A taste of tradition at Hop Sing

 

I am familiar with the wholesome, homecooked-style dishes at Hop Sing, the Chinese Restaurant in Ponderosa Golf & Country Club and was happy to join the preview of their Chinese New Year banquet, one of the menus that will be served from 1 to 24 February.

 

Live music performance by a duet of musicians
playing traditional Chinese instruments, the
erhu [Left] and the gu-zhen [Right]

To enhance the festive mood, the restaurant had arranged for a live music performance by a duet of musicians skilled in playing traditional Chinese instruments, the erhu and gu-zhen, as we usher in the Year of the Dragon.  

 

The Chinese celebrate with sumptuous meals as they believed that it augurs well for greater prosperity and abundance in the coming year and I liked that the set menus at Hop Sing are designed to cater to small groups that aimed to reduce food wastage.

 

To usher in the Year of the Dragon, the culinary team has created sumptuous set menus that caters for tables of six diners (RM388+) and eight diners (RM888+).

 

My portion of Yee Sang salad

Each of these festive menus has the tradition of starting with a prosperity toss of this salad as businessmen in this part of the world had started the tradition of eating Yee Sang or Raw Fish salad at the dawn of the New Year.

 

Hop Sing has provided the option to toss this auspicious salad with or without fish, where the slivers of salmon were replaced by slices of refreshing fresh mango.

 

Since the restaurant started offering the option for Mango Yee Sang, this choice remained popular as it not only tasted good but was also great for vegetarians.

 

The next course served in the set menu dubbed Imperial Dragon Set A for eight diners, a hot soup was presented in a rich broth of Braised Fish Maw with Crabmeat.

 

The festive decor in the lobby of
Ponderosa Golf & Country Club
clubhouse

I chose to add a shake of white pepper to this rich soup while others decided to add a drizzle of dark vinegar.

 

The fish dish served was a whole Grouper steamed HongKong style in a light sauce.

 

To connoisseurs of steamed fish, the skill in steaming was in the timing to achieve flesh that was smooth and tender. So the pile of bones and very little left of the whole fish was certainly proof that they managed the steaming rather well.

 

I soon discovered that the Eight Treasure Prosperity Chicken was so named because I spotted the eight different ingredients that were stuffed inside the bird that was braised to a fall-off-the-bone tenderness.

 

Eight Treasure Prosperity Chicken

The vegetable dish was Braised Chinese cabbage topped with razor clams, fatt choy and dried oysters.

 

This, I thought, was their version of Ho See Fatt Choy, prepared with ingredients that spell auspiciousness in the Chinese New Year tradition.

 

The tradition continued with the prawn dish where whole prawns in their shells were prepared in a tasty Szechuan style sauce.

 

Szechuan style Prawns

The meal rounded off with Golden Garlic Fried Rice, dotted with small peeled prawns, reminiscent of the piles of small prawns that I used to peel after our grandmother did her weekly shopping for the family.

 

Our festive meal at Hop Sing came to a sweet end with a warm dessert of Red Bean Soup with Tangerine Peel where the brew was blended into a rich, smooth blend.

 

Hop Sing, the Chinese Restaurant at Ponderosa Golf & Country Club, is on Level One of the main club-house at No. 3 Jalan Ponderosa 1/1, Taman Ponderosa, 81100 Johor Baru, Johor.

 

Small prawns in the Golden Garlic Fried Rice

Open from 11am to 2.30pm for lunch and from 6pm to 9pm for dinner. Dine-in, takeaway and delivery orders are welcome.

 

Food from Hop Sing is prepared with No Pork and No Lard as all ingredients used are sourced from Halal food suppliers.

 

More details on the Lunar Year of the Dragon menus and resort promotions are on website: ponderosagolf.com

 

For reservations or to order, Tel: 019 – 728 8464 or 019 – 758 8272 or email: enquiry@ponderosagolf.com.