Turns out another conservationist had contacted Cafe de Coral re the soup.
Received reply inc this:
Quote:
“Shark’s fin soup tea set” is one of the items in our regular menu at Wetland Park branch. The soup is made of vegetarian fin, which is not real fin from shark but a kind of Japanese style imitate shark fin, dried bamboo fungus, shredded imitate abalone and shredded pork. The original product concept is to promote usage of Japanese style imitate shark fin as a substitute to real shark fin. Message of using “Japanese style fin” has been incorporated in the in-store promotion materials during initial stage of product launch to emphasis that the product is not using real shark fin. For the sake of easier communication and to let consumer know that vegetarian fin carry the same texture and taste as real fin, however, we decided to use a commonly recognised name “shark’s fin soup” to describe the product in menu.
We regret the lack of elaboration in the recent menu about product ingredients caused misunderstanding to some of our customers. To avoid the same incident happen again, we will amend menu wording of related products and wording in the web site so as to ensure a more direct expression on product ingredients can be achieved.
Perhaps appropriate – fake soup, in place with mock mangroves, fake arctic scene, spaceship like theatre…
Curiously, the Shark’s Fin Soup mentioned on Cafe de Coral website evidently is real shark fin soup.