Staying true to tradition is secret behind Hong Kong's Michelin restaurant
The owner of Ho Hung Kee restaurant in Causeway Bay says winning the coveted Michelin star in 2011 is 'a recognition of Hong Kong’s dining culture'. Patty Ho, the daughter-in-law of the restaurant’s founders and its current owner, said she has stuck to original recipes because she wants customers to experience a “traditional eating culture”.
After queuing on the street, diners are sat next to strangers in the cramped Hong Kong restaurant before rinsing their own cutlery. Welcome to the world’s cheapest Michelin-starred experience.
Ho Hung Kee (Ho Hung’s restaurant) was first awarded a coveted star in 2011 and on any given day is packed with local and foreign diners ordering bowls of wonton or fried flat noodles with beef for around HK$35 - less than US$5.
Wontons, a traditional dish served in Hong Kong and in China’s southeastern province of Guangdong, are similar to dumplings but their skin uses less dough, into which succulent shrimp and pork servings are wrapped.
Like hundreds of other Hong Kong “tea restaurants” or “Cha chaan teng” in the Cantonese dialect, Ho Hung Kee also serves quick, simple dishes ranging from congee and fried rice to a selection of Western-style sandwiches.
Squeezing onto tables with strangers is a normal dining experience in the cramped restaurant that seats about 50, nestled between towers of retail in the teeming shopping district of Causeway Bay.
It is a recognition of Hong Kong’s dining culture
Chefs start from 7:00 am to batter shrimp and wrap wontons for the roughly 1,000 customers served daily at the family-run restaurant, which began life as a humble street stall in the 1940s before it opened up as a full shop in 1964.