We left the eternal Christmas of the Philippines for the glitz of Macau in mid-January, expecting relief from the crowds that large holidays beget.  Not so.  The cultural duality of Macau meant that large Chinese New Year floats were already set up in San Malo Plaza. Portuguese edifices were laden with red lanterns and strings of lights.  Media and tourist alike vied for the best ops in front of each New Year’s structure.

Coincidentally, we had chosen Long Kei, one of the few Cantonese restaurants in the city, for our lunch spot.  From our table on the ground floor, we chewed on some of the most light-handed Cantonese cooking we had ever ingested while watching group after group tromp to the upper floor for what I guess to be dim sum (quite comical really; it was like a circus clown car in restaurant form).

Fish maw and egg drop soup

Braised seasonal vegetables in oyster sauce

Steamed pork spare ribs in apricot sauce

Typical multi-lingual format of restaurant menus in Macau

4 subsequent days in Hong Kong meant more Chinese New Year sights, sounds, and culinary delights.  Disneyland Hong Kong happened to launch its New Year’s makeover on the day we decided to visit.  It was a treat to see childhood Disney favourites wrapped in Asian apparel and to pick up Disney souvenirs that were decidedly one of a kind.

Mickey mouse fruit

Love against the castle

Happiness display

No trip to Hong Kong is complete without a banquet, so we corralled as many friends as we could muster on short notice to join us for an extravagant set dinner at Peking Garden Restaurant.  We savoured Peking Duck (my favourite and the specialty of the house), an assortment of delicate meats, vegetables, and seafood, and a cool demo of handmade noodle-making in a spacious, sumptuous dining room.

Sliced whitefish with olives, vegetables, and scallion oil

Peking duck!

Noodle-making demo

Since we had so much fun enjoying the imminence of Chinese New Year in Asia, it seemed only fair to join in on local festivities upon our return.  New Year’s Eve was spent in Aberdeen Centre in an atmosphere that reminded us all too fondly of Langham Place in Mong Kok.

The meal that we had at Northern Delicacy did not remotely compare to the food we enjoyed in Macau and Hong Kong.  The handmade noodles were bland; the honeymoon fried rice compensated for its lack of complexity with a coronary’s worth of grease.  Our favourite dish, the spicy wontons, was glaringly absent.

The one point of redemption was the steamed pork dumplings (known to me better as “soup dumplings”).  Lesson learned: we’ll revert to our routine of having dim sum at Northern Delicacy and finding someplace else to satisfy our dinner cravings.

Northern Delicacy
4151 Hazelbridge Way | Aberdeen Centre, Richmond
(604) 233-7050

In our attempt to last till the clock struck midnight, we wandered the halls of Aberdeen Centre amongst a most jovial crowd.  Perhaps we were too jetlagged or lazy or old, but we faded well before 11pm, with just enough energy to buy a coconut bun from Saint Germain Bakery and take in a Cantonese skit at the mainstage.

Nevertheless, we arrived home full and happy, our sadness at having left Hong Kong momentarily abated, with high hopes for what fortune the Year of the Ox will bring.

This post is part of the Bites of Asia series – a set of posts I wrote in December 2008 before we left for 27 days of exploring the Philippines, Macau, and Hong Kong. If you’d like updates of our trip as it happens in real time, subscribe to my Twitter feed or better yet, follow me on Twitter.

Last time I was in Macau, my uncle took me on a sleepless tour of the casinos from midnight till dawn.  Neither of us was much of a gambler; we hopped from site to site in search of a place that offered sustenance at an ungodly hour.  The verdict? It seemed that everyone else up that late needed only alcohol, cigarettes, and the thrill of victory to keep them going.

This time around, I’m travelling with my husband, who does a fairly decent job of supplementing our monthly income with his online poker winnings.  He is itching to tour the poker tables at the new Venetian: the largest casino in the world.  It presides over Macau like a bloated monarch, oozing decadence onto the wide colonial boulevards that surround.

I am more interested in capturing all that shiny-shiny with my SLR. My point and shoot photos from last year didn’t come close to doing the glitter of Macau any justice.

In the day, we plan to tour the city’s architectural and culinary facets.  I’d like to take Kurt to food faves such as EOD Cafe and try out some of the places that Rick Green of BC Brews suggested:

For all the times that I went to Macau when I was living in Hong Kong, I never went gambling; I have no interest. I occupied my time during the day walking through the streets, touring the historic sites, seeing the gardens, and visiting museums. In the evening, it was eating, eating, eating. Macanese food is absolutely essential — Fernando’s, Litoral, Riquexo, Sol Nascente.

