Chôm Chôm Vietnamese Restaurant is a permanent favorite of the Hong Kong Tourism Board and major food lists, and is one of the Southeast Asian restaurants with many foreign diners. Located in Central's bar-lined SOHO district, Chôm Chôm is a popular restaurant that combines Vietnamese cuisine, snacks and bars with a wide range of drinks such as cocktails and local beers in addition to classic Vietnamese Bia Hoi street food.
Chef Peter Cuong Franklin was born in Vietnam and studied at Le Cordon Bleu, a Le Cordon Bleu restaurant in France. He advocates MSG-free cooking, and uses all homemade seasonings, and the dishes are authentic and distinctive. The menu is all in English and is divided into tapas, spring rolls, salads, main dishes and a variety of alcoholic beverages. A must-have in Vietnamese restaurants is a variety of spring rolls, among which mushroom and pork spring rolls are the most classic. A small plate of four rolls, the skin of which is fried until crispy, contains plenty of shiitake mushrooms and pork, mixed with various spices. Diners who don't like fried food can choose the shrimp spiced pork rice paper roll, the rice paper is fragrant and glutinous, wrapped in Q-bomb shrimp meat, and the pork is rich in flavor, mixed with green papaya shreds and carrot shreds, which is refreshing and appetizing. The rolls come with a sweet and sour sauce and a small portion of green papaya salad, which is better served in the sauce. In addition, there is a wide variety of snacks such as fried squid, fried chicken wings, dried beef, lime and shrimp salad, etc., which are moderately portionized, and diners can try more than one snack in small quantities.
The homemade staple dish at the store, Shaking Beef, has been well received. Fresh beef is roasted until medium-rare, preserving the tender and juicy texture of the beef, served with seasonal vegetables, chopped peanuts, and topped with a special sauce, which needs to be slightly stirred after serving. In addition, it comes with a bowl of rice and special scallion oil, which is poured into the rice, and served with beef mixed with a variety of ingredients. In addition, there is the signature pho beef in Vietnamese cuisine, which is characterized by the addition of spices such as lemongrass and mint leaves, and the marinated beef is chewy and served with side dishes such as raw onions, green papaya and raw bean sprouts.
In addition to Vietnamese dishes, the restaurant's wide range of alcoholic beverages is also not to be missed, as a casual drink before and after a meal. The signature cocktail is the Phojito, which is similar to the classic cocktail mojito, but with the addition of Thai basil and chili peppers, it is even more exciting and new. Don't miss out on Vietnamese craft draft beer, which has a cool and refreshing taste that is perfect for hot summer days.
Chôm Chôm is a typical small restaurant, with a small area, small seating space, and a semi-open kitchen, which inevitably makes it noisy and crowded during peak dining hours. When there are many people, a few small tables will be simply placed outside the door of the restaurant, which has the casualness and liveliness of a small street shop. The restaurant is only open for dinner, and the popularity is very high, and waiting for a table is very common for Chôm Chôm. Although reservations can be made by phone, due to the large flow of diners and the fast pace, there are often cases where there are no seats when the reservation has arrived, so it is recommended that diners who do not want to wait for a table should arrive at the restaurant when the market opens in the evening to avoid the peak period after 7 or 8 o'clock. 80% of the diners are foreigners, and most of the waiters are foreigners, so it is difficult to keep up with basic services such as ordering and serving food when they are busy, and communication is relatively difficult for mainland diners who only speak Mandarin. These are common problems at popular local restaurants, and diners who come to the restaurant should be prepared in advance.
