Gelatos and Waffles

Remember when milk tea was all the craze way back in the day?  And does anyone remember when yogurt was popular in Hong Kong a few years ago?  There were shops that were popping up all over the city…and then it just went away…

I love these little places where you can try new snacks, old snacks, reinvented little snacks!

Plus, I'm a snacker…grazer to some (Cheung Chau anyone!)

Side Note:  Who was it that said that it'd be more fun to order a meal of appetizers rather than entrees?  

One place that I love to go to for a boring cup of coffee or an afternoon gelato, whenever in Central is Holly Brown.

On our recent trip over to Tsuen Wan's D Park (yes…this is a continued blog posting from last week!), we decided to take a break at Holly Brown and treat ourselves to a little afternoon tea gelato.  So, it was around 2pm and this place was totally sparse.  Most people seemed to still be in lunch-mode…so we were feeling pretty lucky to get a seat…not like Holly Brown is like Starbucks (where seats are impossible to come by!).

 Holly Brown reminds me so much of Cold Stone Creamery (back in Seattle).  I'm not sure if there are Cold Stones everywhere, but, when I lived in Beijing, there was a Cold Stone Creamery that I used to go to as well.  It is basically a place where they mix any ingredient you want with your choice of flavor of ice cream.

We decided on getting the waffle bowl called "Heaven," which, if memory serves me right, was a mixing of berries and some graham cracker crumbs.

I always feel like the gelatos and the mixes are quite healthy…I mean..more so than Cold Stone Creamery, but what do I know!  

Anyhow, if you are in the market for an afternoon tea gelato, Holly Brown is a nice place to check out. They are found at most of the larger shopping malls on Hong Kong Island and Kowloon…and there is even one in Yuen Long's Yoho Mall!

Gelatos…they never go out of style!

Because the gelatos were more of our appetizer, we headed over to try one more snack at the Full House Kitchen.

I always say that it's good to try something new every now and then…and trying a remake of something old is totally apart of that line of thinking.

One of Hong Kong's popular street snacks is called the Egg Waffle (gai dan jai).  It can be found pretty much anywhere that street food is found.  The gimmick that brought us to eat it at Full House Kitchen was the imprint on the waffle iron.  I don't think it's worth the price because it pretty much tastes the same as every other egg waffle around the city, but it does make for a cute photo.  Anyhow, it was also not so expensive and I'd never really tried any other flavor besides the original.

Plus, Full House Kitchen was a pretty eye catching eatery, so I just wanted to check it out.

We got a green tea flavored egg waffle, which had the characters of the Full House Kitchen on it.  I'm not sure if these are popular cartoon characters, but they seemed to be because they had a lot of paraphernalia in the "gift shop" besides the cafe.

There were some pretty cute stationary items…if I were a student, I think I might spring for a pen or notebook.

Everything about this place was pretty cute.  I really liked how they remade popular Hong Kong snacks.

This place also offered macaroons, which seem to be everywhere these days (McCafe…).

They also had a small assortment of pastries…

Like D Park, this place had a lot of backdrops to take photos by, which is probably a draw for many patrons.

It all fits in with the child-friendly vibe of the D Park mall.

When in the area again, I might try more of the little snack places.  There was also a ramen shop that looked pretty good…but, we'll see!

K Pop Shop

I always think of myself as stuck in the 90s.  Most of my playlists on my iPod are songs from the 90s…Our wedding soundtrack was mostly songs from the 80s and 90s…so, this might make me a bit outdated to some.  But, recently, meaning this year, I've become a lot more open minded to what I've been listening to.  Mostly, I think I just am looking for change.  Since going to an EXO concert in the summer, I've been pretty open minded towards listening to the latest K pop songs.  Anything colorful and with a beat is pure love for me!  

The EXO concert was pretty awesome, by the way.  It was the first time I'd ever been to a concert in Hong Kong…and it was the first time listening to a K pop group live.  (MUCH THANKS TO MY SPECIAL KOREAN FRIEND WHO SCORED US ALL TICKETS!!!)  So EXO was my gateway band into the world of K pop, which I am quite the light listener of these days.

