Part of the K.O. Dining Group, Yu Lei makes up one third of the restaurants they have established here in Hong Kong. With Messina covering Italian cuisine and Kazuo Okada showcasing traditional Japanese dishes featured in kaiseki, Yu Lei specialises in Chinese cuisine, namely Shanghainese where some dishes feature a twist of Japanese influence which is not surprising since Chef Miki Imagawa is Japanese himself. All three establishments are located on the 5th floor of the Harbourfront Landmark in Hung Hom and Yu Lei is off to the right once you exit the elevator. There is a long corridor which have several private rooms sectioned off and it opened up into a communal dining area which was amazingly bright with natural lighting flooding in from the full length windows. The main dining area is painted a subtle pale green with hints of light pink and combined with the serene views of the harbour, it offered a remarkably calming ambience to diners.
We were here for lunch as a party of three, Mr. C, Mr. E and myself, and were seated at one of the more comfortable tables with cushioned sofa seats. Menus were presented to us shortly after along with their welcome appetisers of braised gluten and marinated daikon sticks. Tea was charged individually per selection so we ended up having three different types, Mr. E had pu’er, I picked Tie Guan Ying while Mr. C chose something unusual like he always does, but unfortunately I can not recall what it was. The selection of dim sum was quite large, so it was good that Mr. E joined us that day as we were able to try more items~
What we had:
Steamed prawn and spinach dumpling and steamed prawn and sai yeung choi dumpling. Both were delicately pleated and while the skin may look a little thick, it tasted anything but. Soft and slightly chewy, they encased a filling of fresh prawns and vegetables. The spinach was tender, but the sai yeung choi was quite stringy.
We ordered a plate of char siu, but the waitress came back to inform us that they only had half a portion left and suggested that we order another selection from the roast meats to pair it with. We ended up pairing it with roast pork. The look of the char siu was quite unappetising, but Mr. C and I have learnt that the uglier the appearance the better it ends up tasting. This was no different, as the char siu was softly tender and marinated well from the sweet honey sauce while the roast pork had even layers of fat and lean meat with a wonderfully crunchy layer of crackling.
Chinese liver sausage bun. It is rare that you see this prepared with liver sausage as most places tend to use the normal pink lap cheong as the filling. I think we all enjoyed this as the sausage was savoury sweet with generous chunks of lard inside. The bun was fluffy and helped cut through the heaviness of the sausage.
Tomato and scallop dumpling. This sounded quite interesting and visually it was very pretty~ The skin was tinted a rose pink and the filling contained fresh scallops with a tiny sprinkling of sun-dried tomatoes on top. Although it was visually pleasant, we all thought it did not taste particularly special.
Xiao Long Bao. Since Shanghai cuisine is their specialty we decided to try this and see how it fared. The skin of the dumpling was unfortunately a little too thick, but it did retain a lot of the sweet meat juice inside the dumpling, so be careful when biting into this as it was piping hot!
We also ordered a soup course. I had the double boiled chicken drumstick and mushroom soup, while Mr. C and Mr. E had their hot and sour soup with sea cucumber. My soup was wonderfully sweet and had a depth of flavour which only comes from long hours of boiling, while the spoonful of hot and sour soup I tried was palate awakening spicy and was balanced nicely with the sour vinegary aspect of the soup.
Siu Mai. These were very meaty and I was surprised that instead of minced pork meat used as the filling, individual chunks of pork was used together with fresh prawns creating a different sensation in the mouth altogether.
Pork balls with sakura glutinous rice. Dense balls of minced pork coated with sakura flavoured glutinous rice. This creation was evidently a hint to the chef’s Japanese origin, but I was not really enamoured by this as the sakura flavour did not really agree with me, but it was interesting to try.
Bean curd sheet wrapped rolls. This was prepared exactly the way I like it, where the bean curd sheets were soft with a slight chew and flavourful after soaking up the thick sauce.
Phoenix claws. I did not try this as I was already quite full from the previous savoury dishes, but Mr. C and Mr. E seemed to enjoy this, especially Mr. E since he is quite partial to this dish.
And finally to desserts~
The requisite mango pudding for Mr. C. As it came from a mould, the texture was quite firm meaning quite a lot of gelatin was used in the making. I found the mango flavour to be quite subtle and it was also a little too sour for my liking. (top left)
Mini egg tarts. These were fresh from the oven, warm, with a crumbly butter pastry and the egg custard filling was smooth and not too sweet. Good~ (top right)
Sesame paste dumplings. I have had these before in a different restaurant and my experience with these are a soft and gooey dumpling rolled in peanut dust with a mouth-burningly hot liquid sesame filling. The ones at Yu Lei were quite unlike that, big in size with a sesame filling that was paste-like rather than liquid. I found the skin to be too thick, but the sesame paste was wonderfully fragrant which can only be achieved by roasting the sesame prior to crushing. (bottom left)
Almond bun. This is their signature dessert and had to be ordered at least 15mins in advance as they made it fresh. They arrived piping hot from the oven and were about the size of your fist. These were absolutely stunning~ a crispy sweet topping draped over a toasty bun with a creamy filling of almond custard… No matter how full you are these are a must order! Highly recommended~ (bottom right)
I must say the quality of food at Yu Lei is definitely high and they really deserve their one Michelin star. Something also worth commenting on was their service which was attentive and polite to the very end even though we were the last table to leave. I very much enjoyed my experience here and look forward to returning~
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