We have been looking forward to this special Sunday for a couple of weeks already! We are meeting up with Joe’s cousin Joey, her husband Kris and Joe’s cousin KC at a place called The Aquatic Market, a new seafood buffet restaurant, but not until 12pm. So we get up, have a light breakfast (I’m definitely saving my appetite for lunch), catch up on some blogging while the girls play, and then we head out.
This restaurant is, as so many others, on a high floor inside a mall. This mall is actually one that we see when we drive by on the bus quite often, and so when we get off, we’re a little bewildered. We see the parking lot entrance, and then there’s a long escalator along the side of the building, on the outside?? We go up the escalator, and eventually find our way inside the mall.
We get up to the 6th floor, and see an enormous queue for the restaurant. When KC arrives, he says “but we have a reservation” and goes up to the front to ask, because surely we don’t have to line up with the commoners when we have a reservation? Yes, yes we have to line up, we are commoners too.
The restaurant opens at 12pm, and so everyone in the line has a reservation. We are show into an enormous restaurant, full with tables and booths, blink and you’ll miss the entrance to the food area, and more tables and more booths. All the way at the back, we’re shown to our tables, two tables for four, but close together, for the 7 of us.
I try to go get something to drink with the girls, but the food and drink area is so PACKED with people, we grab three drinks and quickly retreat. You cannot walk, you cannot get an impression of what the options are, and you’re fighting with other diners and doors opening and closing in all directions. The three of us head back to the table, and let the experienced locals go ahead.
Joey starts handing out bibs to everyone, in preparation for the main event, the hotpotting action. Maylin, Téa and I get teal ones, the rest go with grey.
You can order food delivered from the kitchens, and we soon have white rectangles stacked on both tables, with thin slices of raw beef to boil in our hotpots. There’s also roast quail and other deliciousness delivered, and we’re soon stuffing our faces. We have plenty of shellfish and vegetables to put into our hotpots, and don’t go back up to the buffet for quite a while.
After about an hour, I go back to get some more beverages, and the buffet is practically deserted! All throughout the restaurant, the tables are full of people adding food to or taking food out of their hotpots, there’s loud music playing, energizing the atmosphere, almost video game like. As I walk through the dining room, I just get this feeling that people here are having a great time, they’re having fun! What a strange sensation in a restaurant.
I head back to the table and grab my phone, time to take some pictures! Let me show you around the buffet:
Not shown: The ice cream freezer, full of Haagen-Dazs in multiple flavours and popsicles in all varieties. The soft serve machine, with vanilla, chocolate or swirl options. The candy wall, to top your self serve sundae. The giant tub of Nutella, with a pump, for topping your sundae. The coffee machine, for fancy espresso drinks, and the tea station with multiple options of teas.
There was also the condiment section: you have to make yourself a dipping sauce, as your food as it comes out of the hotpot does not have a strong flavour, so you can concoct your personal dipping sauce. Usually, at other buffets, they put out five or six options for you to mix in, here there were easily 20. Garlic, cilantro, chilies of all types, hoisin, soy and oyster sauces, crushed peanuts, toasted sesame seeds, sesame oil, chili oil, and so very much more.
Phew! I think I showed or told you about all of it! Needless to say, we ate until we were stuffed. And then we ate some more. We talked and laughed and the girls were full and bored of our conversations, so they played games. Three hours is the time limit for a lunch reservation at this restaurant, and it went by so fast. I wouldn’t want to fight my way through a two hour dinner option, the lunch one was perfect.
I keep thinking that if this buffet was offered at this price in any other country, it would be a complete steal. Especially with all the alcohol offered? For HK$330 per person, and a slight discount for anyone under 130cm (phew, Maylin!), this is an absolute steal! It’s approximately equivalent to CA$56 or NOK390. Absolutely mind blowing! When can we go again?
But we do get kicked out after our allotted 3 hours, and as we leave, they are letting the next 3 hour bunch in. The turnover is fast and impressive, and I’m sad to leave. Full and satisfied, but sad to leave.
We head down to the levels with stores, and browse around for a bit. Luckily for the girls, there’s an entire floor just for them! If you wonder what floor you are on in this mall, just head over to the atrium bit, and you’ll soon feel more oriented.
Of course, like with any other mall, there are plenty of photo opportunities, and this one that we found here, sums up this day completely:
We finally make our way home, and are so full that it lasts until dinnertime. Joe and Téa want no mention of food, but Maylin and I have a slice of toast for “dinner”. It’s a quiet night, and ends with a movie. Have you heard that before, from the travelling Chengs?
I think just reading and seeing your descriptions of the buffet and all it’s options has left me full, too. Haha