Din Tai Fung

Upon riding the escalator up to the third floor of the Silvercord in Tsim Sha Tsui, we were immediately faced with a crowd of thirty or so people waiting in line for their table in Din Tai Fung. Each group had a piece of paper taken from some fancy counting contraption at the entrance of the restaurant. Standing outside felt like waiting for the lottery jackpot winner to be announced and we were dying to find out if we were holding the prize ticket, with us constantly checking to see if the magic letter and number combination announced by the receptionist matched with what was printed on our little piece of paper. With a sophisticated seating system such as this and considering the sheer volume of people patiently waiting to be seated, we never would have guessed that, a mere two decades ago, Din Tai Fung was no bigger than an unknown Chinese eatery in Taiwan specializing in soup-filled dumplings called xiao long bao. Today, nine countries and a New York Times rave later, Din Tai Fung has risen from hole-in-the-wall obscurity and into the consciousness of both discriminating gourmands and the just plain hungry. And after a good half hour of waiting outside and a quick shopping spree at nearby H&M to bide our time, hearing those magic words -- "B54" – to us at least, was tantamount to the heavens parting and cherubs singing the hallelujah chorus.

Ni Hao from Butch & Bob

While we do take pleasure in scouring the streets of Manila for great restaurants to try, we must admit that our economic status does not afford us the luxury of pursuing food criticism on a twenty-four seven basis. We actually have day jobs which we need to fund our regular food adventures. Luckily for our bellies, work has landed us in Guangzhou, China, where we will be staying (and eating!) for the next two weeks. And while waiting for our connecting flight at the Hong Kong International Airport, we managed to get stuffed with Popeye's chicken and Ben & Jerry's chunky monkey ice cream.