Hong Kong Foodie Tour

At 750 Hong Kong Dollars, the Hong Kong Foodie tour is one of the most expensive guided tours I have gone on. There are two options - I took the Kowloon tour at Sham Shui Po, while there as another one at Central. Both tours are walking tours around the respective areas, though the total distances covered isn't that much.

While the tour takes place across 6 preselected restaurants that showcase the local cuisine, the tour is a lot more than food and its associated culture; but a cultural exploration of the area itself. For example, the tour guide and I spent a long time discussing apartment prices (which are amazingly high for such cramped quarters), and also got a brief overview of menus and restaurant styles. There are also walk through through various stores including dried seafood stores and fresh produce stores.

Most of the stops involved family run businesses that have operated for many generations, some even before WW2. Some of them are even still involved in the businesses.

The first store featured freshly baked pineapple buns and Hong Kong style milk tea. Both are made freshly on the premises, and the soft bun and tea is a good start to the morning.

The next stop was at a small place that serves mainly congee and related rice products. Instead of congee however, it was rice rolls with sauce - very glutenous and starchy, and quite delicious. 

The third stop, after a stroll through the produce markets (including a fried seafood store with fish bladders, geckos and abalone [from South Africa]) was another small place that makes their own soya milk and tofu products. The Tofu Desert wasn't really sweet, but rather quite like low sugar custard in taste and consistency. 

After another long walk through the area, including the recommended snake soup store, the fourth store was a braised meat store  with a serving of goose and pork knuckle - both boneless. The pork knuckle was very different to my previous experience (albeit that was cooked Bavarian style), and both were delicious.

After a quick stop at a bakery (and freshly baked cookies), the last stop was a noodle shop. The owner makes approx 75 kg of noodles by hand, every day - and the noodles are amazingly light. I wasn't a fan of the shrimp roe topping, but the noodles were amazing. There is a video of the old man making noodles, but unfortunately I can't find it.

It is an amazing tour of food and culture, and I definitely enjoyed and learnt a lot. It's the next best thing to eating out with locals.