Temple Street Night Market, Hong Kong by Big Fil

I am a huge fan of street and night market style eating. Hong Kong is full of markets so before we left it was off to Temple Street Night Market for a late dinner.

One of the best things about Asian night markets is the atmosphere. Bright lights, loads of people, full of noise and colour. The food is also generally good, in many cases the stall or street café has been run by the same family for generations. If you're worried about hygiene - not that there should be too many problems in Hong Kong - just look for where all the locals eat and make sure that the food is freshly cooked and hot.


We selected our stall at random but funnily enough just after sitting downsomewhere else brought out a huge camera to take some shots of the food, Isuspect for a TV show or documentary. Sure put my little point and clickcamera in the shade!


We were feeling pretty hungry by this stage so we ordered quite a lot of food. While we ordered beef with bitter melon the first dish to arrive was a beef with vegetables. Given we had already started eating when we remembered what we had actually ordered we just continued on eating - I hope whoever got our order enjoyed it. The dish itself was reasonable but nothing special, fairly similar to what you would expect to get in a cheap Cantonese restaurant in Melbourne Chinatown.


I had wanted to order the chicken and mushroom rice in claypot but none of the claypot dishes were available. Wanting some rice and not wanting to go through the menu again I lazily ordered the fried rice. Again this was reasonable, a little dry and lacking in pork and prawns, although the small number of prawns that were included were all of a good size for this kind of dish.


Better was the fried oyster omelette. While it lacked a bit in presentation and finesse, it made up for in taste and quantity. Medium sized oysters in a crispy on the outside/soft in the middle omelette, this is one of my favourite dishes and the one we received was a fairly good one. To be picky the quality of the oysters could have been improved and the dish was a little overcooked. But when you are only paying around $7 Australian , and it's Hong Kong not Malaysia (which is ridiculously cheap for street food), you shouldn't expect the dish to be perfect.


The best dish was the salt and pepper tofu. Again, one of my favourite dishes but not commonly available at home. The tofu was crispy on the outside and soft in the middle, the dish is spicy but not particularly hot.


Overall
While the food was reasonable for the price the main memory I have is of eating amongst the noise and the bustle, just soaking up the atmosphere. Don't expect fine dining or memorable service, that's not what night market food is about. It's about the taste, the price, the often somewhat pushy staff and just getting into the flow of the market and having fun.

Address
Temple Street Night Market
Kowloon Hong Kong