Tasting Kitchen (TK), Asia’s epicurean lifestyle media group, leads the way to the world’s best in food and drink, art and design, and luxury travel adventures. Tasting Kitchen (TK) 是亚太地区最具前瞻性的奢华生活方式品牌 , 荟萃全球高品质的生活文化，艺术设计，以及舌尖上的梦幻美味。
Tasting Kitchen Limited • www.tasting-kitchen.com
SHANGHAI: Room H2, No 25, Lane 550 South Shaanxi Road, Shanghai • 上海市徐汇区陕西南路 550 弄嘉善老市 25 号 H2 室 HONG KONG: Units 1-2, 6/F., Oceanic Industrial Centre, 2 Lee Lok Street, Ap Lei Chau, Hong Kong • 香港鸭脷洲利乐街 2 号海湾工贸中心 6 楼 1 室 MACAU: Rua do Volong n2-a, Lazarus Verde, Rés-do-chão C, Macau • 澳门和隆街 2 号晶品艺楹地面 C 座
Mark Hammons FOUNDER & PUBLISHER
创办人兼出版人 mark@tasting-kitchen.com
Joey Cheang DEPUTY PUBLISHER
副出版人兼主编 joey@tasting-kitchen.com
Lauriane Lemaire MANAGING DIRECTOR
常务董事 lauriane@tasting-kitchen.com
Mamie Chen
Marilyn Burkley
Robert Burkley
Zita Wan
SENIOR EDITORS
资深编辑
Kate Nicholson
CONTRIBUTING EDITOR
ART AND DESIGN
特约编辑－艺术设计专栏
Regina Li
CHINESE EDITOR
中文编辑
David Hartung DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY
摄影总监
J. Carl Kerkman, MFA
IMAGE EDITOR
图像编辑
Jin Lao
IMAGE TECHNICIAN
图像技术员
Vivian Pun
DIGITAL CONTENT MANAGER
数字媒体经理
Victoria Lei
PROJECT MANAGER
项目经理
Alicia Beebe ART DIRECTOR 艺术总监
Lucy Morgan
BUREAU CHIEF, PARIS
巴黎区编辑主管
Wilson Fok
Joyce Kwok
Julie Tu
Chris Zhang
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
特約作家
ON THE COVER
Photography by David Hartung
Executive Chinese Chef Anthony Ho of Zi Yat Heen at Four Seasons Hotel Macao presents Sweetened Walnut Cream with Bird’s Nest Glutinous Rice Dumpling, inspired by the famed sesame dumplings of Shanghai. This elegant dessert embodies “ingredient fusion and elevation” in a harmonious dialogue between textures and flavors, with silky walnut cream complementing nourishing bird’s nest wrapped in soft dumplings.
This issue began with a collaboration with the Hong Kong Tourism Board and a simple but meaningful idea: to celebrate what makes Hong Kong memorable. Not only its great dining rooms, but also the deeper food culture that gives the city its character – its soy sauce makers, seafood traditions, roast meat masters, clay pot rice specialists, cha chaan tengs, dai pai dongs, neighborhood markets – as well as the many people who sustain its appetite for excellence.
As our team worked on this issue, what became clear was the sheer breadth of Canton’s influence. It is not a single style or a fixed tradition. It is a living culture shaped by craftsmanship, memory, discipline, and constant evolution.
In Hong Kong, that spirit appears in everyday rituals and in fine dining alike. In Macau, it takes on new form through chefs who honor Cantonese foundations while giving them fresh expression. In Guangzhou, it extends into the cocktail world, where Lingnan heritage is reinterpreted with structure, elegance, and imagination.
TK Director of Photography David Hartung spent weeks on the ground in Hong Kong with our editorial team and contributing writer Wilson Fok, helping document a city whose food identity lives as vividly in its streets and workshops as in its celebrated restaurants and bars.
From there, this issue travels further – to Hangzhou, New Zealand, Copenhagen, Kenya, Negros, and beyond – but a common thread remains: a respect for place and craft and for the people behind them.
If there is a spirit that runs through these pages, it is the spirit of Canton itself: depth without show, confidence without noise, and a belief that the finest things are built patiently, then made to look effortless.
14 Cellar to Table • 18 Lines of Descent • 22 Artistic Trajectory
26 Listening to the Past • 28 Language of the Steppe • 32 Form and Feeling
34 Architects of Taste • 78 Transformative Tastes • 82 From Vision to Flavor
Time and terroir inspire the look of Louis XIII’s Art de la Table collection. 时间与风土启发了路易十三 「餐桌艺术」系列的设计。
cellar to table
Louis XIII translates the artistry of its celebrated Cognac into a new collection of luxury dinnerware.
LOUIS XIII COGNAC has graced prestigious tables from the Château de Versailles to the Elysée Palace. This year, for the first time, the venerable maison expands into the broader dining experience with the launch of its Art de la Table dinnerware collection.
To produce two inaugural series crafted in Limoges, the Cognac maker collaborated with famed French porcelain house J.L Coquet.
“With our two collections, Soil Is Our Soul and Light of Time, the journey extends from starter to dessert,” notes Louis XIII Executive Director Anne-Laure Pressat. “Each piece is designed to echo the craftsmanship, heritage, and artistry that define Louis XIII Ultimately, we want people to feel connected to something larger than the table itself, a celebration of terroir, time, and savoir-faire.” Dubbed heirloomsin-the-making, the two series are limited to 750 individually numbered editions.
BY KATE NICHOLSON
路易十三干邑曾摆放在凡尔赛宫及 爱丽舍宫的尊贵餐桌上。今年，这 个历史悠久的酒庄首次将视野拓展 至更广泛的餐饮体验领域，推出了 「餐桌艺术（Art de la Table）」餐具 系列。这家干邑生产商与法国知名 瓷器品牌 J.L Coquet 携手合作，在 利摩日制作两款首发之 作。
All pieces in Soil Is Our Soul, from teacups to dinner plates, center on origin. Thick rims feature a textured matte surface created from 3D scans of the ancient chalk earth underlying Grande Champagne, the terroir that Louis XIII is crafted from. In Light of Time, the inspiration moves from literal interpretation to transformation, with the rim of each object featuring translucent facets carved into the porcelain. “It’s a metaphor for the decades of aging that slowly reveal Louis XIII ’s distinctive amber hue,”
Forty J.L Coquet porcelain artisans sculpted the pieces and finished them with hand-painting.
