Restaurants & Cafés

In these parts, rarely does a restaurant fly under the radar. Most are backed by one of a handful of noteworthy food and beverage groups or repped by marketing agencies that flood inboxes to make sure no opening goes unreported. That’s what makes Cardamom Street such a breath of fresh air. The Indian restaurant on Elgin Street arrived with hardly a whisper. No press releases, no marketing campaigns, no news at all. One day it simply opened, and that was that. Cardamom Street doesn’t necessarily stand alone, though. It’s the second restaurant from banker-turned-restaurateur Tiena Sekharan. The other, Masala Train in Wan Chai, is a hidden gem, serving homestyle Indian food for takeout prepared without artificial colours or flavourings. Sekharan has carried over that focus on all-natural ingredients to Cardamom Street, her first proper sit-down restaurant. While it might be more upscale than Masala Train, you can still leave your Oxford shoes at home. There’s a bare-bones bar in the back of the room and out in front a dog-friendly porch that faces Fini’s across the street. On the walls hang posters of colourful mandalas and elephants and other Indian iconography. Sure, the artwork swims in South Asian clichés, but it keeps the atmosphere casual, pleasant and unpretentious all the same. With the food, Cardamom Street aims for something a little fancier than your average takeaway curries and samosas. In a follow-up e-mail, Sekharan says she was inspired by her Indian heritage as

French home-cooking gets the star treatment at PMQ’s latest dining destination

Hong Kong has a complicated relationship with tacos. They’re often soggy and insipid or tiny and overpriced. Taqueria Super Macho, however, hopes to hit the sweet spot between high- and lowbrow, serving tacos inspired by Mexico’s coastal cuisine in a lively but casual atmosphere. ‘Lively but casual’ might be an understatement, though. Every time the door opens, the floor and bar staff shout ‘¡Bienvenidos!’ And, frequently, the corrido music pumping through the speakers is broken by the unmistakable saxophone riff of Tequila Song by The Champs and the room erupts in a chorus of ‘¡tequila!’ The margarita pitchers are novelty-sized sharing glasses. Sombreros appear on strangers’ heads. It is, in short, a fiesta. And the drinks keep partygoers well-lubricated. The margaritas – classic, passion fruit or mango, on the rocks or frozen ($88) – are potent and delicious. Five house cocktails, including a riff on the Michelada called Viva México ($88), provide an alternative to margaritas and run-of-the-mill Mexican lagers like Pacífico, Dos Equis, Corona and Modelo Negra ($58 each, or $298 for a bucket of six).  While the vibe may be more Señor Frog’s than Frontera Grill, when it comes to food expect more than you would get from your standard cantina. Black Sheep Restaurants founder Christopher Mark and development chef Billy Otis spent months scouring the Mexican coast, sampling taco after taco in search of culinary inspiration. They returned to Hong Kong with recipes that seem sim

Inside many of us there exists a burning desire to connect with our roots. Most people will never fulfil that desire. Chef Que Vinh Dang, however, is not most people. Born in Vietnam and raised in New York, where he learned classical French cooking and cut his teeth under culinary icons Geoffrey Zakarian and Rocco DiSpirito, the chef has returned to his roots with his latest restaurant, Nhau. Dang, for the uninitiated, was behind two popular but now defunct Hong Kong restaurants showcasing French techniques and contemporary American cooking: TBLS and Quest by Que. After closing Quest, the chef took a two-and-a-half-year hiatus from the dining scene before opening Nhau in 2019. Rather than reverting to the broad spectrum of Western flavours again, the chef looked to the country of his birth for a fresh angle. If that wasn’t obvious in the name – Nhau translates to ‘together’, as in to eat and drink together – it should become clear as soon as you step foot in the dining room. From the rattan chairs and hand-painted ceramic tiles to the pastel yellow walls, a colour favoured by French colonialists, the design screams ‘Southeast Asia’. The beautiful aesthetics, as well as the tucked-away location just off Upper Lascar Row, are pure bait for well-heeled socialites. Never mind the décor and crowds, though. The food transcends them all. Nhau packs a lot of punch into a one-page menu. Sour, spicy, salty, funky, fresh – every dish captures that distinct blend of disparate flavours