Michael C.
Yelp
We were excited to dine at Cheers! Hong Kong after reading all of the reviews on Yelp! The venue itself looks inviting, with cozy booths and a large photo mural of the Hong Kong skyline. When we first sat down, we were immediately greeted by servers and given water and an opportunity to order drinks (we both got Lychee Old Fashioneds). The menu had a great array of options, and we sampled a lot of dishes. There were some good dishes, but overall, we were pretty disappointed with our food. Many of the dishes felt overly processed. It tasted like the food was bought in bulk, frozen, and then cooked and seasoned. Some dishes were good; many were dry and bland.
-The Lychee Old Fashioned: I love the concept, but it ultimately did not work. The Lychee flavor was good but the other ingredients (bourbon, orange, bitters) did not stand up to it. It also felt diluted. I'd recommend a stronger bourbon; this needed a burn to accent the sweet notes.
Crispy Squid. The picture on the menu showed different cuts of calamari (rings and tentacles, all lightly breaded). What we got was large rings, the size of onion rings. These were well seasoned and sauced. However, the texture of the squid felt off. This is one example of a dish that feels like it was frozen, thawed and heated per order.
Nanjjing Salted Duck. Served cold. One of the better dishes. It was well seasoned and the lemon chili sauce was nice.
HK Classic Boa. This dish immediately fell apart. It was heavy sauced, and the boa bun ripped in half. Despite the saucing, the pork hock felt dry and bland.
Sweet and Sour Pork Ribs. This was very flavorful. The best dish of the night.
House Sweet Chili Chicken. Decent flavor but another dry dish. This also feels like it was previously frozen and then heated and sauced.
Garlic String Beans. This was the weakest dish of the night. Despite wanting some green on our pates, we barely touched this dish. The beans were soggy and had a weird oily-creamy texture. There was very little garlic flavor.
BBQ Beef Dumplings Another failure. I wouldn't guess BBQ if it wasn't in the name. Very dry, and overcooked.
Pork Shu Mei. Very dry and lacking flavor. It tasted better with added chili oil.
We had a lot of items, but this was still a very pricy dinner, especially since we didn't finish a lot of the dishes. It looks like Cheers! HK Had a lot of strong dishes when they opened, but we did not have that experience tonight. I hope they are able to finesse their dishes in the future. In the meantime, there are some more authentic (and flavorful options) in the ID. Id give it 2.5 stars (but halves not allowed).