Where can you dine in Hong Kong with tuxedoed waiters in a building purposely built for the restaurant? Where can you sit down for dinner and receive a custom-pressed notepad with your name staring up at you? Who only uses Wedgwood dishes? Where might you go if you want to show your date that things are getting serious? And, which restaurant in Hong Kong has a roving three man string band to satisfy your parents with tunes from Elton John, Eric Clapton and Simon & Garfunkel while trying to keep it current with Adele, Bruno Mars and Maroon 5? The answer to all of these questions is Amigo.
Amigo opened in 1967 and relocated to its current spot forty years ago, where it’s remained ever since as the sole tenant of Amigo Mansion at 79A Wong Nai Chung Road in Happy Valley. Before there was Caprice at the Four Seasons, Amber at the Landmark Mandarin, food blogs, or even the word “foodie”, there was Amigo. For almost fifty years, well-heeled Hongkongers and aspirants have been celebrating special occasions at Amigo. Not having been back since my early years in Hong Kong, it was with curiosity that I recently returned to Amigo’s friendly confines to see how it is holding up.
Despite its ageing status, the second-floor dining room was packed even on a weeknight. To my right was a table of doctors, and a young couple obviously on a date sat diagonally from me. In addition to the Wedgwood crockery, the table settings included sterling silver cutlery embossed with the Amigo name while a wood-beamed ceiling hung above. Though nothing was trendy and nothing was new, the food was very good.
An appetizer of meaty escargot (HKD240) was bathed in a rich, herbal garlic butter and accompanied by precise sterling silver utensils. I ordered the clear turtle soup (HKD175), as Amigo is the only place I know in Hong Kong where a true, not mock, western-style turtle soup can be found. The soup comes in a turtle-shaped ceramic bowl with a sterling silver lid standing in for the shell. It is a clear broth with a subtle flavor reminiscent of a Chinese lo faw tong, literally “old fire soups” that are seasonal, long-boiled and said to reinforce health and vitality. The oyster soup in a puff pasty (HKD180) came with a delicate, flaky puff and two large, whole shelled oysters submerged within a flavourful creamy broth.
Beef tenderloin with goose liver and truffle sauce
For main dishes, if a chateaubriand for two is not to your taste, try the beef tenderloin with goose liver and truffle sauce (HKD560). The filet is not seared tableside by a blowtorch or aged in a visible butcher’s counter. Rather, it is a simple tender piece of meat cooked exactly as requested, medium rare of course, and topped with a large piece of rich, melt-in-your-mouth foie gras. For a seafood main, the baked king prawns with cheese and seafood stuffing (HKD480) included two enormous prawns perfectly well-cooked and amply topped with a mix of chopped seafood baked together with a rich cheesy topping.
The cherries jubilee for two
To complete the experience, cherries jubilee for two (HKD300), slowly prepared tableside by the tuxedo-clad waiter, adds a bit of drama to your dinner as the flames rise from the pan with the quickly burning spirits. Served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, the cherries will leave you with a full stomach. The only disappointment of the night was the somewhat uninspired petit fours of chocolate-covered chocolate ice cream straight from the freezer. By then, I could hardly care with my stomach full and my own spirits lifted.
Amigo: Amigo Manson, 79A Wong Nai Chung Road, Happy Valley (Google Maps)
