I am looking for what appears to be a uniquely Hong Kong creation, that has unfortunately remained homebound.
Specifically, I am looking for 蛋牛治烘底, or loosely translated a Beef with Scrambled Egg Sandwich.
The name really belies its magical culinary effect on the palate.
Done right, it’s essentially generous flecks of salted beef (not corned beef, mind you) scrambled into, well, scrambled eggs, and then stuffed between two slices of lightly toasted white bread that each have been kissed gently and massaged with margarine and a sprinkling of salt so that the sandwich is meandering that fine line between flakey and crunchy.
It’s like perfect drunk food. Scratch that. It’s like perfect food.
Yelp menu pictures for Hong Kong cafe (162 W Garvey) lists the HK style beef and egg sandwich for breakfast and a la carte. 烘底 would be telling them to toast the bread and that bit is never mentioned in menus here or in Hong Kong anyway (it’s like asking for a less sweet milk tea or coffee).
The traditional HK style beef egg sandwich is made with what the locals call 鹹牛肉 and while the characters translate to salted beef, in essence it is canned corned beef
This is a typical local Hong Kong brand of canned corned beef and very likely has been used by many restaurants to make this beef egg sandwich.
Though I do stand corrected for one place in Hong Kong that makes this legendary sandwich, which is 新香園 in Sham Shui Po (Hong Kong)…apparently they make their own salted beef and it involves a laborous process of removing the gristle and tendons in the meat. Their signature sandwich is what people flock there for, and it’s open 24 hours. Apparently you must order the egg as runny with the beef. There could be other places in HK that use fresh beef as well.
On a side note, another thing to try in Hong Kong is at Lok Yuen (a food stall in a wet market) in Kowloon City. Imagine the Hong Kong cafe deep fried French Toast, but instead of peanut butter on the inside, it’s savory satay beef. And you still eat it with butter and syrup.