四十位 J.L Coquet的 瓷器工匠精心雕琢作品，
The collection debuts at Singapore’s Restaurant Born, helmed by chef-owner Zor Tan. 该系列在新加坡的Born首次亮相，该餐厅由主厨兼老板Zor Tan掌舵。
says Pressat. The process of creating the pieces, sculpted by forty J.L Coquet porcelain artisans and finished with hand-painting, led to the development of new manufacturing techniques.
Art de la Table debuts in Singapore at Michelin-starred Restaurant Born, helmed by chef-owner Zor Tan. Known for his stylish French-Asian contemporary cuisine, Tan has designed an eightcourse menu to showcase the collection. “I’m lucky to have plates that help to bring out the essence of a dish,” he says. “Sometimes ingredients have to match well with the plate, but in this case, I find that the tableware enhances whatever you put on it. I want the guests to see, touch, and experience the textures from different angles.”
The narratives behind the pieces have clearly inspired Tan’s menu development. “When they sent the pieces and I touched them,” he says, “I thought, wow, they’re so delicate and elegant in both the way they’re designed and in the story behind them. I’m a big fan of storytelling – it’s something we focus on at Restaurant Born.”
Heritage and craftsmanship remain central to the identity of Louis XIII , whose history stretches back more than a century and a half. This new handcrafted collection of Limoges porcelain tableware, however, demonstrates that innovation is equally as important to the maison’s oeuvre. “The Singapore event and future dining experiences are designed to immerse guests in the narrative of Louis XIII through Art de la Table,” notes Pressat. “We expect chefs to create unparalleled sensory journeys, elevating the appreciation of Louis XIII to new heights. Following this launch, you will see us continue to extend the legacy of Louis XIII beyond the cellar through experiences, collaborations, and innovations that respect our essence while opening new horizons.”
Exploring family, memory, and mastery, Hong Kong artist Hung Fai redefines traditional ink painting.
AS THE SON of celebrated traditional ink artist Hung Hoi, contemporary ink artist Hung Fai might be said to have been destined to the medium. But instead of the brush his father wields, Fai uses pens, metal rulers, watering cans, folded paper, and the side of his palm.
His solo exhibition A Veiled Revelation, which wrapped up in January at Grotto Fine Art in Hong Kong, acts, he says, as “a kind of review of my work in recent years. It includes times when I hit creative bottlenecks as well as moments of breakthrough, including a shift toward more personal themes, changes in tools, and experiments with installations that combine painting with light and shadow.”
Inviting his father into his work has been a long challenge. Hoi inspired Fai to become an artist, but the pressure was at times overwhelming. After developing his own artistic language, Fai invited his father to work with him for the first time in 2014. Today, they understand each other better, and their partnership has settled into a natural rhythm. “Over the past decade,” says Fai, “my father’s painting style has changed a lot, which has been a constant surprise to me. Collaborating as father and son is a lifelong project.”
Fai explores the relationship between inheritance and innovation in The Six Principles of Chinese Painting – Transmission XXIII, an artwork that is simultaneously a reinterpretation of Xie He’s six principles of painting ( 绘画六法 ) and a collaboration with his artist father. “Copying, or lin mo ( 临摹 ), has always held a very important place in the study of traditional painting,” notes Fai. “I adopted methods similar to tracing, but our choice of tools reveals the differences between us.” Representing a new approach to the father-son alliance, Reconstruction II involves folding his father’s dampened cinnabar landscape, filling blank areas with his paintings, and drawing dots that follow the seeping red lines.
Maze I, a nine-panel work, is an example of Fai’s ink-diffusion technique. To create the painting, he successively opened folded layers of ink-soaked and saturated xuan paper. Moving continuously around the work, he drew lines on the paper with an inkless pen and a ruler. In a modernization of the visual hierarchy found in traditional ink paintings, the mirrored segments resist a single focal point, moving instead in a clockwise, labyrinthine spiral toward a bright center.
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Maze I, 2025, ink on paper, 214.5 x 214.5 cm (set of nine panels, each 71.5 x 71.5 cm)
《迷之一》，2025年，水墨纸本， 214.5 x 214.5厘米（九联屏， 每幅71.5 x 71.5厘米）
The Six Principles of Chinese Painting –Transmission XXIII (with Hung Hoi), 2025, ink and color on paper, 80 x 179.5 cm 《绘画六法 传移摹写之二十三》 （熊海合作），2025年，水墨 设色纸本，80 x 179.5厘米
page 19
Reconstruction II (with Hung Hoi), 2025, ink and color on paper, 96.5 x 90.5 cm
《重构之二》（熊海合作）， 2025年，水墨设色纸本， 96.5 x 90.5厘米
artistic trajectory
A major exhibition at M+ traces the evolution of the work of Chinese-French painter Zao Wou-Ki, from Paris in the 1940s to his later abstract breakthroughs.
TO A YOUNG ZAO WOU-KI arriving in Paris in 1948, European print practices were a freeing pursuit, a lively, unpredictable departure from the rigorous techniques of Chinese calligraphy and woodblock printing he had trained in. From lithography and etching to drypoint and aquatint, he explored it all with vigor, creating a body of work that spanned decades and directly influenced the abstract canvases
“The process of making every single print can be regarded as experimentation. 每一幅版画的创作过程，都可视为一场实验。” Wu Mo 武漠
for which he is best known. “The process of making every single print can be regarded as experimentation,” says Dr. Wu Mo, Sigg Collection curator at M+.
Visitors to Hong Kong’s M+ museum of contemporary visual culture can see nearly one hundred eighty of these works up close, for the first time in Asia. They were donated by the late artist’s wife, Françoise Marquet-Zao, with additional pieces from Zao’s daughter, Sin-May Roy Zao. Fifty more paintings, prints, books, and works on paper are on loan from other institutions and collections. “The turning points of Zao WouKi’s art trajectory can be clearly seen throughout the exhibition as we split the sections chronologically,” says Wu. “Encountering Printmaking” covers Zao’s earliest experiments with printmaking, “Towards Abstraction” focuses on compositions from the late 1950s, and “No Boundaries” encompasses his works from the late 1970s.
