雲貴川 (Yun Gui Chuan)

> Location : 5th Floor, Shing Hing Commercial Bldg.,
21-27 Wing Kut St., Central, Hong Kong
> Cuisine : Yunnan & Sichuan Noodle
> Tel. # : (852) 2854-2389
> Website : N/A

Various locations in the Kowloon area, Yun Gui Chuan has landed its first shop in Hong Kong island at Central (boarder of Central and Sheung Wan)! Famous for its infamously spicy Yunnan and Sichuan noodles, Yun Gui Chuan is no kitty cat in the soup noodle market in Hong Kong. My first visit was surprising because I didn't know it was so close to my office! It's on Wing Kut street too, just right down the road! Hidden inside Shing Hing Commercial Building, some spiciness was about to enter my mouth...

Yun Gui Chuan offers various themed soup noodles (inspired by Yunnan and Sichuan cuisines/both of these Chinese provinces are to the North West of Hong Kong) with various different types of noodles to choose from. Besides noodles, their famous chicken wings are great too! Pricing wise, it's an average of $40 HKD (plus or minus a bit on what you specifically ordered) for a bowl (the three main noodle sets). But don't be concerned, ingredients are fills up every inch of it! Whereas, if you want a smaller bowl, you can always ordered the $25 HKD version. Either way, everything on the menu is customizable As for service, the Central shop was friendly overall and I had nothing to complain about. The wait for the food wasn't long at all too! I had the chance to experience three items from this place and i'll discuss about them now.

For every soup noodle set, you will get a cup of fresh lightly sweeten soy milk! So yeah, first up we have the mixed seafood soup noodle. The bowl was huge! I got to choose from three different levels of spiciness. I asked for medium but they warned me about it so I chose little spiciness. You could add more if needed for your information. So little spiciness wasn't too bad but still I definitely was challenged a bit still =D The soup was sweet, a bit sour from the fermented cabbage (in a good way) and perfectly done saltiness level. The bowl came with all sorts of goodies inside. The following is a list of what's inside: Green onion, lettuce, bean sprouts, peanuts, sesame, fish skin dumpling, fermented cabbage, shrimp wrap, crab roll, ja ja diced pork (like ja ja mien), fried cuttle fish ball, fried fish paste, albacore, Sichuan spicy oil (according to my friend), pepper bits, and scallions. Multiply each item by a few to a lot of times and you have a bowl that's extremely busy! It was like a kid in a candy store digging through all the different flavors within the bowl...

Noodle wise, I went with the "sweet potato" noodles. Although it didn't tasted sweet, it was interesting overall. They were like semi-clear thin tubings and extremely slippery. Besides this type of noodle, you can also choose from rice noodle, Shanghai Lai Mien, egg noodle (oil type), elbow macaroni, flat noodle (ho fun) and other types. I personally would have gone with Shanghai Lai Mien or egg noodle if I had to choose again but it's definitely a personal preference.

All the items inside the mixed seafood soup noodle were good. Especially the fish skin dumplig (the skin of the dumpling is made out of fish skin). The taste and texture were just excellent to me. Everything else was fresh, good and as expected. How about the second item? Well, this was the pig soft bone (the part at the pig's middle spine area) meat soup noodle. This is a great choice if you want some red meat in your system. I personally was brought to this place with a friend so this is what she had. I did get a chance to have some of the soft bone pig meat and I mean the taste was just delicious! I can't imagine what it would be like with the whole experience. So I definitely would recommend anyone trying it because I definitely will =D

Lastly, we have the chicken wings. These things are as popular as the noodles I tell you. Each order has six wings. You can divide up the flavors however you want. As for me, I had half spicy Sichuan style and Sinkiang herb seasoned style (Sinkiang is another province in China). Personally, I love the herb seasoned style because of the aroma and the taste that lingers around your senses so much! The spicy Sichaun style was good and your expected spiciness to it. I'll tell you right now, it gives me good memories of this one place called Wingnuts back in Costa Mesa, California (U.S.A.), a restaurant that specializes in check wings and ribs!

So Yun Gui Chuan was all plus' from me. I mean, the environment might not be some fancy grade A place nor is it some dirty "dai pai tong" style, but it's clean, the service is good and of course, most importantly, the food (at least what I had for my first experience) got me raving it! I'm really torn with what score I should give this place. Both good scores but until it somehow disappoints me with my next attempt, I'll keep this nice score up for now =D

< 4.5 out of 5 >