Oyster & Wine Bar

Address : 18/F, Sheraton Hong Kong Hotel & Towers, 20 Nathan Road, Tsim Sha Tsui.
Tel：2369 1111, ext. 3145

With sweeping views of Victoria Harbour, an in-house sommelier and an oyster specialist, the Oyster & Wine Bar is an exceptional kind of restaurant, one that is bound to make for a memorable experience. Both its design and cuisine are absolutely contemporary. A bright blue ceiling gives the restaurant an under the sea theme, while modern multi-level flooring, glass walls of wine bottles and a custom-made oyster bar make the space feel alluringly modern.

We left our entire meal in the hands of the experts and were impressed from the start when two pairs of freshly shucked oysters on ice arrived at the table. From the restaurant’s accompanying Connoisseur’s Black Book of Oysters, we read about the firm, buttery-sweet and mildly fruity South Puget Sound Kumamoto oyster and the crispy yet pleasantly salty St Vaast oyster from Normandy while we tasted them with a perfect wine pairing.

A Napoleon of Balik Salmon with caviar came next. It was great, but it only whet our palates for more delicious courses. With a change of wine (to a Nederberg 2004 chardonnay) we devoured a duo of crab cakes filled with chunks of meaty crab and served with three types of sauce. With more wine - a Craggy Range 2006 Pinot Noir to be exact - came a dark and tasty French Duckling, in a dish made up of duck and foie gras set atop a small heap of spinach.

To end the meal, we had the dessert of the day, an amazing warm chocolate brownie layered with peanut butter and set in a banana sauce. The sommelier broke out a bottle of sweet 1995 Aszu Essencia dessert wine from Hungary, originally made for 18th century royalty, and we dined and drank like kings while overlooking the bustling harbour below.

The Oyster & Wine Bar is open daily for dinner and on Sunday for brunch.

La Mer Brasserie Address : 1/F, LKF Tower, 33 Wyndham Street, Central. Tel：2523 0200 La Mer Brasserie is quintessentially modern, and if its name doesn’t already tip you off, it specialises in seafood. Decorated in the style of a 1920s-1930s Parisian brasserie, its art deco design is streamlined and attractive. As you enter the restaurant, you walk up a flight of stairs to reach the restaurant’s main area, with its soaring ceilings and massive art-deco light fixtures, and a marble-top seafood bar displaying the day’s freshest catch on ice.

Cucina

Address : 6/F, Marco Polo Hongkong Hotel, Harbour City, Kowloon.
Tel：2113 0808

It is unlikely that Shakespeare had contemporary dining in mind when he famously pronounced, "All the world's a stage", but at Cucina, the saying rings true. Recently opened, Cucina is designed like a culinary theatre. Its open kitchens take centre stage, while its modern design, menu, wine list, two patios and sweeping views of the harbour are supporting actors.

The menu at Cucina reflects the diversity of Hong Kong by featuring Western dishes and traditional Chinese recipes prepared in separate kitchens but presented in the same menu. Cucina's General Manager, Massimo Gavina, a food and wine expert, explains, "The open kitchen concept with a combination of two cuisines is still unusual but is growing in Asia... It allows you to order from different kitchens and is a different approach to traditional dining."

We started off with three appetisers - the dim sum basket (steamed a few feet behind our table in one of the open kitchens), the seared Pacific scallops wrapped in pancetta and the charred beef carpaccio marinated in lemon and garlic, which melted in our mouths. All looked ravishing and tasted very good, but the dim sum basket was a particularly special treat.

For the main courses, or the theatrical climax of the meal, we tried two beef dishes along with a side of wonderfully delicious and creamy truffle mashed potato. The first was the sizeable braised wagyu beef cheek from the Western kitchen. It was strong and succulent, both characteristics of this optimal beef. The next - sautéed diced beef tenderloin with asparagus in wasabi sauce - was from the Chinese kitchen. Wasabi is so strong that it is often a difficult ingredient to work with, but the wasabi sauce in this dish was not overpowering at all. In fact, it emphasised the taste of each ingredient equally.

At the end of the meal, we finished off the dessert platter outside on the restaurant's front patio while we watched the Star Ferry arrive and depart from its terminal below. Reservations for dinner recommended.