The etchings with aquatint shown on these pages, Untitled (1960) and Untitled (1963), reflect changes in Zao’s use of gesture, surface, and technical risk as his abstraction became more assertive and less descriptive. At the time, he was still exploring ideograms, a course set in motion in the 1950s through the paintings of Swiss artist Paul Klee. “Zao Wou-Ki reinterpreted ancient Chinese oracle bone script and bronze inscriptions, rendering them as abstract symbols in his compositions,” notes Wu. “Over time, these concrete symbols gradually disappeared from the imagery, transforming into light, color, and flowing lines.”
Still new to life in France, Zao frequently incorporated aspects of Chinese culture into the work, as seen in the 1963 print, where, says Wu, “the swift and decisive linear structures expressed the artist’s observations of natural forces combined with his inner state, thereby revealing the harmony and naturalness of Taoist philosophy.”
Visitors to the exhibition, on view until May 3, can engage with his process through videos, interactive presentations, and illustrative books, allowing them to, as Wu says, “understand Zao’s experimental spirit through tactile experience and different ways of seeing.”
The hotel design features light-toned materials, including wood, natural stone, handmade bricks, textured plaster, and laminated glass.
酒店设计采用浅色系材质，包括木材、天然石材、手工砖、质感灰泥与夹层玻璃。
Bespoke furniture was designed to maximize the sense of space and guest comfort. 定制家具旨在将空间感与宾客舒适度最大化。
倾听往昔
listening to the past
Ancient architecture meets modern hospitality when B.L.U.E. Architecture Studio reimagines Yangzhou’s Jiangnan House.
THE HISTORIC CITY OF YANGZHOU is undergoing a transformation, but that doesn’t necessarily mean replacing old with new. Instead, ancient cultural heritage is being preserved in a way that resonates with twenty-first-century residents and visitors.
Jiangnan House, a newly opened property from Vanke Hotels & Resorts, encompasses numerous legacy buildings in the city’s historic center, Guangling Ancient City. Tasked with converting the structures into contemporary accommodations were several stakeholders, including Southeast University’s Architects and Engineers Co. Ltd. and Beijing’s B.L.U.E. Architecture Studio.
The B.L.U.E. Architecture Studio team leaned heavily into Yangzhou’s classical garden courtyards for aesthetic inspiration.
B.L.U.E.建筑设计事务所团队从扬州古典园林庭院中汲取美学灵感。
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The hotel lobby features the original wooden framing of the former Subei Cinema.
酒店大堂保留了原苏北电影院的木质框架。
Despite Jiangnan House’s state of disrepair, the B.L.U.E. team retained its original timber frame, which now encloses a central pond and corridors inspired by Yangzhou’s classical garden courtyards. The hotel’s lobby is in the former Subei Cinema, and public areas and guest rooms are adorned with film-themed works created by local artists. “With these elements, the architecture is not a cold, physical space but a vessel where memories are kept and where mind, body, and soul connect to create meaningful moments,” notes Shuhei Aoyama, B.L.U.E.’s founder and director.
The B.L.U.E. design team was responsible for the entire hotel’s interior as well as the facades of two new buildings housing forty guest rooms and various hotel facilities, including dining venues. They continued the Yangzhou courtyard theme throughout the property, using traditional materials like bamboo- and wood-molded concrete, hand-carved stone tiles, and reclaimed gray bricks laid in contemporary patterns. “It all comes together to create a modern yet heritagerich atmosphere,” says Aoyama. “What remains constant for us is that we see renovation as a dialogue. The process is not about what we want to do but about listening to what the building has to say.”
The domed roof of Hotel Indigo Nalati’s entrance is reminiscent of a yurt. 酒店入口的穹顶，令人联想 起草原上的毡房。
The circular bar is inspired by the trees of the steppe. 圆形吧台的灵感源自草原树木。
草原细语
language of the steppe
From architectural concept to interior design, Hotel Indigo Nalati is at one with the rolling landscape and sweeping vistas of Ili Kazakh.
THE WORLD-RENOWNED VIEWS along the Duku Highway in China’s Xinjiang region are a priceless scenic asset that Hotel Indigo Nalati takes full advantage of. The domed roofs of the boutique resort in Nalati in Xinjiang’s Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture are expertly conceived by international hotel design firm CCD / Cheng Chung Design to mimic the backdrop of undulating grassland and steep peaks, and the irregular clusters of buildings reference nomadic settlements. Indeed, for CCD CEO Joe Cheng, the most rewarding aspect of the project “was seeing diverse expertise converge into a unified vision – one where architecture, interiors, and landscape speak the same language.”
Guests are surrounded by locally sourced brick, stone, and timber as they peruse menus crafted with a knowledge of local cuisine. 宾客细阅以当地饮食为特 色的菜单，四周环绕着当 地红砖、石材与木材。
Inside, the earth-toned lobby and 151 guest rooms, replete with skylights, lattice screens, and traditionally patterned carpets, take inspiration from yurts. Everything is rooted in the region’s unique seasonal color shifts using natural materials like locally sourced red brick, washed stone, and carved timber. A central hearth-like fireplace unifies the lobby, and floor-to-ceiling windows frame expansive views of the surrounding grasslands. “The goal was quiet immersion, not nostalgia,” says Cheng. The property’s F&B venues, SHOW: A Neighborhood Cafe and Bright Bar, are purposefully communal, offering menus crafted with a deep knowledge of local cuisine. The gentle curves found in walls, furniture, fixtures, and a circular bar inspired by the steppe’s trees recall
Guest rooms feature yurtlike lattice walls, traditionally patterned carpets, and views of grasslands, mountains, and starry skies.
客房内设有毡房风格的格栅 墙、传统图案地毯，窗外则 是草原、山脉与星空美景。
a meandering river’s edge or village paths. “We wanted guests to feel relaxed and connected, able to gather, linger, or observe.”
Of course, the project wasn’t without challenges, like long transport distances and extreme seasonal conditions inherent to the area. “This led us to innovate in masonry techniques and detailing, allowing materials to perform both environmentally and aesthetically,” notes Cheng. “The resulting textures are deeply tied to place.”
