Hoi Fan Restaurant

It’s no secret that Cantonese cuisine is not exactly a hit among expats. The slimy plates of overcooked and under-chopped veggies look almost appetizing next to fish heads and gooey, pale chicken. Lack of proper translations never helps. We’ve lost track of the number of times our check has listed ‘capitalist lobsters’ and ‘saliva chicken’ among the dishes that were apparently (appallingly) ordered.

But when your mother comes to town, as will eventually transpire, she’ll naïvely volunteer to sit down for what she expects to be an adventurous, delightful meal of all the local specialties that characterize your ‘new’ diet. When that day rolls around, we suggest you give Hoi Fan a try – not because it’s located in the uppity, mom-approved suburbia of Canton Place, but because the dishes (somewhat miraculously) succeed in being traditional and westernized all at once.

Take the ‘fried cuttlefish balls with soup inside’ (RMB35), for example. The name is so precise it’s outright laughable (though we didn’t dare poke fun for fear they’d change it to ‘dear cuttlefish with liberated soup’ by nightfall.) Served on a narrow, ivory plate, four spikey puffs of fried fish awaited to drench our chins in squirts of delectable juice. Unforgettable.

The next arrival, fried rice with bass (RMB58), did feature an intact head, but spared us of all bones. Served in a traditional form just for show, this ‘gongfu’ (time-consuming) dish came de-boned as a pile of bite-sized bits over a hidden mound of fried rice. Mediocre though the squishy fish pieces were, it was quite the visual feat and provided a good portion of reliably delicious carbs.

Cantonese is nothing without roasted goose and sweet roasted pork. Hoi Fan’s siu mei four treasures (RMB68) features both, along with classic chicken – yes, the gooey stuff – and our new obsession: traditional pork roll with salted egg yolk and seaweed.

Seldom seen these days in what we’re told are “inferior, lazy Cantonese restaurants”, the salted egg pork is truly a gastronomic rarity. Made of hollowed pork slices filled with yellow yolk and a strip of seaweed, the exquisite dish pleasures taste buds and instills a sense of old Canton.

Bursting with curious presentation, most notably the ice-coated glass of chilled Hoifan milk tea (RMB28), the meal left us giddy with childlike contentment – and not because we were playing with our food. Hoi Fan’s articulate English menu leaves little to the imagination, though we dare say its cuisine does just the opposite.

// For address, see listing.