Hong Kong-style cafes boom in Sydney as expats seek a taste of home

August 27, 2022

Hong Kong Street Food's owner Cecilia Yun is happy to provide a portal to the streets of Hong Kong for her Sydney customers.Edwina Pickles

Spaghetti, French toast and cream of chicken soup don't typically spring to mind when someone mentions Hong Kong food. But for the 100,000 Hongkongers in Australia, these dishes are a powerful reminder of home, perhaps even more than yum cha or roast goose.

It's these Western dishes that are found at the many Hong Kong-style cafes (known as cha chaan tengs) that are now flourishing in Sydney, especially in suburbs such as Burwood.

From left: Dick Kwong, Howard Lee and Howin Chui from Kowloon Cafe in Burwood.Kera Wong

Half a dozen have opened recently, serving plates of baked spaghetti and cups of Ovaltine to cure the homesickness of those trapped by COVID-19 border closures.

"When they come to my shop, they can find some feeling of Hong Kong," says Cecilia Yun, who opened Hong Kong Street Food in Rhodes Central shopping centre in December.

Cha chaan tengs in Hong Kong were originally an aspirational style of restaurant for locals who couldn't afford to eat at the same places as the British ruling class.

Kowloon Cafe's French toast with butter and maple syrup is built for big appetites – and Instagram.Christopher Pearce

Locals had seen Western food as far back as the 1840s, but had not necessarily eaten it. After World War II, they recreated what they had seen, adapting dishes with ingredients that were affordable and widely available.

That led to mainstays such as macaroni soup with char siu pork, baked rice with ham, and spaghetti with pork chop. Fresh tomatoes and ham were expensive imports, so ketchup-based pasta sauce and Spam became common.

Today, cha chaan tengs are a beloved symbol of Hong Kong's embrace of both East and West.

Tornado eggs at Hong Kong Street Food in Rhodes.Edwina Pickles

"We made sure everything was nostalgic, from the pumping Hong Kong music to the chairs, furniture, cutlery and posters," says Howin Chui, co-owner of Kowloon Cafe, which has two Sydney locations.

"Whenever I landed in Hong Kong, the first thing I would do is go to a Hong Kong cafe. That's how it triggered the whole project," he says.

He opened in Haymarket in 2019 because he felt Cantonese food in Sydney was dying out. Now it may be going through a resurgence as more Hongkongers and Australian expats leave the country after strict COVID-19 restrictions and political turmoil.

Cha chaan tengs give homesick migrants and curious Sydneysiders a taste of the Hong Kong of old.Edwina Pickles

"There's capital flight from Hong Kong and there's human capital flight, quite noticeably," says Professor Tim Harcourt, an economist at the University of Technology, Sydney, who has lived in Hong Kong. "Much more than 1997 [Asia's financial crisis] and much more than during the [British] handover."

Some now view cha chaan tengs as a memento of Hong Kong's zenith, which is quickly fading due to tensions over the reality of the "one country, two systems" arrangement with China.

"I like to remain very neutral on this. My vision is just to keep the culture," says Chui of Kowloon Cafe.

The replica Hong Kong subway car and station at Rhodes' Hong Kong Street Food.Edwina Pickles

"Obviously the golden years are gone, but I'm really grateful that I lived during those years. That's why we want to keep that culture, but with a twist for the local market."

In Burwood and Haymarket, Chui has created eye-catching venues targeted at the TikTok generation, with bilingual staff that attract both Hongkongers and Westerners.

A mini-bus like those seen in downtown Hong Kong dominates the Burwood cafe, while a forthcoming Eastwood location will feature one of the city's famous double-decker trams.

Traffic signs and a minibus recreate a streetscape at Kowloon Cafe in Burwood.Kera Wong

Similarly, Hong Kong Street Food in Rhodes is like a trip to Kowloon, thanks to a replica of Mong Kok subway station and colourful signs based on actual Hong Kong shops.

Researcher of Chinese diaspora studies Mei-Fen Kuo of Macquarie University says the Australian versions of these cafes look very different from the real deal in Hong Kong.

"The Hong Kong diaspora group create these cha chaan tengs to remind them of what Hong Kong looks like. For customers, they come to these cafes not just for food but also for the feeling."

Instant noodle soups are common at Hong Kong style-cafes, such as Kowloon in Sydney.Kera Wong

Yun of Hong Kong Street Food has also added her own stamp to staple cha chaan teng dishes. The ubiquitous milk tea – typically made strong and sweet – is served by Yun with ice bears bobbing in the glass.

"Every tea looks the same in every cha chaan teng, but I wanted to make mine unique and more fun," she says.

She also serves scrambled eggs in a coiled shape, known as "tornado eggs".

Chips, spaghetti, rice and noodles all share space on the menu of a typical Hong Kong-style cafe, like Kowloon Cafe.Kera Wong

Meanwhile, Kowloon Cafe is a one-stop shop of both street-food, such as curry fish balls, and cafe dishes like peanut butter-filled French toast.

In Hong Kong, these would be found at separate restaurants but, in Sydney, it's more convenient to offer them on one menu for those wanting a taste of home.

Kristy Phanhsena is a regular at Hong Kong Cafe in Chatswood, ordering congee with minced beef, an iced lychee Yakult drink or pineapple buns, named for their ridged surface, not for the presence of pineapple.