In fact, the CCD team’s work on Hotel Indigo Nalati impressed on them the importance of designing with, not against, the changing seasons and considering “how hospitality can further support ecological sensitivity and cultural continuity.”
Peridot offers terroir-inspired cocktails and plant-based haute cuisine in a sensuous setting, embraced by twenty thousand points of light.
LUMINOUS WITH THE SUBTLE HUE of its namesake gemstone, Peridot, the city’s sky-high cocktail and dining destination at Summit 38 atop The Henderson, has brought the “Natural Futurism” of acclaimed design firm Studio Paolo Ferrari to Hong Kong.
Peridot’s spectacularly surreal vision of tomorrow, conceived by Paolo Ferrari as a spatial cocoon, envelops guests in its serene interplay of light, texture, and color. Walls and ceilings merge seamlessly in a continuous volume of soft green, punctuated by a matrix of numberless glowing cylinders of frosted acrylic capped with gleaming steel.
Providing a grounded counterpoint to the interior’s celestial network is a monumental bar sculpted from green marble. A striking pastel green grand piano is surrounded by accents of polished glass and steel that reflect light mesmerizingly, as sweeping views of the city shimmer across mirrored finishes.
Plush mohair seating and custom lacquered furnishings nestle in carved alcoves, romantically intimate spaces that invite lingering. Every
Peridot 是坐落于 The Henderson Summit 38 中的餐饮新地标，以名字橄榄石的含 蓄色调为灵感，将著名设计事务所 Studio Paolo Ferrari 的「自然未来主义」带到香港。
设计师 Paolo Ferrari 将 Peridot 对未来 的超现实想象化作一个茧型的空间，以光 线、材质与色彩交织出静谧韵律，包裹每 一位来客。墙壁与天花无缝融合，连绵的 橄榄绿色空间中，点缀着无数发光的磨砂 圆柱，顶部以亮面钢材收边，错落有致。
detail contributes to an atmosphere that effortlessly evolves as the natural light of day turns to the evening’s glamorous glow.
Extraordinary surroundings are matched by Peridot’s equally extraordinary cocktail and culinary offerings. The Global Terroir Cocktail Programme, curated by Director of Beverage François Cavelier, is a visionary initiative that each quarter celebrates a selected spirits-producing region, exploring its terroir and telling the stories of its makers and its drinking culture. World-renowned Argentinian chef Lisandro Illa, who began his career at famed Noma and Popl, brings plant-based cuisine to a delectably new level of sophistication. Often using complex fermentation techniques, his dishes transform familiar ingredients into new creations.
With its boldly unconventional design, terroir-inspired cocktails, and refined plant-based cuisine, Peridot weaves an unforgettable immersive dining experience.
As Hong Kong welcomes Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants’ awards ceremony, TK explores the city’s culinary landscape, a thriving complex of timehonored craftsmanship and bold innovation.
INTERVIEWED BY WILSON FOK
WRITTEN BY JOEY CHEANG AND ROBERT BURKLEY
PHOTOGRAPHY BY DAVID HARTUNG
THE CITY’S POSITION as a global culinary destination isn’t defined by accolades alone – it’s rooted in a profound cultural foundation built on tradition, expertise, and boundless creativity. Understanding Hong Kong’s gastronomic brilliance requires an exploration of the techniques, ingredients, and practices that comprise its culinary DNA
Hong Kong’s dining landscape thrives on contrast – where traditional recipes coexist with innovation, street food stalls operate near Michelin-starred establishments, and culinary knowledge passes through generations with meticulous attention.
What distinguishes this culinary heaven is the passionate perfectionism permeating every level of food preparation, creating a gastronomic experience that captivates both visitors and locals alike.
Hong Kong’s diverse culinary landscape stands on fundamental elements that have been perfected over generations. These building blocks, from the umami-rich soy sauce undergirding Cantonese cuisine to the precise steaming techniques for seafood, are among the city’s intangible cultural treasures.
香港的饮食版图由数代锤炼的基础元素支撑。
从为粤菜注入灵魂的醇厚酱油，到蒸煮海鲜分秒不差的掌火之功， 都是这座城市无可取代的无形滋味遗产。
HONG KONG’S SOY SAUCE production represents one of the city’s most important culinary traditions. Artisanal producers like Yuan’s continue creating world-class products using traditional fermentation methods that rely on natural climatic conditions and non-GMO soybeans.
The production process remains largely unchanged through generations: soybeans are steamed, mixed with wheat flour, and left to ferment in massive clay urns under the sun. This slow maturation—often taking months—develops the complex umami flavors that form the foundation of Cantonese cuisine.
From Premium Light Soy Sauce to Royal Soy Sauce, these products represent a rejuvenation of a disappearing craft that dedicated sauce artisans are striving to preserve, creating a liquid heritage that connects today’s dining experiences with centuries-old traditions.
IN TRADITIONAL CANTONESE FEASTS, a whole steamed fish symbolizes completion and prosperity. With success hinging entirely on ingredient quality and precise timing, steaming remains the classic seafoodcooking method, as well as the one that is healthiest and best allows the natural umami flavor of premium seafood to shine without interference.
But, as chef Hideaki Sato of Ta Vie observes, “Hong Kong is a dynamic melting pot of cultures, and restaurants are always evolving for the better.”
This evolution extends to seafood preparation with such alternate techniques as salt-and-pepper treatment, ideal for squid, prawns, and fresh abalone. The resulting quick-fried textures showcase the superior quality of the ingredients while paying tribute to traditional methods.
CONSIDERED THE CROWN JEWEL of Cantonese cuisine, siu mei embodies Hong Kong’s culinary craftsmanship. Chinese restaurants often dedicate specialized teams of chefs skilled in selecting and marinating meat cuts before roasting them in standing ovens. Although the term literally means “roasted varieties,” siu mei encompasses not only spit-roasted meats but also includes white cut steamed chicken and soy-sauce chicken.
Among the most popular varieties is char siu, or barbecued pork, known for its iconic red color and sweet glaze. A great char siu balances lean-to-fat ratio perfectly, with charred bits along the exterior and an interior that remains juicy and tender. The sought-after pork collar butt cut provides the ideal balance for the perfect bite. This iconic preparation can be found at Michelin-starred establishments like Chai Wan’s Sun Kwai Heung as well as at notable restaurants like West Villa and Mott 32, where it’s made with premium Spanish Iberico pork.
