Tonight's topic is the street foods of Hong Kong. They're famous for their dim sum but the food culture there is much more deep and developed than most people know. One of my main objectives during this trip is just to walk around and try as many amazing foods as I can and the first day certainly didn't disappoint! I ate so many foods that I ended the night in my hotel room feeling like I could pop at any moment.
Tonight's Smorgasbord of Foods:
1. Grilled Octopus Skewers
2. Octopus Balls
3. Grilled & Fried Food Stands
4. Outdoor Fruit & Veggie Markets
5. Hong Kong Sausage
6. Famous BBQ Duck
My first day I racked up a foot-aching 34,000 steps. I walked high and low to find as many street foods as I could, and consequently burning the calories to keep eating more! For my first day I stuck mostly to the Ladies Market of Mong Kok and Temple Market Streets of Yao Ma Tei where I found some of the most amazing fried/grilled street foods!
Grilled Octopus Skewers
Grilled octopus on a stick seasoned with a chili oil to give it a bit of spice. At 20 kkd a skewer, it's a heck of the deal if you like Octopus. It might seem a bit strange depending where you're from (I know I'd never had octopus before coming to China), but grilled octopus is super popular in Asian countries and it's really delicious when cooked right! When cooked wrong though it can be really tough and chewy and a bit of an unpleasant experience, luckily these people are pro's and the octopus is amazing!
Octopus Balls
There's a lot of octopus love here and you better learn to love it because it's fantastic! Here we have octopus balls! They pour a wonderful veggie mixed dough into these molds and put one chunk of octopus into the middle of each. When they're done cooking you have a golden brown octopus ball that melts in your mouth with the perfect soft and doughy texture. To top the octopus balls off they top it with one of several sauces including a cheese sauce, wasabi sauce, spicy sauce, sweet mayo and more.
Grilled & Fried Food Stalls
All over the place you find open faced street restaurants like this selling a galore of grilled and deep fried foods. Don't get too much of one thing because they're all super good and worth a try! There are tons of dessert yogurts and fried food in a cup that they drizzle with one of their many sauces.
Outdoor Fruit & Veggie Market
As you explore a bit more outside of the popular tourist streets you may come across some outdoor fruit & meat vendors selling everything you might need for a quick little healthy snack. Most of the fruits and vegetables had price stickers on them though usually indicating they weren't open to haggle.
Hong Kong Sausage
One of my favorite chinese foods is the sichuan sausage. They mix it with pork, chilis and numbing peppers to give it an amazing taste unique to sichuan. Every city in China has their own style of sausage and I'v always loved trying them all out. I was really excited when I came across this stall and found these hong kong style sausages. The dark brown was made with innards while the brighter red one used normal pork meats. I was super excited to find this little place except that they were raw and I had no way to cook them in my tiny hotel room. I still have a few days left in Hong Kong though so I'm hoping I can find a place selling it already cooked!
Famous Hong Kong BBQ Duck
I'v saved this for last and with good reason. Everyone knows Beijing is famous for it's beijing duck but Hong Kong has quite a renown duck as well! Occasionally while you're walking the streets you'll come across a store with hanging ducks and if you're lucky they'll be Hong Kong's wildly famous Chashao 叉烧 flavor or more commonly known as hong kong bbq sauce. Most people know of the famous bbq pork buns of dim sum but the bbq style is used in much more than just dim sum!
The bbq sauce is a bit more loose and watery than the thick bbq sauce I grew up with in America but it's certainly not by any means less flavorful. It has a powerful sweet and savory taste and leaves anything it touches glowing in a magical gloss. It's messy and drips everywhere if you're not careful but it's amazing! They do a wide variety of different cuts from the duck and I highly suggest going for either the ribs for the rich and strong flavor that section of cut usually gives or the back shoulder blade for a more meatier selection.