The Chinese restaurant in Tsim Sha Tsui’s most luxurious new hotel is finding its way
There’s an immediate sense of pomp and circumstance when you hear the word “legacy”, a word that calls to mind power, history and traditions being passed down through generations. With the opening of the Rosewood Hong Kong (the new flagship for the luxury hospitality brand) in Tsim Sha Tsui’s newly minted Victoria Dockside district, it’s clear that there is a message to be made here: we’re here to stay.
The “we”, of course, being the Cheng family—siblings Sonia (CEO of Rosewood) and Adrian (executive vice chairman and general manager of New World Development, who are behind the Victoria Dockside project) have together dominated this particular prime plot of land, which was acquired by their grandfather, the late Dr Cheng Yu-tung, back in the 1970s. From the windows of The Legacy House, you can gaze down at the bustle of the Avenue of Stars below, while behind you the house music pumps steadily over the chatter of diners. The whoosh and clatter of woks can be heard from across the dining room, stirring our cravings for the hot, flame-licked dishes that characterise much of southern Chinese cuisine. An open station next to the bar showcases the day’s fresh catches from Sai Kung. For a restaurant paying tribute to the patriarch of the family, the initial impression can be jarring—the space is ambiently lit, tables are closely packed, and the atmosphere is somewhere between Aqua and Mott 32 during a mid-week dinner service.
The menu is where the roots of the Cheng family come into play, with sections that highlight the Shunde specialties of the Pearl River Delta region. Traditional dishes using fresh and preserved seafood dominate the first few pages, and it’s highly recommended you pick and choose a few items from this section. Requiring precise knife skills and a deft hand at frying, the classic deep-fried stuffed pastry of crabmeat, pork, shrimp, yellow chive and water chestnut (known in Cantonese as the “gold coin crab moneybox” for its golden-brown exterior and prized fillings) falls just short of expectation. The main issue isn’t with the flavouring or the thinly rolled out pork lard, which forms the crisp “skin” of the pastry—it’s the pallid exterior and grease that continues to seep onto the plate, suggesting that the oil wasn’t hot enough when the parcels were fried. At HK$80 each (each plate is priced at HK$160 for two pieces smaller than a coaster) it’s a costly misstep.
Pan-fried dace fishcake with preserved meat and minced pork, on the other hand, is solidly executed and goes perfectly with a bowl of steamed rice—the ultimate comfort food, with the funky-edged saltiness of the fishcake contrasting with the freshness of the coriander and spring onion dispersed within. It’s also a dish that provides punches of flavour between bites of the Daliang-style wok-fried milk with bird’s nest, crabmeat and egg white, another Shunde classic. Such a dish requires experience so as to not overcook the milk and egg mixture, with perfectly soft-set, cloud-like curds that have a silky texture when eaten. The version at The Legacy House meets these standards, and the seasoning is adjusted correctly so as to let the sweetness of the milk shine—if anything, we lament the superfluous addition of bird’s nest, even if we understand that it’s befitting of a luxury hotel restaurant that wishes to charge HK$480 for such a dish.