So, when I was exploring the new D Park mall, I was so excited to see that there was a shop dedicated to the K pop style!  Or…is it just Korean style?  This, I know is popular in some subcultures around this city.

There is a dedicated K-POP Zone in D Park, which is basically just ONE SHOP, I feel...

And that shop is called SPAO, which is located by two of my favorite things:  Starbucks and H&M!  

SPAO is a global fashion brand, as it says online, that has clothes for pretty much everyone (men, women and children).  The Tsuen Wan shop spans two floors and seemed to have all the latest trends out of Korea (I wouldn't be the first to be called an expert on Korean fashions, but you can just see for yourselves).

I would sort of equate this store to H&M (which was right next door) or maybe Top Shop.  The prices of things were pretty nice...I mean, they were the prices of H&M almost because it was a trend-focused shop.

The shop was also decorated floor to ceiling with some pretty awesome photo boards of two of Korea's top K pop bands:  AOA (aka Ace of Angels) and EXO.  I don't know much about AOA, but the girls are gorgeous and what I think of as the typical K pop girl band (lovely!).  The images of EXO are pretty awesome as well…super cool.

The shop is really clean and also pretty empty, which I love.  I don't think it has been advertised much…or people haven't really discovered SPAO out there in Tsuen Wan yet…but, I think, when people realize it is there…there will be a cult following of some K pop lovers there.

Heck, I'd wear some of these things because I love the simplicity of some of the styles.

I'm really glad that I bumped into this shop whilst exploring this new mall.  There are always some pretty amazing things that I can always find in HONG KONG!

D Park, Tsuen Wan

Today, I'm bringing to you a new discovery:  D Park in Tsuen Wan.  My husband actually found this mall a few days before I went to check it out.  He said that it was probably the most child friendly mall in Hong Kong.  

So, today, we hopped off at the Tsuen Wan West MTR Station and caught the taxi to D Park.

This mall looks so incredibly new.  I'm not a frequent visitor to Tsuen Wan (though there was a summer that I was obsessed with its beaches), so I might be wrong, but the facilities and the shops just look so brand spanking new.  Everyone (meaning the sales people and even the mall staff) seem to also be quite nice (un-jaded!)…so, my first impression of D Park was pretty darn positive.

This mall had some magnet shops like Eugene Baby (at the top floor), Toys R Us on the ground floor, and Bumps to Babes (my new favorite baby-gear shop) on the ground floor.  Though these shops are pretty small, they do carry a lot of selection of all your baby needs.  There are even some toddler and youth clothing shops splayed around the ground floor.

The second great thing about this place was that there was a pretty good variety of places to eat…and probably all family (kid) friendly.

There were Japanese restaurants there…

There was a pretty cool looking burger joint there…

There were dessert places there…

The main thing about this mall was that there was a HUGE play zone for kids to enjoy at the center of the mall.  The play area was zoned off, but it had a lot of kids packed in there…socializing with each other, playing with the equipment, exploring the play area, and interacting with everything down there.

The floors of the play zone also extended out into the actually shopping area…there was a giant game board on one side of the shopping area…

And there were train tracks and a small little town in another area...

It seemed like a really great place for kids and families to enjoy.  And, whist we were there, we also saw the mall staff evacuate the play area for a daily cleaning.  So, that was pretty good to see…I sort of won't worry as much if my kids play around in the zone because it's not going to be TOTALLY filled with germs.

The entire mall is so child-friendly…and quite Hong Kong.  It's very Hong Kong in the fact that there are huge colorful things just dotted around the mall for people to take photos by.  A lot of my friends ,via Facebook, are drawn like moths to a flame when they see displays they could take selfless next to.    There are lots of huge colorful animals everywhere…

The final really awesome thing about this mall (which made me think it was pretty brand spanking new) was the fact that there were family bathrooms and nursing stations available for nursing mothers.  It makes me feel like it's probably going to be a mall that is quite popular for new families (since there are facilities there to accommodate all their outing needs).

Even the signs are child-friendly!

What a wonderful discovery!