Yu Joy Hot Pot at K11 Mall

K-11 is another new mall that opened last Novemeber 2009 in the Tsim Sha Tsui area. This was my favorite shopping spot when I was a kid. The stores then were Bargain Center, Bang Bang, Apple Jeans and several mom and pop toy stores. After a few decades and a whole block flattened to the ground a modern, artsy mall takes its place in the shopping district of TST.

K11 by night

One of my favorite bread stores, La Creation is basement 1 right across Jason’s Marketplace.

Both the exterior and interior of the mall had plenty of lcd and led panels integrated in its design.

K11 calls itself an art mall due to the numerous art installations all over the floor area and walls.

Some were even hanging art works.

We had Chinese hot pot at Yu Joy. It was similar to the Japanese shabu shabu at Gyu Jin at iSQUARE.

One of the main differences between Chinese hot pot and Japanese shabu shabu is the dipping sauce. For the Chinese hot pot a lot of importance is placed on the sauce. You can choose from a wide array of ingredients to mix in a bowl and topped with a light soy mixture. Whether you like it hot & spicy, garlicky or even sour it’s your choice. I loved the tom yum sauce which I tried for the first time. It was sour and mild and very addicting.

sauce fixins

I loved all the crunchy garlic on the fried tofu.

typhoon style fried beancurd HK$48

salted fish fried rice

I know that congee base for a hot pot looks really weird. When I first tried it I thought so too. But as the flavors from the meat, fish and other ingredients melded with the congee it was really very good. I found myself scooping the soft rice. It ran out pretty quick and soon we were just left with soup stock.

congee w/ conpoy soup base HK$68

Although the beef wasn’t wagyu or Kobe, it was very good and hearty. It was very tender when cooked in the broth.

US fatty beef HK$118

The balls were yummy and not the frozen kind. In Manila all you get are frozen, mass produced balls.

4 kinds of homemade meat balls HK$88

sea bream

pea shoots HK$38

Look there’s no more rice in the soup base.

deep fried bean curd sheet HK$35

They gave us free papaya for dessert. I discovered papaya tasted even better with a generous squeeze of lemon.

papaya w/ lemon

Yu Joy is a joy to eat in (sorry couldn’t help myself). The restaurant had a fabulous exhaust system because I never felt the steam blur my vision nor did I smell like food when we left. The ingredients were very fresh and the menu selections were extensive. I want to go back to try the foie gras dumplings.

Yu Joy menu