Pretension, often without substance, has been the trend in recent years among new restaurant openings. In stark contrast to this is Roberto Kwong’s, the original owner of Racks in Lan Kwai Fong, newest venture Cheeky. A bright orange irreverent hole in the wall pasta takeaway in Wanchai. Founded with long term friend Fu Chan, Cheeky – complete with it’s own theme song composed by local singer Charles Chan, aka H, aka Fu’s brother; and a logo drawn by comic artist Elphonso Lam – opened in mid-September offering a menu of bites, pastas and lunch sets.
Fu’s in charge of the kitchen, while Roberto handles the witty repartee. And since neither likes doing the washing up they employed a kitchen hand. One of Fu’s creations is jalapeño poppers ($35) – these are jalapeños stuffed with cheese, breaded and deep fried, and they’re delicious. The big fat skin on chips ($30) sound like they’re something different but sadly turn out to be normal chips, but nicely cooked crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside. There’s three pasta options spaghetti, penne and linguine with a choice of freshly made toppings – bolognese, meatballs, bacon wild mushroom cream sauce and pesto primavera. The cheeky specials are cream pea wasabi, ring of fire in three firery flavours ‘burning’, ‘pounding’ and for the real masochists ‘bleeding’. There’s also a sweet angel hair dragon beard, a dessert style pasta that’s served cold and needs to be ordered a couple of hours in advance.
Cheeky also have $48 lunch sets, where the sauces are different to the regular menu and there are side dish options of a pork chop, chicken fillet, seafood or vegetarian.
The portion sizes are ok, the pasta is served nicely al dente. The meatballs were baked and the tomato sauce fresh with a hint of herbs. The wasabi cream pea is something cheeky that shouldn’t work but does. If there’s one slight criticism, I’d prefer slightly more sauce, but that’s a purely personal preference. Take a wander down Swatow Street for an enjoyably Cheeky lunch or dinner.
Cheeky
B2A, 4 Swatow Street, Wanchai. Tel: 2325 2725