The abalone may have a soft, extravagant bounce to it, and the bird’s nest may well be silky and true, but taking credit for them is a bit like claiming Bernard Antony’s cheese as your own. It doesn’t really count.

The braver — and ultimately wrong — move, at the three-Michelin-starred T’ang Court, in Kowloon, is to order the basics. At lunch, that means a relatively cheaper set menu ($75 USD) or a few dim sum plates. No smiling captain will upsell you on the “treasures of the day,” nor a $175 (USD) glass of Perrier-Jouët to celebrate a Tuesday. The enormous, bi-level dining room is staid and dark, with thick crimson-colored carpets, a draped ceiling upstairs and graying chairs reminiscent of a funeral home dabbling in the occult. In tone, and in jest, servers glide between tables and whisper, as if you’re on your last legs towards a journey you’d hope would end sooner.

Food isn’t as well-choreographed. They appear in spurts, and depending on the kitchen’s temperament, may begin with spring rolls that don’t have much of a spring left in them, or baked puff-pastries filled with nondescript meat (roasted duck and Yunnan ham, I’m told). I wouldn’t have known if their char siu buns came from a highly-decorated kitchen, because the ones at T’ang Court could very well have emerged a foggy food warmer at a neon-lit bodega — mealy dough shielding fluorescent meat that chews like play-doh.

But the bigger transgressors are simpler still: fried beef noodles arrive as a tangled, flavorless pile — so greasy it could double as a fire hazard. And the roasted duckling carries the faint musk of socks that had been freed after a hot day.

Yes, there are more merciful ways to go. The thin, crystalline skins on har gau have a nice drape, and the siu mai are equally delicate. There may even be gems lurking in the restaurant’s $420 USD “greatest hits” menu, but you’ll find them buried under all the ceremony. Alas, it appears that no one, not even those Michelin-hunters, is here to dig. Less