Hong Kong and Macau_ City Guide (Lonely Planet, 14th Edition) - Andrew Stone [111]
Festival Walk is a huge and glittering shopping mall with Hong Kong’s largest cinema and ice-skating rink. It has a good midrange selection of some 200 shops and around two-dozen restaurants as well.
EATING
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HISTORY & CULTURE
DINING LOCAL
HOW HONG KONG PEOPLE EAT
ETIQUETTE
COOKING COURSES
PUBLICATIONS
PRACTICALITIES
HONG KONG ISLAND
CENTRAL
ADMIRALTY & WAN CHAI
LAN KWAI FONG & SOHO
SHEUNG WAN, THE MID-LEVELS & WESTERN DISTRICTS
CAUSEWAY BAY
THE PEAK
HAPPY VALLEY
ISLAND EAST
ISLAND SOUTH
KOWLOON
TSIM SHA TSUI
TSIM SHA TSUI EAST & HUNG HOM
YAU MA TEI & MONG KOK
NEW KOWLOON
NEW TERRITORIES
TUEN MUN
YUEN LONG
TAI PO & AROUND
SHA TIN
SAI KUNG
TAP MUN CHAU
OUTLYING ISLANDS
LAMMA
LANTAU
CHEUNG CHAU
PENG CHAU
PO TOI
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top picks
Da Domenico Click here
Dah Wing Wah Click here
Hang Zhou Restaurant Click here
L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon Click here
Mido Cafe Click here
Spring Deer Click here
T’ang Court Click here
Tung Po Seafood Restaurant Click here
Woodlands Click here
Yin Yang Click here
What’s your recommendation? www.lonelyplanet.com/hong-kong
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A chef from Hong Kong planted the city firmly in the world’s culinary firmament by becoming the first ever Chinese chef to receive the top ranking of three stars from the début Michelin Hong Kong and Macau guide in 2009. The French bible of gastronomy also gave seven restaurants in the city two stars while fourteen received one star. Despite cries about why most of the inspectors were not local Chinese and the bias towards French restaurants, most Hong Kongers were at least a little pleased with the results.
It came as no surprise that the top honour went to the chef of Lung King Heen Click here, a restaurant specialising in Cantonese cooking. Hong Kong’s Cantonese cuisine is the best in the world. It’s a cuisine known for its obsession with fresh ingredients. Seafood restaurants display tanks full of finned and shelled creatures enjoying their final moments on terra infirma. Housewives complained about the ‘fridge taste’ of previously frozen chicken when Avian Flu forced them to forgo buying live chickens. Cantonese dishes are characterised by delicate and balanced flavours, obtained through restrained use of seasoning, and light-handed cooking techniques such as steaming and quick stir-frying.
In Hong Kong, Cantonese cuisine refers largely to the culinary styles of Guangdong (Canton) province, as well as Chiu Chow (Chaozhou) and Hakka cuisines. Chiu Chow cooking reflects a penchant for seafood and condiments. Deep-fried soft-boned fish comes with tangerine oil, and braised goose is accompanied by a vinegar and garlic dip. Hakka cuisine, known for its saltiness and use of preserved meat, was popular in Hong Kong in the 1960s and ’70s. Salt-baked chicken and pork stewed with preserved vegetables fed many hungry families and workers from the city’s construction sites.
Though originating in Guangzhou, Cantonese cuisine underwent significant development in Hong Kong. Dim sum, for example, has expanded to include mango pudding, egg tarts and other delicacies. Hong Kong’s chefs also pride themselves on innovation. They will seize upon a new ingredient and find ways to use it. For example, asparagus is a vegetable little known in the rest of China, but Hong Kong chefs serve it every day, combining it with baby abalone and olive oil or with caviar and preserved eggs.
In the last half century, Hong Kong has developed into an epicentre of international trade. The lifestyle of its population has become cosmopolitan, and so have the things people eat. In Western dining, hotels play an important role. As it lacks an established culinary institute, Hong Kong has always relied on resource-rich hotel groups to bring in trained non-Chinese, although such dependence has decreased with the development of many stand-alone restaurants.
It is hard to have a conversation in Hong Kong without mentioning food. Many greet each other by asking, ‘Láy sik-jó faan may?’ (Have you eaten yet?) Dim sum lunch on