Another food post.

Tonight, a business dinner. At the Chinese restaurant at the Grand Hyatt Hotel. At the Chef’s Table.

I’ve never eaten at a chef’s table. I’ve certainly read about it often enough to be really excited at this opportunity. And I hope that tonight’s experience wasn’t typical of the genre.

In terms of the physical set-up, we walked through the restaurant and into the kitchen. Which, I should mention, was the most spotlessly clean Cantonese kitchen I’ve ever seen. We were then led to a private room located in the back of the kitchen.

Once in the room, it could have been a private room in any restaurant anywhere in Hong Kong. There was a TV set up in the room – a camera pointed out into the kitchen and we could turn our heads to the TV to see what was going on in the kitchen.

And at no point before, during or after the meal did the chef come in, introduce himself, share a glass of wine with us, ask what we thought of the food. (Language difficulties? Of the 11 of us, 7 were fluent Cantonese and Mandarin.)

So there was really nothing especially “chef’s table” about the whole experience. Except that every time anyone had to go through the bathroom, they had to go through the kitchen and out into the restaurant. And every time walking back into the kitchen, would get stopped by a waiter who thought we were looking for the bathroom and got lost.

And in return for the private room, we then lost the magnificent harbor view that one gets when one eats in the regular section of the restaurant – 8th floor unobstructed view looking out towards TST.

And the food? There was nothing unusual on the menu at all. There was nothing risky or unique or that displayed any sense of creativity. It was all your standard Cantonese banquet fare – extremely well executed, of course. Here’s what we had …

• Peking Duck
• Hot and sour soup with some lobster meat
• Steamed prawns with garlic sauce (nice sauce)
• Stir fried garoupa
• Stir fried wagyu beef
• Pea shoots with crab meat
• Rice with diced chicken
• Mango pudding
• Chinese petite fours

All very nice. All high quality ingredients and well prepared.

So a good dinner. And I’m sure an expensive one (no, I have no idea what it cost). But not a particularly memorable one.

Yeah, yeah, I know, I get taken out for yet another super nice meal and all I can do is complain.

What’s the world’s best city for food according to the Michelin guide? Must be Paris, right?

Nope, it’s Tokyo.

The Michelin Guide awarded twice as many stars to restaurants in Tokyo as they did to ones in Paris. And, oh yeah, 3 of the 8 restaurants in Tokyo deemed worthy of 3 stars serve French cuisine.

More here.

I am told that Paris has responded to this by saying, “Hey, Tokyo! Your mother is a hamster and your father smells of elderberries!” and then collectively farted in Tokyo’s general direction.

Three quick recommendations for people who like classic soul and r ‘n b and maybe are thinking that no one does it anymore.

1 – James Hunter – a Brit, I guess, he sings and plays guitar. He’s white, but he sings just like Sam Cooke. Authentic? Van Morrison doesn’t seem to worry about it, he turns up to duet with Hunter on two Bobby Blue Bland songs on the album “Believe What I Say” and Hunter was occasionally part of Morrison’s touring band. I have that album and “People Gonna Talk” and can’t decide which one I like better. Mojo Magazine put People Gonna Talk as #8 on their top 50 albums list for 2006.

2 – Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings – 100 Days, 100 Nights. Her voice is classic and the band is tight. Too bad the songs aren’t better. Still worth a listen.

3 – Bettye LaVette – Scene of the Crime. 61 years old but you’d never know it by the power in her voice, and in this case her back-up band includes legend Spooner Oldham and members of Drive-By Truckers. No problems with the material here, most of the songs are covers (though not necessarily well known) and she seems to own whatever she sings.

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Following my renewed convertible dreams, I did a bit of car shopping over the weekend. Today I found a real beauty. A 2003 BMW 330 Ci, white, cream leather seats, blue convertible top, sport trim package, a stunner. But it was $288,000, ostensibly marked down from $328k. One reason may have been that the registration had expired – people in HK shopping for used cars tend to look for ones where they have as long as possible before paying the annual registration fee. The dealer said he could “probably” include a year’s registration (approx $8,000) for free.

But when I sat down and worked the numbers, I realized that while I could have afforded this car, the monthly payments were almost double what I consider to be comfortable. As sweet as that 330 was, I quickly realized I could live without it.

The only BMW convertible that I spotted under $200k this weekend was a year 2000, very clean, but just a 323. I can go with an older car but it’s gonna have to be a 328 or 330 (depending on model year).

Sometimes you hit the used car “malls” and see tons of convertibles. This time I saw about a dozen or more two seaters but only three or four that had a usable back seat for the dogs.

So I suppose the current Spikemobile will have to last me a little while longer.