Royal Plaza Court Seafood Restaurant

Ground Floor, Sun Yuen Long Centre, Yuen Long
Visited 6th April 2008 It's somewhat strange that I haven't written up the Royal Plaza Court Seafood before as it's a place we regularly visit. Maybe I'm hesitant because of the bloody long name, maybe because the cleansing tea, nourishing buns and blotting fried treats of yum cha have a tendency to accompany a cloudy head or maybe I've just still got a thing about tying to evaluate Chinese food. Anyway the restaurant, known as King Fook to locals, is located in the shopping centre aside the Yuen Long West Rail Station. It's a huge place with all the charm you'd expect of a Chinese restaurant of this size; floral chair covers, hanging balls of fake roses, phoenix and dragon statues with real glowing eyes, tanks of flapping grouper and a yelling crowd, flapping more than the grouper.

Yum cha served on trolleys is pretty rare this far from the decadence of central and at Royal Plaza Court Seafood it's a simple matter of tick the box on the photocopied menu; simple of course if you read Cantonese. Luckily with the help of local colleagues I've been able to hack together translations on a battered, outdated old menu. We were with overseas visitors so enough of the classics were ordered to fill the six of us. Pork and custard steamed buns, rice paper rolls, prawn dumplings, beef balls, sui mei, turnip cakes, spring rolls, wontons, glutinous rice puffs, fried rice noodles, roast pork belly and a dumpling soup. Along side the mandatory tea, the boys got stuck into the bargain of the century; three Heineken beers for $18. Sometimes you drink beer at 11am simply because it's dirt cheap. The food was pretty good; the ingredients seemed of decent quality, it was served fresh and it wasn't too oily. Naomi's favourite are the BBQ pork rice paper rolls, I can't resist roast pork belly and the visitors were fans of the Char Siu Bao or steamed pork buns.

Royal Plaza Court Seafood isn't a bad place for yum cha. The prices are reasonable (always under $100 per person), the food is generally good and the vibrant atmosphere is reminiscent of something resembling a circus in Hello Kitty Land. Service is OK and simply waving something in the air, whether it's menu, bill or pork bun, usually gets good results. The lack of English can be a problem, though if the staff can't help there's usually a helpful punter nearby who can. Royal Plaza Court Seafood; big restaurant, big name and worth a look if you're in Yuen Long and hungering for adventure and yum cha.