Restaurant recommendations in Hong Kong?

these vary in authenticity and prices (and I don't have the energy to look them all up - they're all listed online or in HK Magazine or BC Magazine)

Thai - Green in Wanchai, Basil Thai in Pacific Place. Basil Thai isn't very authentic, but it's my favorite. It's dressed up and hipped up thai food - I love the eggplant/yellow curry, stingray salad and the sticky banana pudding/honey comb ice cream is the best dessert in Hong Kong.

Vietnamese - Pearl Vietnamese restaurant in Central. It's off one of the streets of Lan Kwai Fong - heading towards Sheung Wan. I LOVE the red-cooked rice, but it's not very vietnamese at all. The pho is okay, but not great

Malaysian - The Banana Leaf chain is all over hong kong. THere's also a place in Rat Alley off Lan Kwai Fong that does good roti cananis and 1-meter tea, but it's a little pricey for street side dining.

Don't expect SE Asian food in these districts to be cheap though.

There are cheaper restaurants in the more "local" districts such as Kowloon City(opposite old Kai Tak Airport)

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<hr>expect SE Asian food in these districts to be cheap though.<hr></blockquote>

Pearl Vietnamese is plenty cheap. (It's not really vietnamese though - it's Chinese-Vietnamese).

Banana Leaf is cheap - especially considering it's all you can eat.

I remember having a really nice (and not expensive, but not majorly cheap either) Malaysian meal in a hip restaurant that's opposite the Stanford Hillview hotel on Observatory Rd in TST. You can't miss it, because it's just a mini street, I think probably off Kimberly Rd from memory... good curries, nice and spicey, hip place, good service... sigh. I miss HK!

Thai
that Thai Basil place in Pacific Place - agree, not authentic, but very nice.
Kowloon City area: cheap and cheerful, but a tad greasy
Orchid (Big Boss) Thai Food Restaurant & Lounge 1/F., Jade Centre, 98 Wellington Street, Central, Hong Kong : If I remember rightly, this is a restaurant on the first floor, near the mid-level escalators, which had very good yellow crab curry.

I also like Banana Leaf

The infamous 'rat alley' (Wing Wah Lane) at the base of Lan Kwai Fong Has A Thai and Vietnamese restaurant side by side.

Don't be put off by the name the food is good and it's fairly cheap plus you can hit the bars in a 2 minute walk. Three of us ate a tasty Thai meal this wednesday for about HKD350. We had way more food than we could eat so you could really have knocked a dish off that a well. The Vietnamese restaurant next door look pretty decent, I spent a little bit of time gazing onto other peoples tables to see what they were getting stuck in to.

The food court of Langham Place in Mongkok has a nice and cheap Malaysian restaurant. Great architecture too!

Good thread - added to Budget travel basics for Hong Kong.

CK

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<hr>I remember having a really nice (and not expensive, but not majorly cheap either) Malaysian meal in a hip restaurant that's opposite the Stanford Hillview hotel on Observatory Rd in TST.<hr></blockquote>

That's Indonesian 1968 in Observatory Road.

Regarding their expense - there are cheap (for Hong Kong) SE Asian restaurants all over Hong Kong, and serving very good food.