It’s 1pm on December 23rd. By now, my husband and I should be aboard Air Canada Flight 7 to Manila via Hong Kong. Assuming, of course, that this unusual cold snap hasn’t resulted in flight delays, or heaven forbid, cancellations. But this is a pre-scheduled post, so I’ll be an optimist and say that all is well.

The next 27 days will be spent in the Philippines, Macau, and Hong Kong as we visit my homeland and detour in China on the way back home. That’s an awfully long time to neglect you and this blog, so I have spent the past 72 hours scheduling a dozen posts for you to enjoy while we are away.

These posts will mostly project the itinerary of our trip and what we plan to do at each of our major pit stops. Some posts are Vancouver-centric in case you tire of hearing about places a zillion miles away. You may also find Farmstead Wines stopping in for a guest post before my return.

For those of you who want to keep up to date on our goings-on, I will attempt to swap my SIM card in Manila in order to Twitter-feed you with the food and fun that comes across our way. If you are on Twitter, simply follow me and enjoy the updates from Asia.

If you are not on Twitter, you can either subscribe to my Twitter RSS feed like you would for a regular blog or news site. I’ve also installed a plugin that *should* create weekly Sunday digests of my Twitter updates and publish it here on Tiny Bites. The testing for this didn’t go quite as planned, so you may get them, or you may not. I’m hoping you will.

Access to the web will be nigh impossible in many of the places we plan to stay. I welcome any comments and Twitter feedback that you have between now and January 18th (our slated return); should you have questions or comments that require a response from me, note that you will likely not hear a peep until after we get back and shake off our jetlag.

Well, we’re off. See you in the new year and enjoy the all the festivities in Vancouver!

Photo courtesy of The HouseKeeper (Creative Commons)

Fall is just around the corner, which means that we are finally working out the details of our long-awaited winter getaway to the Philippines.  Although I was born in Manila, I was primarily raised in Vancouver, and it’s been over 20 years since I’ve been back to visit the homeland.  Can’t wait to introduce my husband to a tropical experience and to rediscover my heritage!

My husband has been doing most of the travel planning thus far.  I’ve been more focussed on teaching him rudimentary Filipino than figuring out how to pass the time (since my fall-back response would be “eating”).  However, we have gotten this far with our travel agenda:

• Christmas – Dec 29: Family quality time in Metro Manila
• Dec 30 – Jan 4: Hiking about in Northern Luzon
• Jan 5 – 12: Splashing about in the Visayas
• Jan 12 – 13: Gambling about in Macau
• Jan 14 – 18: Touring about in Hong Kong

Throughout all this, of course, we expect to be indulging in as much of the local cuisine as we can possibly digest.  There are culinary tours and food festivals in some of the regions that we’ll be visiting, but we’ll probably peruse the tour packages as a guideline and rely upon our eyes, our noses, and your recommendations instead.

What should we see and eat?

We’ll be booking our round trip flights this week but are still in the process of cementing just what we’ll do in the Philippines and Hong Kong.  If you have any recommendations for accommodations, places to eat, and places to see that are off the beaten path, please leave me a comment!

As we figure out these logistics with your help, I’ll leave you with a taste of Asia from my last trip to Hong Kong and Macau.

Rice Paper

The Hong Kong Thai fusion restaurant that ruined me for Thai food in Vancouver.  It’s a beautifully laid out venue with an entire wall face of glass that looked out over the harbour. My culinary planner for the week had arranged a 7:30pm reservation so that we could catch the breathtaking light show during our meal.

The food was one of the most memorable of that week. My colleagues had favourite dishes so they ordered plate after plate of Thai food that I had never before encountered (at home, we usually don’t veer far from the pad thai and curries that one normally sees on North American menus). Faves: a crab noodle dish that came highly recommended; the pomelo salad; the beef with red rice; the experience of rolling up my own rice paper roll of roasted duck and guava.

EOD Cafe

Small Makanese restaurant near my relative’s flat in Macau.  Simple, homestyle stuff, but I’d take my husband here in a heartbeat.

Tin Hau

Food stalls along Electric Road wink at you from every corner.  The best vegetarian dim sum and congee I’ve ever had to date was found in this vibrant Hong Kong neighbourhood.

More about this trip:

• Hong Kong travel diary: Day 1
• Hong Kong travel diary: Day 2
• Hong Kong travel diary: Day 3
• Hong Kong travel diary: Day 4
• Hong Kong travel diary: Day 5
• Hong Kong travel diary: Day 6
• Hong Kong travel diary: Day 7