Chung Kee 忠記 @ Hong Kong

My favourite city in the world is Hong Kong. And whenever I visit, I would not include hotel breakfast because I know where I would be going for breakfast.

My favourite breakfast in HK is porridge or what the locals call congee. There are many congee stores in HK so the competition is stiff. So for a place to survive so long is amazing. Chung Kee is one of those that has been serving the neighbourhood for years. These days, it is owned by a F&B group, and has since expanded across more neighbourhoods in Hong Kong.

Just by looking at the shopfront, you can sense the nostalgia and the old-school vibes. A warmer cabinet kept the dough fritters hot. The place can only seat around 24 comfortably, but during the peak hour they would try to pack as many as 30 into it. Most of the clientele are residents around the area or office workers on their way to work. A TV on the wall would blast the news channel.

Fried Dough Fritter 油条 is the best friend to porridge. The Cantonese name for yaozhagwei 油炸鬼 means “oil-fried devil.” According to folklore, it was a form of protest against a Song Dynasty official named Qin Hui 秦桧. He was believed to have plotted against the patriotic general Yue Fei 岳飞. The words 桧 (“oak”) and 鬼 (“ghost”) synonyms in Cantonese. The youtiao is said to represent Qin Hui and his wife, who were involved in the plot against the general. Therefore, the youtiao is deep-fried and eaten to symbolise the punishment of the traitorous couple. Traditionally youtiao are often made as two foot-long rolls of dough joined along the middle, with one roll representing the husband and the other the wife.

I introduced Princess to pork blood jelly 猪红 for the first time, and she grew a fondness to the pudding that we cannot get in Singapore. So she ordered it for her porridge with her other favourite ingredient for porridge, the century egg 皮蛋. Because these ingredients were pre-cooked, they did not come with the choice of boiling congee.

My favourite porridge is Pig Organ Porridge cooked a la minute. 生滚粥 or Quick Boiled Porridge is made a la minute by boiling porridge and then introducing ingredients like pig innards, chicken bits, fish slices, anything you like. And at Chung Kee, you can literally combined 20 different ingredients. But remember the bowl can only take that much porridge.

You must be wondering what the youtiao is for. The porridge is boiling hot. The fastest way to eat it quickly is to dunk the youtiao into the porridge and then eat the whole soggy mess. I would not recommend the soy bean milk anymore, as it was quite watery when I ate there.

Another favourite of mine was their freshly steamed rice rolls which you can add a variety of ingredients as fillings; this day I chose the pork liver 豬潤. The pork liver was cooked perfectly and still 粉粉 (creamy?) – this is a texture that I could not find an English word to describe, because I don’t think anyone find liver a delicacy in the West. 

The place is always packed and there’s no reservation. So be prepared to share the table with total strangers. But everyone would just hunker down and chomp through their breakfast, so one does not need to feel the need to be friendly. Everyone was very conscious of time and the crowd waiting for a seat, so everyone would try to eat their porridge as quickly as possible and bugger off.

Chung Kee Congee Shop 忠記粥品
香港灣仔軒尼詩道275-285號立興大廈地下E舖
Shop E, Ground Floor, Lap Hing Mansion, No. 275-285 Hennessy Road, Causeway Bay, Hong Kong
Tel : +852 2511 0021

Visited Dec 2023