Heartbreak Sour & Spicy Noodle (傷心酸辣粉) in Mongkok
Price: 49 HKD
Wait time: 5 minutes
Dined at: dinner time
Rating 6/10
Mongkok is a bit of a revellers playground, a kind of Suzie Wong representation of Hong Kong. Neon lights, fast cars, a sea of people, and everyone out to make some fast money (or spend it). You want it, Mong Kok's got it.
Apart from being walking distance from where I live, it's a great dining hub especially late at night. Streets like Sai Yueng Choi, Tung Choi and Fa Yuen are spilling with cha chaan tengs on the streets, and laden with restaurant after restaurant on the upper levels of buildings. Every type of cuisine is covered, and there are a million choices. But I had only one thing on my mind: chilli.
Don't ask me about the name of this place, the chinese means heartbreak noodle or something along those lines. Right then, well here's hoping tonights meal doesn't break my heart.
The place is on the first level of a large complex in Dundas Street, at the Yau Ma Tei end of the Ladies Market. It's flanked by street vendors selling siu mai and egg waffles, and the small entrance to get into an elevator kind be very easy to miss unless you know where you're going.
The dining space is open, airy and relatively comfortable. One thing you notice as soon as you come in.. this place is BUSY. That being said, I was given a table in just a few minutes and led to sit down. The waiters seemed to be in a bit of a flurry shouting at one another for an english menu, which appeared to have gone missing. The staff were pretty surly, but hey. Eventually the english menu was found.
I placed an order for a sour and spicy noodle soup (their signature dish), chilli oil wontons and a iced coffee. The server asked how hot I would like my dishes. I looked around and noticed that pretty much everyone was sweating profusely. If it makes the locals sweat, then whats it going to do to me?
'...er, siu la ngoy'
Better play it safe.
First to arrive was the signature dish, the sour & spicy noodles. The noodles are made with gluten free cassava noodles, usually used in sichuan dishes. It has a strange texture, they're very slippery and chewy. The dish was laced with pork mince, peanuts, chives and coriander. The soup was great, just spicy enough not to be uncomfortable and very flavoursome. Big thumbs up.
Next were the Chilli oil wontons. This is one of my favourite dishes when I go to places like Din Tai Fung, or Crystal Jade.
However they were pretty disappointing. The wontons themselves didn't have a whole lot of meat in them, and the soup they were in was very plain (kinda just tasted like water with chillis in it). I just fished out the wontons and put them in my noodles, made them much tastier.
So did Sour & Spicy Noodle break my heart? Well, no, but it didn't necessarily make my day either. Would I come back? Yeah, sure, the food was dirt cheap and my soup was great. But the chilli oil wontons weren't fabulous, I never got my iced coffee, and the staff didn't seem to care that much, but at these prices i'm probably not paying them enough to.