Roast suckling pig, often the centerpiece at banquets, is typically spitroasted to produce a glossy, thin, cracklingly crispy skin. A vanishing art is the roasting of meats in underground fire pits, where whole pigs are lowered and roasted for hours, with a distinctive touch of charcoal-grilled flavor permeating the meat.
FEW DISHES embody Hong Kong’s culinary soul like clay pot rice. This deceptively simple dish requires extraordinary precision: expert sourcing of ingredients, thoroughly soaked rice, adequate stirring during simmering, and minimal intervention once toppings are added. The cooking process, traditionally done on inconsistent charcoal stoves rather than predictable electric ranges, demands heightened attention to detail.
The secret lies in positioning the pot at precisely the right angle so that the sides receive enough direct heat to develop the coveted crackling rice crust – a technique that requires years of practice to perfect and that masters guard closely.
“Hong Kong is constantly evolving,” says Chef May Chow of Little Bao, famed for clever riffs on classic comfort foods. “One of the great things about us is that we never forget what makes us special, and we focus on that and do better every day.”
It is precisely this dynamic tension between honoring the past and embracing the future that continues to attract global attention to Hong Kong’s vibrant food culture.
PERFECTLY EMBODYING this dynamism is Hong Kong’s unique answer to the café – the cha chaan teng. These establishments blend casual dining with café culture by offering everything from hot and iced beverages to local bakery specialties like pineapple buns and egg tarts.
The famous cha chaan teng milk tea, recognized by UNESCO as an intangible cultural heritage, exemplifies Hong Kong’s culinary richness. This seemingly simple beverage, a blend of various black teas strained through silk stockings and enriched with evaporated milk, represents generations of refinement and meticulous precision
DAI PAI DONGS, or open-air food stalls, represent the epitome of Hong Kong’s democratic food culture. For travelers and locals alike, these establishments offer culinary theater at its finest: flames leaping from blazing stoves, cooks demonstrating their wildly jerking wok tosses, and steam billowing as dishes are prepared in mere minutes.
The term “dai pai dong” refers specifically to a food vendor who operates under a “dai pai” license – literally a framed certificate larger than a conventional license. Though the government has retired issuance of these permits, what makes dai pai dong cuisine special is the elusive “wok hei” or “breath of the wok” – that distinctive smoky flavor achieved when ingredients are caramelized in a hot wok at precisely the right temperature.
Hong Kong’s dai pai dong scene flourishes in two main areas: a section of Stanley Street in Central, specializing in stirfries and noodle soups; and Sham Shui Po in Kowloon, where favorites like Oi Man Sang are lauded for their amazing stir-fried creations. The best dai pai dong experience involves simply strolling along, selecting dishes to share while enjoying the excitement and showmanship of skilled performers who can cook just about anything with a few quick tosses of a wok.
HONG KONG’S BURGEONING CRAFT SPIRITS scene reflects the city’s innovative spirit. Local distilleries like Two Moons and Perfume Trees Gin have gained international recognition for their distinctive botanicals that range from Chinese medicinal herbs to dried tangerine peel and local citrus fruits.
The creative energy behind these craft beverages mirrors that of the city’s restaurant scene – a continuous balancing act of pushing boundaries while respecting cultural foundations.
Hong Kong’s layered food culture manifests across a diversity of neighborhoods, each of which tells its own story. From Central to Island West to Sham Shui Po, each offers a distinct gastronomic experience that makes up an essential part of the city’s multifaceted culinary identity.
香港层次丰富的饮食文化，在不同社区各自生长、发声。
从中环到港岛西再到深水埗，每一区都提供独特的餐饮体验， 皆是这座城市味觉拼图中不可或缺的一环。
CENTRAL EPITOMIZES Hong Kong’s harmonization of tradition and innovation. Here, heritage monuments stand alongside modern architecture, creating an accessible culinary landscape where wonton noodle shops, award-winning cocktail bars, dim sum tea houses, and internationally acclaimed restaurants are all within walking distance.
The district hosts a superlative array of fine-dining establishments, from China Tang and Luk Yu Tea House to international stars like 8½ Otto e Mezzo BOMBANA, the first Italian restaurant outside Italy to earn three Michelin stars.
Central’s thriving cocktail scene has garnered global recognition, with establishments like Bar Leone, COA, ARGO, and The Aubrey regularly placing among Asia’s most celebrated bars.
STRETCHING from Sheung Wan to Kennedy Town, Island West brims with fascinating contrasts. The “Seafood Street” district along Queen’s Street West to Des Voeux Road West offers vendors of Chinese medicinal herbs, dried seafood, homemade preserved sausages, rare dried mushrooms, and regional spices – all lending the area an alluring collective aromatic identity.
In Kennedy Town, a thriving café scene offers cold brews and artisanal pastries made by creative young chefs who lead the neighborhood’s evolution toward contemporary culinary expressions.
AWAY FROM THE BUSTLING CITY CENTER lies residential Sham Shui Po, a district that has undergone remarkable transformation over the years.
In the early 1950s, Hong Kong’s textile and garment industries flourished, becoming leading sectors in Asia. Though these industries faded by the 1980s, Sham Shui Po evolved into a hub for handicrafts and retail shops selling fabrics, garments, buttons, and ribbons that continue to attract locals and tourists.
Walking along quiet side streets, visitors can discover workshops preserving traditional craftsmanship, where artisans create handmade leather goods and textiles using time-honored techniques. These small establishments add historical depth and artistic character to the neighborhood.
Beyond crafts, Sham Shui Po has recently become home to independent cafés nestled among textile shops, offering hand-brewed coffee in spaces with Northern European aesthetics. This blend of innovative spirit and youthful energy ensures the coexistence of coffee culture and artisanal craftsmanship for generations to come.
As Hong Kong’s food scene continues to progress, sustainability has become a central focus for many of its leading establishments.
