W’s Kitchen Fire
The W Hotel’s Kitchen (1 Austin Road West, Kowloon, 3717 2222) serves ‘comfort food’ with a unique Austro-Asian twist. It feels very homey, the open kitchen allowing diners to watch their food being prepared. The menu unconventionally mixes Asian tastes into Western dishes – try crispy lobster tacos with green papaya and mint for starters ($175), followed by chicken confit, sautéed kipfler potatoes and endive salad ($300). If you’re looking for something more traditional, Kitchen offers a barbecued chicken burger with a Thai twist – the burger is made with chiang-mai spices and green chili relish ($245).

For something more formal, Fire is the peak of stylish, contemporary dining: The restaurant’s seductive décor in red and black with ‘fiery’ LED lights holds true to its conflagration theme. For starters, try the sweet wasabi bavarois, sake and Asian spiced ocean trout gravalax with a micro shiso ($260). Spit roasted suckling baby pig with oven roasted garlic, cherry apples, rock shallot and sakura cress ($390) and the crispy loin of Murry River grain-fed pork and creamed corn, with pulled barbecue pork, tomato relish and corn fritters ($440 for a single portion and $800 for a double portion) are handsome mains. During September, Fire will only be open for dinner.

Continental Shifts
Cecconi’s Italian (43 Elgin Street, Soho, 2147 5500) has just launched a refreshed a la carte menu. Among the new appetizers try the semolina-dusted calamari on a rocket salad and salsa verde ($108) or for something lighter, check out the classic Caesar salad with romaine lettuce, anchovies, pancetta, poached egg and parmesan ($128). There’s a variety of main courses including braised lamb shank in white wine on a bed of Ligurian vegetables ($198) that is slow cooked for three hours. One of our favourite desserts was the pavlova roulade, cream Chantilly and fresh fruits ($68) which provided a light, sweet finish to a meal.

Dap JP Wine & Dine (23/F, QRE Plaza, 202 Queen’s Road, Wanchai, 2572 3228) offers Italian and Japanese fusion cuisine. There’s a bar on the 23rd floor and the restaurant is a floor above. Dishes like the Caesar salad and pasta are traditional Italian fare, but incorporate ingredients imported from Japan. The Caesar salad with coddled egg white, anchovy and Parmesan cheese ($88) is a starter tossed in front of the customer. Among the main courses, try the wagyu rack of lamb with smoky aubergine, spinach and green miso ($198). Dap JP Wine & Dine’s club space has a chic atmosphere to match its champagne cocktails such as Flirtini ($100, champagne, vodka and pineapple juice) and Mummy’s Eye ($120, champagne, lychee liqueur, fresh lychee and blueberry) - visit www.dap.com.hk for more information.

Fly Me to the Moon
A Mid-Autumn Festival without traditional mooncakes is like Christmas without Santa Claus. Luckily, nobody in Hong Kong need miss out this September as all major hotels and bakeries are supplying mooncakes by the thousands. The Sheraton (20 Nathan Road, Kowloon, 2369 1111) offers white lotus paste with egg-yolk mooncakes (four pcs/box) for $248 per box and mini custard cream with egg-yolk mooncakes (five pcs/box) for $198. Metropark Hotel Kowloon (G/F, Cake Shop, 75 Waterloo Road, Kowloon, 2761 1711) has come up with something unique: bird’s nest mooncakes with double yolks and white lotus puree (four pcs/box accompanied with two tins of Chinese tea leaves) for $168. Dynasty (L4, Renaissance Kowloon Hotel, 22 Salisbury Road, TST, 2734 6600) is downsizing its mooncakes this year with the mini white lotus seed paste with egg-yolk mooncakes (six pcs/box) for $140 and the mini custard cream with egg-yolk mooncakes (six pcs/box) for $150. The Peninsula Hong Kong’s Spring Moon Chinese restaurant is racing to produce 400,000 mooncakes by September 13 as part of their annual mooncake marathon. The traditional mooncakes will sell until the 13th for $198 per box of eight. As part of The Peninsula’s 80th Anniversary charity celebration, $10 from each box will go toward Make-A-Wish, Mary Rose School, and St. James’ Settlement Funeral Navigation Service.

Häagen-Dazs has launched its much loved ice-cream mooncakes with the usual chocolate coating, ice-cream filling and mango sorbet ‘egg yolk’. Six variations on the traditional Chinese dessert include ice-cream flavours ranging from the usual vanilla, strawberry and chocolate to the more exotic strawberry cheesecake and summer berries and cream. Coatings are made of a variety of chocolates: milk, dark, white, blueberry, caramel chocolate, etc. Prices range from $229 to $789. Ice-cream mooncakes can be bought in selected Häagen-Dazs stores from now until September 14 or mooncake vouchers may be redeemed on September 14. For more details, go to www.haagen-dazs.com.hk or call 2629 6116.

The Starbucks empire will colonize the mooncake craze with café-themed cakes, including ‘coffee and nuts concerto’ and ‘apple black tea bliss’ flavours. Each box ($178) contains four mooncakes, two of each flavour, and four Starbucks coffee coasters. Starbucks cardholders will also receive a special edition 2009 diary if they buy three or more boxes of mooncakes. And in doing their part to save the planet, Starbucks will reward customers with a tall latte if they take their empty mooncake box back to any Starbucks store between September 16 and October 31. Starbucks’ mooncakes can be found at selected Starbucks stores from now until September 14. G.O.D. is taking the understanding of the word ‘mooncake’ at a bit of an angle with their Full Moon Collection ’08 – the mooncakes are shaped like naked bottoms in four styles: the Full Monty, T-Back (slightly more modest, with a thong covering up some of the cleavage), Spread My Cheeks (with two bold hands pulling apart the hemispheres) and Mind the Gap (the classic saggy-jeans plumber look). Though the concept is different, the contents are still traditional mooncake paste with egg yolk. The mooncakes are $55 each and can be found at G.O.D. outlets. For more information on shop location or for contact details, visit www.god.com.hk.

Ever since the 1994 launch of the champagne-truffle snowy-skinned mooncake in Singapore, the pale treats have taken over shelves in Asia every September. Maxim’s Group offers their own snowy-skinned mooncakes with more flavours than one can count on one’s fingers and toes. The Snowy Deluxe collection ($235) contains eight different mooncakes in a box. Flavours include iced milk tea, strawberry, mango crunch, sesame tofu, sago cream with mango and pomelo, black forest, bird’s nest with green tea and red bean, and yam. Two new collections, snowy mooncakes (HK Style) and snowy mooncakes (Japanese style) are $175 each and contain eight mooncakes per box. The HK style boasts iced milk tea, sweet potato soup, sesame with macadamia nuts, and mango crunch while the Japanese style includes apple crunch, Japanese white peach, green tea with red pea, and sesame. One of the most popular collections is Snowy Party with five mooncakes in a box ($218) – apple crunch, sesame with macadamia nut, premium green bean paste, sago cream with mango and pomelo, and tiramisu. These mooncakes can be found at Maxim’s cake shops, call 2101 1333 for more details.

For an alternative mooncake selection, try agnès b. DÉLICES. Its French-style chocolate mooncakes come in four special flavours – guava, banana, black sesame and Gianduja. Nougat with chocolate mango paste forms the ‘yolk’. The well-known agnès b logos, such as the ‘b.’, the lightning bolt, star and point d’ironie, are embossed on the chocolate exteriors, giving a comic-book slant to what’s usually a traditional engraving. Three gift box collections are available from $138 to $488, check out agnès b. DÉLICES outlets for details.