Dinner at the Steak House, Inter-Continental Hotel (Tsim Sha Tsui)

The Steak House is located inside the 5-Star Inter-Continental Hotel, the Steak House specializes in chargrilled meat and new orleans food.

In terms of atmosphere, the restaurant portraits both a high-end but causal environment. Certain parts of the restaurant matches with its high-end direction, but the salad bar in the center fails to catch up with it. The ingredients at the salad bar looks fresh and the selection is wide, but the salad bar just seems out of the place unless it is competing with the Keg. I understand that the restaurant is within the hotel and it is difficult to set a dress code... but it needs a dress code... people were wearing jeans and polo shirt and the restaurant is charging around HK$150 for an appetizer and minimum $500 for a steak.

Also the restuarant can be more confident about its food, in particular its chargrilled steak. Let me explain.

After having our appetizer (H had a new orlean crab cake, quite good with lots of crab meat for HK$168), the waitress came over with a set of 10 steak knives, some are made in Germany, Japan, France, China etc. It was fun to select one that you like...

Then more selections... we had to choose the sauce we want for more steak... peppercorn, red wine sauce, bernaise etc.

When the steak came, we were given a set of 9 different mineral salts and then a choice of 12 mustards. It was our first time at the restaurant and we were fascinated with the mineral salts and the different selection of mustards. But can't we go back to the basics?

If the quality of beef is good, which it is and the chargrilling was just right, why can't the restaurant be more confident about the food and not to have so many sauces, salts and mustards to cover the taste the meat then.

The waiter and waitress at the Steak House are pleasant and helpful.

For the price per person (HK$700-800) excluding wine, there are other selections... we have yet to try the newly opened Lawry's Prime Rib place at Lee Garden, Causeway Bay.

H's Rating: *** (out of 5)