken feet, nice sauce and tender feet with a bite

xiao long bao

fried beancurd skin with mushrooms

fried beancurd skin fillings

dong po beef balls, huge!

dong po beef ball

tender and nice

fried springrolls

fried spring roll with prawns and fruit

custard bun

not the type that we wanted!

We paid in total about HKD185 for the meal. So each pax was about SGD6+. Cheap and good.

Hui Lau Shan @ Hong Kong

Passed by this dessert shop while we were walking aimlessly around Mong Kok (or at least I think we were at Mong Kok....) We were pretty tired from all those walking around and not to mention, thirsty too. So what better way than to go in and have some cooling desserts!

signboard

The shop was pretty small in size, but we managed to get a table for us 5 pax.

menu

Service was brisk and very soon our orders came.

all time favourite mango pomelo

nice and smooth

They were having a special combo and it comprises of three small items. One of my group members got that for himself.

special combo

glutinous rice balls in mango soup

ice cream and jelly

Cold birdnest soup with hashima at HKD53 (less than SGD9)? Why not. Got one to try.

cold bird nest soup

birdnest

hashima and lotus seed

First time having hashima or snow jelly (or in reality, dried fallopian tube from a species of frog..ugh!). It tasted soft, and on its own nothing funky (thankfully!) The soup was sweet and cold. Nice. Lotus seed was still crunchy and birdnest was rather gooey. Drink everything together with the soup and it made a refreshing dessert.

The mango desserts there were as nice as whoever that had tried Hui Lau Shan (许留山) would say.