My topmost aim in coming to Wenchang county in Hainan island was to learn as much as possible about Wenchang chicken, the mother of Singapore Hainanese chicken rice.
I'm happy with my progress on that front 😊 🕺
But, one of my most memorable taste experiences from this ten day Hainan island trip was white cut goose 白切鹅 at 鸿盛鵝馆.
Once we landed at Haikou airport from Singapore, we were immediately whisked to Wenchang city about 1.5 hours drive away.
We got into action straightaway. Our first stop was 鸿盛鵝馆 a goose restaurant on the way from airport to Wenchang city. They serve 白切鹅 white cut (boiled) goose, braised goose, white cut Wenchang chicken, stir fried vegetables and also seafood dishes here.
鸿盛鵝馆 is a goose specialist with honking live geese at the restaurant.
The goose-pens were within earshot from the dining tables 🤣
The geese are processed right there at the restaurant so you can't get geese any fresher than these.
The restaurant has a farm / village feel which I like even though it doesn't have the "high class" eatery ambiance - doesn't matter to me as long as the food is good 🤭 I like hyperlocal places.
Stole a shot of what another table of diners were having - Tony is bad but local folks were friendly 🤭😅
Okay.... our own food is here too.
First to land on our table was goose blood curd stir fried with bean sprouts, scallion, oil and sauce.
This was the first time I am having goose blood curd.
The stir fried goose blood curd was delicious. Th goose curd was tender, it has a slight coarseness similar to chicken blood curd and it had a bit of toasty wok hei taste overlying the blood's savouriness. In fact, the whole dish was savoury with wok hei enveloping every ingredient in it. The chef is skilful 💪👏👏👏
Next came the goose. I was excited with joyful anticipation 🤣
You can't blame me as we can't have goose in Singapore 😔 None, zilch.
The half bird came chopped in large pieces with skin, fat, bone and meat all on. It was boiled, chopped and served. The goose came without any dressing sauce at all (the way Hainanese like to treat their poultry dishes including chicken and duck).
In Hainan, white cut 白切 is a popular way to prepare meat, be it goose, duck, chicken or pork. I like white cut (boiled / poached / steamed) too as it put the freshness and quality of the meat to the test.
The goose meat was thick and so was the skin. It was quite chewy but not as chewy as how Hainanese like their chicken and duck. Goose meat was also more juicy than chicken and duck in Hainan.
Chicken, duck and goose all taste different and all have their unique flavours. My favourite is the goose because its tender chewy juicy meat is the sweetest in my opinion.
I love the dipping sauce for the goose. The base is goose stock with rendered goose fat, then add in chopped garlic, chili pepper, cilantro, squeeze of calamansi and optional soy sauce. Personally, I prefer it without soy sauce.
For chicken and duck, the principle is the same, just switch the stock and rendered fat to chicken or duck.
I love the oil rice served with the goose. The rice was boiled in goose stock and rendered goose fat. It was so deliciously savoury sweet and perfect with the boiled goose 💪👍
The principle for chicken or duck oil rice is the same in Hainan. Chicken or duck stock and rendered fat as appropriate.
(On a side note, we also had roast goose in Hainan but the one that we had didn't really leave a deep impression and probably wasn't representative of the best here. Need to try more.)
Stir fried fresh crunchy juicy sweet greens with garlic, a savoury sauce and grease. Simple and simply wonderful.
Generally speaking, Hainanese restaurants do stir fried vegetables very well in Hainan.
Besides Wenchang chicken, white cut goose was the most memorable taste experience I had during this Hainan trip.
The goose at 鸿盛鵝馆 restaurant costs RMB68 per kati (500 grams) which is about the same price as premium Wenchang chicken in Hainan. Couple good price with the uniquely sweet taste of goose, don't miss 鸿盛鵝馆 when you come to Wenchang 😁
Written by Tony Boey on 3 Jun 2023
🎗 Opinions in this blog are all my own as no restaurant or stall paid money to be featured
U are so right cos when my friends from Hainan are here…they don’t appreciate ours too…that why I always say taste is subjective and so it the eating culture that ppl are brought up with…
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