The myth about Westerners in Hong Kong Restaurants

And why I do not do Food Tours and who are the best

Me Jamie, your host, I am English and I have lived in Hong Kong for 53 years - I know the place.

I have personally completed 2,300+ Private Experiences (over 6,000+ guests) since April 2011 and I am considered one of the finest Private Tour Guides in Asia.

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The myth about Westerners in Hong Kong Restaurants

And why I don’t do Food Tours and who are the best Companies to choose if you want to do a Foodie Tour of Hong Kong

In many Chinese restaurants there is NO English menu and you may have difficulties communicating with staff

The Big Hong Kong Food Myth and my recommendations for doing amazing and affordable Foodie Tours in Hong Kong

Updated and revised from an article I wrote on my J3 Private Tours Blog back in 2018

The big Hong Kong Food myth has 2 related parts to it - part 1 from where I am standing is this notion amongst Western Tourists that a great local Hong Kong Restaurant is only great because you do not see foreigners eating in there, therefore it must be an authentic experience…. and you have been taken to (or stumbled upon) a secret hidden gem! - what nonsense! especially given that Hong Kong is a major International City with a long, rich and varied history and part 2 is that if there are foreigners in a local restaurant then it must be a tourist trap with the food prepared in such a way as to cater to Western Tastes! again what nonsense.

Maks Noodles - a famous Hong Kong eatery and popular with tourists, this does not mean it is not an authentic restaurant with great Hong Kong Chinese Food!

Here are some relevant facts related to the food myth :

  • Hong Kong is 430 sq miles or 1,114 sq km in total

  • Officially we have just shy of 13,000 licenced restaurants as of December 2024 but unofficially we probably have anywhere from 15,000 - 30,000 licensed and unlicensed Restaurants in Hong Kong and the vast majority are Chinese Restaurants. There are so many conflicting reports even from related Government Departments about the precise number of restaurants, a lot of restaurants have closed within the past 18 months.

  • To highlight the confusion surrounding the number of restaurants in Hong Kong, Open Rice, the most popular and authoritative Food app in Hong Kong claims there 28,000 restaurants in Hong Kong!

  • This is not as high as London (15,000 restaurants) and not even close to New York, both cities with similar (slightly larger) populations but Hong Kong gets a lot more tourists for example in 2018 Hong Kong had 65 million visitors, London had 20 million visitors and New York had 38 million visitors.

  • The population of Hong Kong is 7.45 million (ish) at the end of 2024

  • roughly 0.8% of the population in Hong Kong are Westerners and 92% of the population are CHINESE

  • in 2024 we had over 45 million visitors to Hong Kong and 80% of them are from China and they eat in local restaurants

  • So chances are you can go into any Chinese Restaurant anywhere in Hong Kong and not see a foreign person, it has nothing to do with it being an authentic local eating experience

  • I have eaten in over 1,250 Chinese Restaurants in Hong Kong and pretty much in most Chinese Restaurants you either never see a foreigner or 98% of the patrons are Chinese!!

  • ...and for the record and in my experience, the best Chinese Restaurants in Hong Kong are frequented by local Chinese people and foreigners alike, great food is great food ........... and this does not make the restaurant touristy!

  • The official Government chart of visitor arrivals is shown below, it gives a breakdown of visitor arrivals between 2002 - 2023, this explains why we have so many restaurants

This is the main reason why you never see foreigners in local Chinese Restaurants in Hong Kong, it has nothing to do with the restaurant being a hidden gem or a place that only locals would eat at! it is everything to do with the huge number of restaurants, Hong Kong’s population and visitor statistics.

Please bear in mind that I can guarantee that ANY of the 200+ restaurants listed in the Michelin Hong Kong Restaurant Guide have a Tripadvisor Listing and all have their fair share of average, poor and terrible reviews, it is human nature, I spend a lot of time reading Tripadvisor reviews and you get the impression that people like to slag off a a restaurant simply because expectations are so high that a bland dish or two bursts that particular bubble even if the overall experience is amazing.

… and yes this negative Tripadvisor review above of a food tour in mid 2024 highlights the perception of the myth I am talking about.

