Review: CNY Set Dinner @ Shark Fin House

**Non-Halal**

Before Chinese New Year ends, I better post this Chinese New Year set menu that we have partake for our reunion dinner. We have been calling Ming Room and Noble Banquet but they are either fully booked or we have to take the first seating at 5.30pm! After more calls, we managed to get a table at Shark Fin House which is a lesser known restaurant within the Oriental Group of Restaurants at 7.30pm. Perhaps people are shying away cos of the name of the restaurant? Anyway, their menu is quite similar to Ming Room and slightly cheaper :p

Capt'n Hook placed the order of the cheapest set menu available at RM738++ for a table of 10 pax. The menu we have that evening was:

新 年 齐 捞 生 (三文鱼捞生) 

Salmon Yee Sang

春 启 万 家 门 (竹笙凤展翅) （每人每） 

Double-Boiled Stuffed Shark’s Fin in Chicken Wing & Bamboo Pith

凤 凰 来 报 喜 (杏花鸡拼鲜虾捞Rojak) 

‘Hang Fah’ Chicken & Fresh Prawn Rojak

顺 利 庆 有 余 (香芋竹枝顺壳煲) 

Braised ‘Soon Hock’ with Yam & Beancurd Skin in Clay Pot

横 财 就 手 (蚝士发菜猪手蔬) 

Braised Pork Trotter with Dried Oyster & ‘Fatt Choy’

新 春 乐 满 堂 (生炒腊味糯米饭) 

Fried Glutinous Rice with Waxed Meat

甜 蜜 过 新 年 (冰镇雪梨白玉丹) 

Chilled Snow Pear with Sea-Coconut

双 星 齐 新 年 (千层马来糕拼脆皮窝饼) 

Thousand Layered Cake & Chinese Pancake

After the dinner, we did a count and realised that out of the 8 courses, one is the yee sang and 2 were desserts. So we only have a soup plus 3 dishes and a rice dish. Hmmmm... Capt'n Hook mentioned it's not really as worth it as Standard Chartered Bank's Extravagant 8 promo at Gu Yue Tien. I concur to that but we have a couple of old folks with us who can't climb stairs hence this was the alternative. 

Let's just see how did Shark Fin House fare then. The Salmon Yee Sang came with everything on the serving plate including the sauce which was placed on one side. We all noted that the amount of salmon slices is rather generous. We were given extra long chopsticks to toss our yee sang. This yee sang is tasty enough but a little dry here and there as the sauce was not throughly poured all over. Saved time for them but not so great for diners.

Next we have ermmm

Double-Boiled Stuffed Shark’s Fin in Chicken Wing & Bamboo Pith. This is a refreshing change indeed from normal starchy soup. The clear broth is filled with natural sweetness of the stuffed chicken wing, dried cabbage (choy korn) and bamboo pith. (OK pelt me with stones now!)

‘Hang Fah’ Chicken & Fresh Prawn Rojak consisted of 3 items on the plate. There's a plate of rojak, some stir-fried cubed chicken with bell peppers and onions and of course the hang fah chicken. 

The only weird combo here is the rojak lol cos the taste sort of like overwhelm the other 2 dishes but the rojak does tasted good though. There were thinly strips of turnips, cucumber, yau char kwai but I didn't manage to grab any prawns.

The hang fah chicken is basically having removed the chicken meat from the skin, fish paste is then spread onto the skin before covered in almond slivers. Lots of work and this version has crispy skin on top and crispy almonds at the bottom.

This claypot contains big chunks of marbled goby! Accompanying the fish are generous portion of yam, gluten puffs (mien karn), Chinese mushrooms and beancurd sheets. Thumbs up generally from everyone as the fish is fresh and the sauce was well seasoned.

The next dish that can't run away from Chinese New Year menu! Usually it's warng choi chau sau (pork trotter) or hoe see fatt choi (oyster with black moss) but this claypot has both combinations inside!!! Chunks of melt-in-the-mouth pork trotters indicated this dish has been braised for hours! Married with large dried oysters and black moss with a tasty gravy, this dish is screaming for rice.

Even though there were very little dishes BUT the portion of each dish is super huge. We have to packed most of the dishes back. Looking left and right of our table, seems like our neighbouring tables are doing the same too! And so we came to our last savoury dish,

Fried Glutinous Rice with Waxed Meat. Actually the rice here looked like steamed glutinous rice and the texture is soft whilst retaining just a wee bit of chewiness which went well with the older folks. Very very tasty but my only gripe is there's too little waxed meat and mushroom or rather they were chopped so tiny that we can't chew on them even though the taste is there.

We ended our dinner with 3 desserts. First was a chilled snow pear with sea coconut which tasted pretty normal but good as a refreshing end after a heavy meal.

Then came BoiBoi's favourite Chinese Pancake and my favourite of Thousand Layer Cake but the waitress said it's Malai Goe (Malay kuih). Both varieties are good especially the steamed cake. Not sure how we managed to wiped the plate clean! 

Since the elders have rather good feedback on the food, I reckoned this place can be added to our list for future family gatherings. Service was surprisingly good and prompt even though it's jammed packed. The only thing is there's always Imbi Palace, across the road, in competition!

Shark Fin House is located at where the first Tai Thong Restaurant used to be and it's opposite Imbi Palace. Parking is fairly easy as there were a couple of open air carparks opposite and besides Imbi Palace. Else valet parking is available at RM5. 

Since today is St Valentine's Day, wishing everyone a very happy Valentine's Day! Love from all of us at Babe in the City - KL ;-)

Shark Fin House No. 51, Jalan Barat,
Off Jalan Imbi ,
55100 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 603-2143 9966
Business hours:
Open daily (including Public Holidays)
11.00 am – 3.00 pm
6.00 pm – 11.00 pm
Map

GPS Coordinates: 3.143409,101.715379





I'm submitting this for Muhibbah Malaysian Monday blog event. This event is the brainchild of  Shaz (Test With A Skewer) and Suresh (3 Hungry Tummies). Read more here.