Review: Porterhouse’s brunch buffet – AKA, how a steakhouse does Sunday roast

The spread of cold plates at Porterhouse’s Sunday roast brunch buffet. Photo: Tomas Wiik
The spread of cold plates at Porterhouse’s Sunday roast brunch buffet. Photo: Tomas Wiik

For years, Porterhouse as been known as one of Hong Kong’s go-to spots for reliably good steak. With a seventh floor location in Lan Kwai Fong, high ceilings, and modernist decor, it’s also one of the best-looking steakhouses in town, too.

Now, with its Sunday roast brunch buffet, Porterhouse is also trying its hand at wooing the weekend brunch crowd. Priced at HK$428 per head — with add-on free flow options priced at HK$188 to HK$288 for two hours, and HK$288 to HK$488 for the whole meal — it’s certainly pretty steep for a daytime meal.

If it’s a special occasion kind of day, however, then you might feel pretty convinced that you’re getting your money’s worth after that initial recce to check out what’s on offer — the buffet spread includes a carving station, seafood bar, salads, and dozens of other cold dishes. There’s also a great selection of desserts presented across a table of sweets.

Porterhouse's cold spread as part of the Sunday Roast brunch buffet. Photo via Tomas Wiik.
Spread of cold dishes at the Sunday Roast brunch buffet. Photo: Tomas Wiik

On any average weekday lunch or dinner, Porterhouse serves up fantastic steak dishes — we’ve had dinner here on a number of occasions — but the roast beef served at the Sunday brunch was on the lackluster side. The meat was thinly-sliced, still a little bit red (but not too rare) — and had a dull, one-dimensional flavor.

Porterhouse's roast beef. Photo by Vicky Wong.
Porterhouse’s roast beef. Photo: Vicky Wong

Right in front of the carving station is five choices of Porterhouse’s own mustards — we particularly liked the Dijon and English mustards — but they all overpower the beef (which doesn’t seem too difficult to do in the first place).

Other hot food options at the buffet included baked salmon with sea salt, and ribs — the latter of which were delicious and had a lot of flavor.

For us, it’s actually the spread of cold dishes that we found most enjoyable and impressive. Some standouts: sliced smoked salmon, marinated portobello mushrooms, grilled asparagus and eggplant, marinated anchovies, and carrot salad.

Salmon, asparagus, pasta, portobello mushrooms, anchovies among a selection of items from the cold spread at Porterhouse's Sunday roast brunch buffet. Photo by Vicky Wong.
A selection of items from the cold spread at Porterhouse’s Sunday roast brunch buffet. Photo: Vicky Wong

The seafood bar was also very good — the quality of the lobster, mussels, prawns, and oysters was solid. Yes, the oysters were on the small side, but that’s pretty much par the course for these kinds of AYCE deals.

Desserts at Porterhouse were also great, in particular, the carrot cake — moist, not too sweet, and complemented well by a well-balanced frosting — and the cherry tart.

A selection of items from the seafood bar at Porterhouse's Sunday roast brunch buffet. Photo by Tomas Wiik.
A selection of items from the seafood bar at Porterhouse’s Sunday roast brunch buffet. Photo: Tomas Wiik

Overall, we’d say Porterhouse’s buffet offering is a great option for dropping that brunch dough — we’d happily go again just to eat from the cold plates section of the buffet table — but if you’re more of a meat-eater, then just know that the meats on offer at the carving station will be pretty different from what Porterhouse’s kitchen is usually capable of rolling out.

Porterhouse’s Sunday brunch is available on weekends between 11:30am to 3:30pm.

 

FIND IT:
Porterhouse is at 7/F California Tower, 30-36 D’Aguilar Street, Lan Kwai Fong, Central.
Reservations: +852 2522 6366
Mon-Fri, 12pm to 2:30pm and 6pm to 10:30pm; Sat, 11:30am to 3:30pm and 6pm to 10:30pm; Sun, 11:30am and 6pm to 10pm.
MTR: Central (approx. 5 minute walk)



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