We saw some Hong Kong traveler playing with firework in our early trip. And convenient enough, we bought some from a convenient store. And we had our own little firework show 花火晚會 on the first night in La Collina.
Muraoka San was very thoughtful. He brought us a big flash light and a bucket of water. Unlike our "Chinese Style" which shoot everything up in the sky, these pretty ones were just like those we see in Japanese anime.
Back to our second dinner at La Collina. As mentioned before, because we wanted to watch the
parade, Muraoka San was kind enough to cook the dinner an hour later specially for us. After what we had for the first night, we really didn't want to miss his cooking for the world!
Tonight Menu:
Caponata: This Sicilian style cooked vegetable salad topped with some ricotta cheese. The vegetables were cooked right and very refreshing.
The Pasta of Short Neck Clam: Classic Vongole dish. I don't know where the clams came from. It was very soft, and not chewy at all. The pasta was coated with the clam juice. When I thought my restaurant did a pretty good vongole, this was the BEST vongole I had ever eaten!
Before:
After:
I don't know if it's rude to lick the dish in Japan. And I hope Muraoka San did not laugh or mad at me. But even the olive oil on the dish was full of clam flavour. I used the bread to wipe my dish and even Jayson's dish. I would feel guilty for not doing so. Ha!
The Meuni of Salmon: Grilled salmon served with a pesto sauce. Thing started to look weird now. My restaurant serves the exact same dish too. And this was just awesome! One could easily tell that he used a very good quality salmon. And it was cooked perfect to a crispy skin with tender meat. The pesto sauce was rich in aroma of the basil. I could feel the foods dancing in my mouth.
Chicken Escalope: I believe this was a chicken breast sauteed in a marsala wine sauce. Because we used to serve a similar dish. Escalope is pounding of a meat to make it tender. This chicken breast was tender and soft, but not falling apart. This was resulted from a lot of care from the chef.
I could taste the sweet wine in the sauce with a punchy lemony flavour. Although we were quite full already, we could definitely each one more piece. Amazing.
Panna Cotta: Sophie had been screaming since she saw this on the menu. And it didn't disappoint her. It was VERY GOOD! The milk pudding with fresh vanilla bean was rich and tasty. I was pretty sure that it's the magic of Hokkaido milk.
The topping was a homemade strawberry sauce with some blueberry. Even Jayson could tell how good it was!
The dinner was just awesome. Every bite of the foods made me burst into tears. I was so happy to share this experience with my family (including Jayson's god-parents of course). The tenderly love Muraoka San put in the foods, and care to the guests. This is really something you could not taste from a mechanically operated restaurant.
When we left pension the next day, I could see Muraoka San waving us good-bye from the back mirror in my car. I regretted that I didn't jump out and give him a big big hug (and asked him to adopt me). And because of this, we will definitely visit Muraoka San again. Finally, we want to thank Muraoka San again for his hospitality. And we wish his family good health and good fortune. We wish to visit him again very soon.
~ Lindberg
