Hong kong mongkok dim sum free#

Remnants of British colonialism still linger in Hong Kong but one cultural aspect you would not expect to see fused with this traditional Cantonese cuisine is that of bottomless brunch.

YUM CHA also operates a second dim sum branch at Tsim Sha Tsui. One last thing to note is the non-optional 20% service charge added to your bill.

As a food experience, it wasn’t our favourite in terms of overall taste but this could have been due to our narrow menu selections. Dining at YUM CHA Central was certainly a novelty with the gimmick dim sum providing plenty of entertainment. On the day we visited, we were seated one minute after opening but we estimate that the restaurant was almost at capacity by midday.

The icing on the cake is the baked pineapple puffs, a trio of canary birds which are presented in a birdcage.Īrrive early (even 15 minutes before opening) as the Central branch is a popular spot for business lunches. Char siu bao (barbecued pork buns) arrive shaped as little piggies, lau sha bao (molten custard buns) feature googly eyes and squirts out warm custard when you poke them (there is a technique to get the right amount of “custard ooze” so research this for your Insta Stories otherwise you will fail dismally as we did!) and the doggy sausage rolls are cleverly constructed daschunds. If your budget allows it, go crazy and order all the Instagram-friendly dishes. The restaurant channels a New York loft vibe with its exposed red brick walls, copper pipes and hexagonal stone floor.

Hong kong mongkok dim sum free#

The chefs at YUM CHA Central have boosted their popularity with millennials by animating some of their dim sum dishes, encouraging a “camera eats first” culture and simultaneously benefiting from free publicity. This will be the best looking dim sum in Hong Kong Central that you will ever lay eyes on. These were Bevan’s favourite and had I not been paying attention, he would have eaten the last one without sharing with me!ĭining at a Hong Kong Michelin star restaurant is certainly more accessible and affordable with the Tim Ho Wan restaurants so if you’re going to eat dim sum in Hong Kong, it might as well be at a lauded restaurant! If you do miss out though, the Tim Ho Wan Group now operates 46 outlets in seven countries including, Singapore, Japan, the USA and Australia. It seems somewhat bizarre to admit that until I sat down to eat at Tim Ho Wan, I had never eaten the baked version of BBQ pork buns. Thankfully the baked BBQ pork buns improved my mood. Perhaps my epicurean taste buds aren’t as developed as fellow critics, but it is not what I expected from a Michelin star restaurant. The seasonal vegetables were a disappointment a plate of limp lettuce arriving on our table with a drizzle of bland soy sauce. We selected steamed shrimp dumplings, steamed beef balls with bean curd, wonton and chilli sauce, poached fresh seasonal vegetables and of course, the signature baked BBQ pork buns. We sat next to other parties of two and fortunately, we had enough room to use our chopsticks without having to pin our elbows to our sides during the entire meal. Tables inside are manoeuvered to maximise occupancy. Our wait was approximately 30 – 40 minutes and your order is snapped up even before you sit down, meaning that your food arrives within minutes. You can always take a peek at the makeshift list as diners are seated mostly in numerical order depending on party size. If your number is called and you don’t appear, you will lose your slot so make sure to stand close to the podium. When your table is ready, this woman calls out your number over the crackly microphone – but in Chinese only.

She then records your number on her paper list and the size of your group. A woman stands at a podium lectern and dispenses numbers to customers along with a tick-box menu in Chinese or English. Instead of an orderly queue around the block, the restaurant has a rather disorderly yet functional ticketing system. You would think that four years after receiving a Michelin star that the hype would have died down but it certainly wasn’t the case at the Sham Shui Po branch on a weekday morning shortly after opening time.