I feel very sorry for the tour company and the restaurant (Sister Wah) which I should mention has a stellar reputation and is very popular with locals and visitors alike, I should also point out that it is tiny with something like 6 tables but I do not understand why anyone would object to seeing foreign tourists eating in a Chinese Restaurant particularly one which is on everyone’s wish list when coming to Hong Kong. Sister Wah has an average 4.0+ rating out of 5 on Tripadvisor by the way

The reviewer is entitled to their own opinion - indeed, in my opinion some people like to take pot shots at restaurants with a great reputation, but why? food is so damn subjective - I have eaten at over 1,250 Chinese Restaurants since January 2nd 1972 in Hong Kong and I have never had a bad meal, yes, average meals but not really bad ones, food is very subjective when it comes to taste.

Why I have never done food tours in Hong Kong

This does NOT mean however that I stay away from food on my experiences that I do, far from it, I am more than happy to stop for lunch or a snack, it can be Chinese Food, Asian Food or Western Food, you can let me know by ticking the appropriate box on my booking form… please bear in mind that I can be pretty blunt when people ask my opinion of food (particularly when it comes to dodgy restaurants and street food) I am NOT a foodie but I have eaten in well over 1,250 Restaurants in Hong Kong in the 53 years I have lived in Hong Kong so I have an opinion | but what’s the old cliche… “one man’s meat is another man’s poison” food can be a touchy subject in Hong Kong, many people will take the middle ground and tell you what you want to hear, with me, you get my good | bad | ugly opinion.

Let me be clear, I am not a chef, food critic, blogger or journalist, I really cannot deconstruct a bowl of wonton noodles (and why would you do that?), I am a guy that gives you the Hong Kong experience and proud of it and quite often I am completely flummoxed by the above mentioned people and how they write about food, to me it is either great, good, poor or awful, so you have guessed it, I do not deconstruct a dish but I love great food and as a reminder - since I was a kid I have eaten in over 1,250 + Chinese Restaurants in Hong Kong and I am sorry I keep mentioning that statistic - and I have tried just about every Chinese dish imaginable and honestly most of it is pretty darn good but some food just makes you want to gag and I will NEVER suck out the eyeballs of a fish in an effort to improve my eyesight!.

I have eaten in three Michelin 3 Star Restaurants plus many 2 stars and 1 stars + quite a few places listed in the Bib Gourmand category and yes, the 3 star establishments were awesome but then again I was not paying the bill (!) and in these places it is not just about the food. I have had great food in decidedly dodgy Chinese Restaurants but most of time you have forgotten the meal 30 minutes after leaving the restaurant | this is why you need to book a food tour with people who are real foodies!

The 8 images below are some quite famous restaurants in Hong Kong that offer up authentic Chinese Food, they also have lines as they are very popular and you will see foreigners in them, do NOT be put off by this just enjoy the food! I have eaten in all of them, many times over the years


Din Tai Fung, my favourite Chinese Restaurant in Hong Kong, top quality at moderate prices, it is a Taiwanese Place

…. and on this one I risk been burned at the stake for daring to call a pineapple bun bland… for the life of me I have no idea why people rave about this “dessert style” product. I have a sweet tooth and I am a dessert guy so I can be pretty hard to please, but the pineapple bun… gosh, so bland and really messy to eat and NO trace of pineapple in the bun but it is an iconic Hong Kong food product so I guess you need to try one!… on the other hand I can eat 6 Hong Kong egg tarts from the Tai Cheong Bakery in one sitting… go figure.

Hong Kong is famous for so called street food (but there are only roughly 25 legal licenses in Hong Kong for street food) personally I give it a wide berth, it is cheap and cheerful and most of the time pretty average but that is just my opinion - millions of younger people would say the opposite, Bubble Tea is a bit of a thing here as well… I don’t drink tea and have never had tea so I have no opinion on this drink and yes I am a Brit and I simply prefer coffee, I have offended thousands of lovely Chinese people in Hong Kong by refusing to drink tea which is served at the drop of a hat, it is not my thing and that is that, I do not subscribe to this nonsense that you should eat or drink something that is offered just to please someone and fit in - you should ask me about the true story of the Norwegian Consul General, his wife and a Hong Kong Government Banquet and the small matter of Pigs Lung Soup.

I am always happy to visit street markets which most people find quite fascinating as they get to see how Hong Konger’s shop for food and I know a bit about Chinese Medicine and the connection to food products.

