江川手打烏冬 Egawa Udon
旺角西洋菜街152號
152 Sai Yeung Choi Street, Mong Kok
https://www.openrice.com/zh/hongkong/review/only-for-the-environment-and-eating-utensils-e2096120
I have bookmarked this place ages ago but never really made a real effort to visit this place, what’s even more surprisingly is that I always walk past it and never notice it, so it shows how it doesn’t stand out.
Today, it must have been late at night, and less people on the street, so somehow it stood out.
I bookmarked this place because of the semi transparent bowls and chopsticks they use, other than that I don’t really like to eat Udon, especially Udon in soup because it tends to be tasteless.
However I did hope for some miracle that it would taste nice like this shop in TST that is closed, the one with the shake shake black octopus udon.
Inside, the seating was quite nice, individual tables partitioned nicely, there were some nicer seats along the wall too with pretty colour changing optic lights.
Even on the bottom of the benches there was blue lighting, and the support to the table was clear acrylic pillars.
The skirting was pretty too, it was tiled with crystals and the mirror was very relaxing, patterned with bubbles.
Anyway back to the food, udon seems to be its main item on the menu.
Typically udon means its Japanese cuisine, however in this case, the outside of the shop doesn’t look very Japanese to me and its name makes it sounds like one of those China provinces.
Looking further at the menu, they do have some rather bizarre items for a Japanese restaurants.
I tend to find bizarre items in Mong Kok, most probably because the people there are more diverse and they expect all sorts of weird and wonderful combinations.
I was tempted in ordering mashed potatoes and escargot, and there were these rolls that were like Mexican tortilla rolls in Japanese style.
As for udon, there was at least ten different soup bases to choose from, the ones that stood out were: carrot, tom yum kung and bak kut teh. Considering they had tom yum kung, they should of had Laksa too!!!
I think carrot would have been nice, but I ordered bak kut teh instead.
I wish they had other noodles to choose from as well.
Apart from the noodles I also ordered stir fried clams Korean style with asparagus.
Bak Kut Teh Udon:
The soup smelt like bak kut teh, although there was a slight sour taste to it, as expected the udon was a bit tasteless.
Stir fried Clams:
The clams were quite big, however 90% of the were tightly shut, which was a nuisance opening them up.
The dish was a bit like one of those Korean clay pots with sizzling ingredients, it had mushrooms in it as well.
The taste was a mix of yellow bean sauce and ketchup with a hint of chili and slightly smokey from the stir frying process.
The asparagus was buried right at the bottom of the dish, and only the stalks was served and no asparagus tips.
Overall the food is so-so, only the decor is nice.
The chopsticks were innovative, but unpractical, it was impossible eating the noodles as they kept slipping back in the bowl and splashing soup everywhere.