随香港饮食格局持续推进，可持续发展已成为一线餐厅的命题。
Urban Farming Initiatives 都市耕种
URBAN FARMS are emerging throughout Hong Kong as innovative solutions to food sustainability challenges. These green spaces serve as both agricultural sites and educational platforms, offering workshops on sustainable practices and the farm-to-table journey.
Sino Group’s “Farm Together” program has established twenty-one urban farms across Hong Kong, creating over fifty-seven thousand square feet of public green space. The Hong Kong Gold Coast Hotel’s organic farm cultivates twenty varieties of crops without chemical fertilizers or pesticides. These initiatives produce healthy food and foster community engagement through farmer’s markets where local growers sell fresh produce directly to consumers, reflecting Hong Kong’s commitment to sustainability within an urban environment.
LANDMARK MANDARIN ORIENTAL’S AMBER, which holds three Michelin stars, has also transformed its conventional fine-dining approach into a sustainability-driven concept under the guidance of culinary director Richard Ekkebus. The reinvented restaurant has significantly reduced its carbon footprint by showcasing fresher flavors from produce sourced from neighboring regions.
CHEF SIMON ROGAN’S ROGANIC, awarded both a Michelin star and a Michelin Green Star, underscores its commitment to sustainability. Following its relocation to Lee Garden One in Causeway Bay, the restaurant continues to maintain its sharing menu format highlighting locally grown vegetables and herbs, while its zero-waste ethos remain intact.
Simon Rogan 主厨的 Roganic 荣获米其林一星及绿星认 证，餐厅完美展现对可持续发展的坚持。自搬迁至铜锣 湾利园一期以来，这间餐厅持续采用共享菜单的形式， 精选本地蔬菜与香草，并始终坚持零废弃的环保理念。
CHEF DAVID TOUTAIN’S debut in Hong Kong focuses on the life cycle of plants, introducing diners to unexpected forms and flavors. With seasonal, vegetable-forward tasting menus, Feuille follows a philosophy both culinary and ecological.
David Toutain 主厨在香港的首家餐厅 Feuille 围绕「大 自然植物的生命周期」这一主题展开，为食客们带来 了前所未有的食物形态与风味体验。餐厅提供以时令 蔬菜为主的品味菜单，彰显了其融合美食与生态理念 的烹饪哲学。
AT ONE-MICHELIN-STAR MORA, founder-chef Vicky Lau is reducing foreign imports by maximizing the potential of soybeans. Moving beyond conventional tofu and soy milk, Lau elevates this humble ingredient by creatively incorporating soy-based products into her dishes and even into lifestyle items like soy candles.
米其林一星餐厅 Mora 的创办人兼 主厨刘韵棋，以大豆为载体，拓展 本地食材的边界。她跳脱豆腐、豆 浆的传统框架，以创意将大豆转化 为菜肴乃至大豆蜡烛等生活物件， 降低对进口食材的依赖。
THE ESSENCE OF HONG KONG’S APPEAL
What makes Hong Kong’s food scene special is the passionate community behind it, from traditional sauce makers and innovative mixologists to dai pai dong masters and visionary chefs.
THIS SOCIAL ESSENCE – bringing people together through extraordinary food experiences – remains the heart of Hong Kong’s appeal as Asia’s ultimate dining capital, a destination where cultural heritage and unbounded innovation continuously interact to create delicious new flavors.
“Everybody wants to come and eat, everyone travels to Hong Kong for food, not just Cantonese, but also French, Italian, and the best bars in the world.
人人都为吃而来到香港 不 只粤菜，还有法菜、意菜， 以及世界顶尖的酒吧。”
VICKY CHENG 郑永麒 VEA & WING VEA 及永
“Hong Kongers are curious and keen to explore novelty in cuisine, with full appreciation of our multiculturalism.
香港的食客充满好奇， 勇于探索味蕾的未知 领域，也很欣赏本地 餐饮的多元文化。”
UMBERTO BOMBANA
8½ OTTO E MEZZO BOMBANA
“Hong Kong is a dynamic melting pot of cultures. Its reputation as a capital of top gastronomy is internationally known, and restaurants are always evolving for the better.
“What keeps me buzzing is the passion and inspiration that pops up around every corner. There are no boundaries for creativity.
这座城市最让我着迷的， 是处处涌动的热情与灵感。
”
创意从来都没有边界。
ANTONIO LAI
QUINARY & THE OPPOSITES
“Hong Kong is as diverse as a city can be. Hong Kongers love all food and keep developing ways to refine their taste for cuisine.
香港是一座极多元化的城市。
香港人热爱各种美食， 并且不断探索提升自身 美食品味的方法。”
ADAM WONG 黄隆滔 FORUM RESTAURANT 富临饭店
“Hong Kong’s bar scene is one of the best in Asia. What’s unique is that there are so many bars concentrated together in one area and the scene is very international, just like the city itself.
“Hong Kongers live to eat, deep dive into expertise and traditions, and establish the city as a melting pot of food cultures.
香港人「为食而生」 他们钻研技艺、深究 传统，将这座城市塑造成一个饮食文化熔炉。”
MAY CHOW 周思薇
LITTLE BAO 小包包
“The can-do attitude of HK-ers is instrumental in ensuring maximum efficiency and promoting the city as a global culinary destination with great restaurants and bars. We always stay ahead of the curve.
“The most important thing about Hong Kong is that people really appreciate cuisine and are motivated to fuel their passion by eating out.
在香港，最可贵的是人们真正懂得 欣赏美食，并且乐于用每一次外 出用餐，滋养对味道的热忱。”
HIDEAKI SATO 佐藤秀明
“Cantonese cuisine really resonates with me. I’ve learned so much more about the food, and I also get to work with independent purveyors, like local farms and tea houses, in creating my cocktails.
“Hong Kong is a highly developed culinary destination. It stands out by offering an unparalleled variety of live seafood and the best fresh produce from both East and West.
香港是顶尖美食之都，游水海鲜选 择丰富，东西方顶级时鲜应有尽 有 这份丰盛，世间少有。”
DANNY YIP 叶一南 THE CHAIRMAN 大班楼
COURTESY OF THE CHAIRMAN
“Hong Kong is positioned as one of the best, most sophisticated cities in the world. Its international reputation has been shaped by its desire to continue polishing and refining in a quest for perfection.