….. and I am pretty sure we do not eat fried scorpions, worms, slugs, gecko’s and such in Hong Kong but a friend of mine does a tour where you sample a frogs vagina ( I am not joking ) and a snake’s penis! which is an absolute 10 | 10 on the disgustingly yucky factor scale.

At the top of this blog post there is a button you can press that will take you to the Michelin Food Guide for Hong Kong which includes the Bib Gourmand restaurants (great food, moderate price) please take a look at this it is great for research

And one final point, the 3 main talking points about local restaurants and food

  1. Do not be put off by foreign tourists in restaurants, it does NOT mean the restaurant is a tourist trap or the food is westernised!

  2. The best restaurants, Chinese or otherwise are actually in our great hotels, in most cities around the world this is simply not the case

  3. Many of the guests I have had over the past decade + have always mentioned that Chinese food tastes quite different to what it does at home and that is true, simply put the food is made for Western tastes, in Hong Kong food takes into account the medicinal point of view when it comes to food preparation and ingredients, ie does eating it have health benefits and as such sometimes it tastes truly awful, that is the way of things here.

Anyway if you want to book a food tour please do contact my friends, you will have a fantastic experience.

This is a bit of an odd piece of advice so bear with me.

Hong Kong has 3 official languages, Cantonese, Mandarin and English but for whatever reason providing English menu’s in local Chinese Restaurants just never really took hold.

I have lived in Hong Kong for 53 years and I have eaten at somewhere north of 1,250 local Chinese Restaurants, my wife is not Chinese but was born in Hong Kong and has lived here for longer than I have, she went to Chinese Schools and her native language is Cantonese.

My point being is that I know Hong Kong food and yet I always refused to do any sort of food tour and on my Private Tours if guests wanted a Chinese meal I would take them to my favourite restaurant, a restaurant in NO shape or form like the one in the images above.

For some reason in Hong Kong, the Food Tour Industry has morphed over the past 14 years and it was decided by the tour companies that in order to know Hong Kong Chinese Food you would only go to old established traditional Chinese Family Restaurants carefully chosen by the owner of the Tour Company and NOT an English menu in sight and not a word of English spoken by the Restaurant staff and a typical group or private food tour would involve tastings at 6 locations.

In other words you need a local Hong Kong Chinese guide to do a food tour with you.

The Hong Kong food scene to me is rather unique, you can find fantastic food in really odd locations and in many cases it is great value for money.

I absolutely agree with this approach 100%, I have never had an issue in Chinese Restaurants here because my wife and her family are all native Cantonese speakers, I am not and with no English Menu’s and very few English speaking staff members I am completely out of my depth which means I was never able to offer an experience at my usual high quality level.

Some of my great and trusted tour guide friends speak Cantonese as a second language and get by doing private and group food tours but for me my suggestion of a local Hong Kong Chinese guide is probably the best option, my Chinese friends offer amazing food tours and some of them are social media celebrities and influencers.

Look, anyone can learn about Hong Kong food, the history, cultural significance, the dishes, the ingredients and preparation and such but that is meaningless in a Chinese Restaurant with no English, when it comes to NON food tours I absolutely believe that a Native English Speaker is your best option given that fluency in English is absolutely not what you think here, I have been on tours in Hong Kong (for research) and honestly it can be a horrible experience having a guide who does not really speak English fluently, my hats off to them of course for having the fortitude to give it a go, my Cantonese is so bad it is embarrassing.. but at the end of the day, you have to do right by the guest.

I should point out that the my friends that own Private Tour Companies all speak eloquent English as do many of their guides


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Jamie, Your Passionate Hong Kong Expert & Storyteller

Discover Hong Kong - Pearl of the Orient

Learn about the unbiased, real Hong Kong | forget what you read in the press!


The truly stunning and amazing panoramic day view from the Lugard Road Lookout at Victoria Peak

The truly stunning and amazing panoramic night view from the Lugard Road Lookout at Victoria Peak

Lugard Road Lookout at Victoria Peak

If I had any followers on Instagram who liked views rather than my car images then this would be a classic, Mum, Dad and 4 kids aged from 12 - 22 from England, perfect weather, the planets aligned as they do on most days at the Peak.

This rather sums up Jamie’s spot at the Peak.



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