As many of you who follow Anthony Bourdain know, he visited my new great city in Season 4. As luck would have it, I live literally around the corner from one of the stops he visited during that episode; Under Bridge Spicy Crab. The atmosphere is much different now that their spicy crab can be dubbed "famous" spicy crab; and understandably so. The prices have more than doubled and their clientele has gained a large amount of "gwailos" (white ghost: a term of endearment [in the case of those that i've come to meet and know, probably wasn't, and isn't, always a good slang] for us non-asians). Mario, our cheeky server, seemed to be the only staff in the restaurant who spoke any English, and it was broken English at that. He would stop by and drop off peanuts or watermelon slices to the table and smile saying "eat! eat!" Little did I know that there are no "freebies" in Hong Kong. $641 HKD later, Nicholas and I practically rolled ourselves out smiling and mumbling "xiexie" (thank you; pronounced 'shayshay'). Boy, did Mario know how to up-sell. Being that it was my first time at the spicy crab rodeo, I can only give the guy props for milking the new gwailos on the block for all they were worth. Next time, however, I wont be so easy!
As for the food itself: Yum. It was a massive crab covered in fried pieces of chili and crushed garlic. We ordered the "medium" spicy, and it was the most perfect lip-numbing blend of spice, garlic and chili. We also ordered a plate of vegetables. I'm actually not certain what they were called but they seem to be a mix between spinach, mustard greens and broccoli. Yum nonetheless. And while the crab could have gone on forever and I would have been a happy little camper, the evening had to come to an end sooner or later. Mario bid us farewell and every smiling staff member, in the most proper of pronunciations, half yelled "Thank you! Come again!" Yum.
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