“It’s the community spirit and collective work that form Hong Kong’s heritage.
正是这种社区精神与集体努力， 塑造 了香港的文化传承。”
JAY KHAN COA
Yellow Croaker Meat Dumpling with Brown Croaker Fish Maw
transformative tastes
Hennessy celebrates the exciting Year of the Fire Horse by pairing three of its illustrious cognacs with the Michelinstarred cuisine of Yong Fu Hong Kong.
BY JOYCE KWOK
PHOTOGRAPHY BY
DAVID HARTUNG
AN EXCEPTIONAL food and wine pairing goes beyond simple harmony between glass and plate. Transcending mere enhancement of flavor, it can raise the act of dining to the level of a cultural experience. This year, Hennessy’s ongoing pairing explorations take a bold step in this direction as the famed French cognac house, with a presence in the Chinese market of more than one hundred sixty years, reveals its intimate understanding of the lunar calendar’s significance.
In 2026, with the once-every-sixtyyears arrival of the fire horse or bing wu, the heavenly “bing” fire burns with solar intensity, inspiring the earthly “wu” horse to spur transformation. To mark the momentous occasion, Hennessy unveiled The Horse Edition.
It also partnered with Yong Fu Hong Kong, celebrated for its distinctive Ningbo cuisine, to curate the Start of Spring Banquet. In this collaboration, Hennessy was set to surpass its roles as libation and collectible art, becoming an emblem of the union of Chinese and Western aesthetics.
Yong Fu Hong Kong General Manager Yu Qiong, with her deep understanding of Ningbo’s culinary heritage, saw the restaurant’s venture into pairing Hennessy with Ningbo cuisine as a logical progression: “Archaeological finds at the Hemudu culture site reveal that Ningbo’s relationship with fermented spirits dates back more than seven thousand years.” Executive Chef Liu Zhen believes that Hennessy’s rightful place at a Ningbo banquet is also attributable to the cuisine’s evolution over the past three decades: “A new wave of passionate, creative chefs on China’s culinary scene has allowed modern Ningbo cuisine to keep its essence while embracing a more innovative approach.”
Chef Liu crafted ten courses to accompany three selected Hennessy cognacs. In creating truly memorable pairings, his considerations went beyond mere flavor compatibility to achieving conceptual resonance.
The menu opened with an assortment of five cold appetizers paired with Hennessy V.S.O.P, whose fragrant sweetness and supple texture provided complementary
Claypot Braised River Eel Rice paired with Hennessy X.O
X.O
notes. The dish’s ingredients, including wind-cured eel and salted crab, require timeconsuming techniques like curing and air-drying that echo the centuries of inherited craftsmanship behind Hennessy V.S.O.P. James Hennessy, an exceptional blend that pays tribute to one of the House’s pioneering figureheads, was paired with two main courses embodying the same spirit of innovation. Monkfish Liver Rice Burger Wrapped in Caul Fat unfolded in layered textures. The luxurious richness of Zhoushan monkfish liver, contrasted with crispy pork caul fat, was nestled in a local-style fermented steamed bun. The imaginative accompaniments were seaweed powder, avocado purée, and a hint of wasabi.
Yellow Croaker Meat Dumpling with Brown Croaker Fish Maw drew inspiration from Ningbo’s traditional Sanhuang soup. A testament to the chef’s skill and creativity, the dish features fresh yellow croaker meat encased in delicate croaker maw. For classic Hennessy X.O, Chef Liu transformed one of Ningbo’s ten signature dishes into his substantial Claypot Braised River Eel Rice. Brimming with intricate nuances, both the dish and the cognac are bold and complex. A spoonful of rice followed by a sip of X.O was a meeting of equals, each elevating the other to new heights.
Time has taught Zi Yat Heen’s Executive Chinese Chef Anthony Ho a simple truth: the deepest flavors are not created but remembered.
THERE’S A DISH Anthony Ho has never forgotten. It wasn’t some grand banquet spectacle but a humble plate of sweet-and-sour pork (goo lou yuk), fragrant with the warmth of a childhood shaped by his father’s world in the Hong Kong food industry. “It was that early memory of taste,” he says simply, “that gently guided the direction of my life.”
The memory has traveled with him across Singapore, Hong Kong, Mainland China, and now Macau, where he serves as executive Chinese chef at Zi Yat Heen, the acclaimed Cantonese restaurant at Four Seasons Hotel Macao that has been awarded both a Michelin star and a Black Pearl diamond for several consecutive years. “Recognition is both affirmation and motivation to keep improving. We must always stay true to our original passion, approaching every dish with the same care and dedication as if we were cooking for our very first guest.”
To understand what that means, it helps first to understand how he interprets Cantonese cuisine itself, by distilling its essence into four characters: freshness, purity, roundedness, mellowness. Freshness embraces the principle of eating only what the season offers. Purity means honoring the truest flavor rather than masking it with culinary technique. Roundedness and mellowness speak to quiet harmony, with every element finding its natural place alongside the others.
The soul of Cantonese cuisine lies in knowing exactly when to use what and how to let its flavor speak at the right moment. As Ho explains: “Techniques will evolve, ingredients may change, but the spirit of respecting the season, respecting the ingredient, and respecting the guest – that’s what keeps traditional Cantonese cuisine timeless.”
That attentiveness gave rise to one of his most beloved creations. During a four-hands dinner in Kuala Lumpur, he encountered an elderly local Chinese gentleman who spoke fondly of a taste from his past – the aromatic wok hei of sizzling dried shallots and preserved olives. Ho turned longing into inspiration by marrying the pungent fragrance of dried shallots and the savory punch of salted olives with plump lobster, all brought to life by the intense heat of the wok. More than just the recreation of a remembered flavor, wok-fried lobster with dried shallots and salted olives became a heartfelt response, a cordial gesture conveyed through food. As Chef Ho puts it: “Our guests are our best teachers. Their yearnings are often where our creations begin.”
Zi Yat Heen’s current menu embodies that philosophy in dish after dish. The roasted Peking duck is a signature meditation. More than twentyfour hours of preparation go into each bird, with skin coaxed to a lacquerthin crispness and pancakes rolled fresh by hand every morning. Ho insists on tableside carving by chefs, a moment of exchange between culinary team and guest. Pairing options extend beyond the traditional hoisin to a curry satay sauce carrying the complex flavors of Macau’s cultural identity.
