Heart Warmers at Hong Kong

Tanushree Podder

No visit to Hong Kong can be considered complete unless one has experienced the Yum Cha ritual. Simply translated as ‘Tea Time’, Yum Cha, can turn out to be an addicting experience. The closest equivalent to the ‘Elevenses’ and ‘High Tea’, Yum Cha is a Cantonese practice that has found its way across the world. The tea ranges from the ubiquitous jasmine tea to Po-Lay and Sau-May. These are sipped in a leisurely manner while an assortment of dim sums serves as accompaniment.

As to the invention of dim sum, stories abound. According to one of the versions, the delicacy was invented by an enterprising chef employed in the royal palace during the reign of Ching dynasty. The empress held a contest to encourage the innovative cooks to come forth with interesting snacks for her mid-morning tea ceremony. It is said the contest continued for more than a year, during which chefs vied with each other to present the most delicious snacks. An amazing range of more than 2000 variations of the delicacy were produced. These were named dim sum.

The words dim sum mean ‘heart warmers’. The steamed and fried versions of dim sum went on to become a rage with the royalty before making their way to the homes of the common people. Tea houses vied with each other in presenting the most innovative range of dim sum to their patrons. During the imperial times, tea houses served as important meeting places, where businessmen sealed important deals and gentlemen of leisure spent time to catch up with each other. Often these were used to settle disputes. Tea houses continue to remain in favour for the same reasons till date.

At Hong Kong, the practice of using Yum Cha for sealing important deals continues. Perhaps, it is the informal ambience coupled with the taste of comfort food that does the trick. Although, they have turned into noisy and busy places, the restaurants that serve Yum Cha are favoured by many businessmen for meeting their customers.

Hong Kong has some of the most imaginative dim sum chefs. While prawn is the most popular stuffing, there are dim sums with stuffings of pork, chicken or minced scallop. Herbs like ginger, coriander, and chives are used to create a unique flavour.

Dim Sums come in two forms — steamed or fried. These also come in savoury or sweet avatars. Most of the sweet dumplings are made with fillings of red bean paste. A rather delectable version comes as coconut snowballs and thousand-layer sweet cake with egg topping.

These come with an amazing array of dipping sauces, which range from the conventional soy sauce and chilli sauce to the more exotic sweet cilantro sauce, ginger soy sauce, lime and fish sauce, or plum sauce. Some of the most popular dim sums are the Har Gau, Dai chee gau, Xiao Long Bau and Cha siew bau. The vegetable and meat Siew Mai, pan-fried chives and meat dumplings, fried garlic prawn dumplings and sesame prawn are equally in demand from the discerning Yum Cha aficionado. Whatever be the choice, a Yum Cha experience at Hong Kong is a unique and unmissable one.