Farewell Dim Sum Brunch end January

Lionel: I hosted a small farewell dim sum brunch for my friend Carla, the outgoing GM of The Carcosa just before CNY. It was at one of my favourite chinese restaurants, The Elegant Inn at Menara Hap Seng.  They had just started serving dim sum a few months ago and I have to say, although the selection is small, it has to be one of the best in KL.

Totally, decadent as I chose to pair this wonderful brunch with champagne. The first was a bit of a oddity, a 1988 Dom Perignon which was given to us to try as it hadn't been stored very well and the neck level was already down to almost shoulder level on the bottle.

Now, for those uninitiated, dim sum and champagne is a pairing made in heaven. The delicacy of the dishes and the wine meld together seamlessly, and the bubbles just cleanses the palatte ever so gently to accomodate the next delightful morsel!

I know it doesn't look like much, but this is the ingredeints that went into the soup, damn nice with the champagne too!
Fried carrot cake
Fried Yam dumplings, yum, yum
These are the prawns wrapped in cheese and beancurd roll!
It was oxidized of course but still winderful, the honeyed secondary caracthers were all there and maybe even more so, hardly any bubbles left but what an interesting drink it made. Wonderful!
Steam Prawn dumplings of course
Now, I can't remember what these were called. they were like paus but with cream paste flavoured with mint. lovely
A hallmark of a good HK trained chef is if they can produce a "Chew Yim" salt and pepper dish, sounds simple but very difficult to do well. This is white bait friend in salt and pepper, perfection!
Of course, one bottle of champagne isn't enough. So a bottle of Drappier 2002, yum yum
Siew Mai or prawn and meat dumpling
Best Malai koh in town, yes not many people do this and most of them are terrible. This is melt in your mouth stuff, must try!
AS you can see almost didn't get a chance for the picture, very, very good egg custart