Lung King Heen

Totally overrated

Who is familiar with the phase: "With great power comes great responsibility"? If that term is to apply to restaurants, surely it would be something along the line: "With great awards comes great food"? Sadly my lunch experience at Lung King Heen proved otherwise. Located inside the Four Seasons Hotel, Lung King Heen is currently the only traditional Chinese restaurant in the world to hold 3 Michelin stars, it has countless awards and recommendations from the media across the world and is regarded as one of the best restaurants in Asia.

Views from our table

All of the above gave me a very high expectation when I visited Lung King Heen for lunch. We ordered all the chef's recommended items plus a few classics from the seasonal dim sum menu. The baked abalone puff showcased some very high standard pastry work, it was rich, buttery but not overwhelming. The abalone itself had a silky and soft texture with a well balance dressing of diced chicken, it was a great start but the same just can't be said of the rest.

baked abalone puff

The three steamed items were of pretty decent standard but nothing really stood out which was a shame. For the steamed shrimp and scallop dumplings, I had a similar dish from Sun Tung Lok, but everything: Presentation, taste and texture were all a notch below Sun Tung Lok, a good mixture of texture and flavour but it failed to take it to another level as you would expect. Then there was the shrimp dumplings, I've eaten plenty of shrimp dumplings in my life but I found this one at Lung King Heen very ordinary but yet it was double the price to your standard dim sum places in Hong Kong.

steamed seafood dumpling

steamed shrimp & scallop dumplings and
shrimp dumplings

Baked roast goose puffs continued to showcase the quality pastry skill from the kitchen, the goose meat had lovely seasoning which the XO chilli sauce gave it a lovely nutty and robust aroma as well as a delightful moist texture. Pan fried beef buns with wild mushrooms was also solid, the meat had a really delicate peppery flavour with the mushrooms providing a soft and smooth texture.

baked roast goose puffs

pan fried beef buns with wild mushroom

winter melon cakes and petit four

The meal itself was pleasant enough with a smart service and beautiful views overlooking Kowloon, but in the end I left the restaurant rather disappointed, mainly due to the fact that Lung King Heen has been hyped up as one of the finest in Chinese cuisine but it wasn't even half close to anything special. Just because it was a lunch service with lesser profit, the restaurant shouldn't get lazy and provide a below par level of cooking, instead they should take this as an opportunity to create something great with lesser ingredients to really show diners what they are capable of, impress them and make them wanting to come back for another lunch or dinner, sadly this is something that Lung King Heen doesn't seem to be interested in.

Food 3/5

Executive chef: 
Chan Yan Tak

What I paid: 
£30 per head with tea

Average cost without drinks and services:
£30 - £120


 8 Finance St, Four Seasons Hotel, Hong Kong

http://www.fourseasons.com

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