If the Peking duck represents a cherished tradition carried forward with care, the gold leaf caviar stuffed suckling pig roll makes a different argument. More than ten stages of preparation involve forty-eight hours of craftsmanship. The skin is roasted to a glassy brittleness, and the
Whole 25-Head Yoshihama Abalone with Supreme Oyster Sauce
Steamed Pork Patties, Sea Urchin, Crab Meat
Australian Lobster 澳洲龙虾
interior unfolds in careful layers of cured meats, mushrooms, dried shrimp, and Thai glutinous rice. The finishing touch is a flourish of sustainably sourced French caviar, an accent that speaks not of fusion for its own sake but of a quiet curiosity.
The chilled Amela tomato with passion fruit and osmanthus jelly offers another kind of revelation. Sometimes referred to as the “Hermès of tomatoes,” the Japanese Amela arrives with a natural sweetness and complexity that needs very little coaxing. It meets the bright acidity of passion fruit and the gentle floral whisper of osmanthus in a thoughtful composition where premium ingredients converse not in opulence but in harmony.
Ho’s newest creation, steamed pork patties crowned with sea urchin and coral crabmeat, brings his entire philosophy into focus in a single dish. Rooted in the soulful comfort of a traditional home-style recipe, it is elevated by bold, imaginative touches. The result is a balance of contrasts, each element coexisting without conflict, each bite unfolding in layers.
Spring arrives at Zi Yat Heen with a menu that reads like an ode to the season’s abundance: steamed star garoupa rolls with bamboo piths
and Yunnan ham, finished with a whisper of caviar; purple asparagus with sautéed clam, Chinese chives, and black truffle; French morel mushrooms stir-fried with sautéed sliced lotus root, simultaneously earthy and ethereal.
For those who want to go deeper, Ho is hosting an Abalone Master Class this season that will guide VIP guests through the art of preparing one of the Cantonese cuisine’s most revered ingredients. Beginning with a welcome cocktail, the event ends with a bespoke abalone dinner.
The restaurant has also revived its Cantonese-style dessert trolley, a rolling gallery of nostalgia where guests may choose from a daily rotation of traditional Chinese pastries and Western sweets, each a small ceremony of anticipation.
Watching the young chefs in his kitchen grow prouder and more focused with each recognition the restaurant receives, Ho reflects: “People ask me what Zi Yat Heen sells, and I tell them, it’s not just Cantonese cuisine. It’s the feeling of being cared for. In an age where everything is AI-driven, there are still people willing to spend twentyfour hours on a roast duck, forty-eight hours on a single handmade dish, people who take the time to remember a regular guest’s preferences. That almost stubborn devotion might be what makes this place truly irreplaceable.”
The Michelin stars and Black Pearl diamonds serve a purpose beyond validation. They forge a collective identity, a quiet understanding among the team that their daily, almost obstinate, commitment to craft is the driving force behind Zi Yat Heen’s steady advance.
Barbecued Suckling Pig with Kristal Caviar and Gold Leaf
以本致新
innovation with roots
At DIVA, Chef Kwok-Hung Cheng brings his unique contemporary touch to time-honored Cantonese cuisine.
MACAU, A CITY WHERE MASTER CHEFS ABOUND and Michelinand Black Pearl-listed restaurants dominate the scene, has become a prestigious and competitive arena for high-end Chinese cuisine. But Chef Kwok-Hung Cheng, who was born in nearby Hong Kong, isn’t the least bit fazed by the challenge.
After leading top-tier Chinese restaurants in Singapore and Taipei, he returned last year to the local area to become executive Chinese chef at DIVA, W Macau – Studio City’s signature Cantonese restaurant.
High on the hotel’s fortieth floor, DIVA features an art deco-influenced interior whose dining space transforms as night falls into a stage with the city’s dazzling skyline as backdrop. The striking decor has served to inspire a clear direction for Chef Cheng’s culinary approach: “DIVA’s cuisine must be equally stylish,” he says, “but it can’t forget its roots.”
郑师傅先后领军新加坡、中国 台北的星级中餐厅后，于去年底毅然 回归港澳，接掌澳门新濠影汇 W 酒 店的粤菜餐厅「嬅」，成为中餐行政 总厨。
For the chef, “its roots” implies faithfulness to the local food culture and to the core philosophy of Cantonese cuisine. Cheng points out that before Portuguese settlers arrived in the mid-Ming dynasty, Macau was a fishing village, home to thousands of fishermen who unloaded and sold their fresh catches at the Inner Harbour piers. Only later did the settlement grow to become a maritime trading port. Using this slice of Macau’s history to tell cultural stories, he has carefully stocked a row of glass fish tanks in the kitchen with live seasonal seafood, ranging from Australian rock lobster to tiger grouper. Every selection is perfectly cooked to order to ensure that guests enjoy the freshest possible contemporary dining experience of Macau’s heritage.
Modern Chinese cuisine has popularized individual portions, a trend that has gradually replaced the traditional large-servingplatter format. Besides savoring the flavors of the dishes, guests are
encouraged to appreciate them with their eyes. “Taste is, of course, important,” notes Cheng, “but visual presentation makes the first impression, and it requires thoughtful planning and design.”
A good example is the restaurant’s signature dim sum, Shrimp Dumplings, Caviar. Half of the dough is first tinted a dreamy purple using water colored with butterfly pea flowers. The dumplings are then filled with handpicked crabmeat, shrimp, asparagus, and other ingredients before being artfully folded. When the steamer lid is lifted, three elegant “butterflies” appear on the plate.
With main courses, Chef Cheng also strives for delicate, refined presentation. For his Sautéed A5 Wagyu Beef with
Stir-fried Sliced Abalone, Black Truffle Sauce 黑松露酱爆鲜鲍柳
Morel Mushrooms, Chinese Yam, the tender meat is cut into precise, bite-sized morsels before serving. “I believe a firstclass Chinese chef always considers the guest’s perspective: Can every dish be elegantly managed and neatly eaten? Are there small hidden bones that might make dining awkward?”
This attentiveness extends especially to seafood. Traditional Cantonese restaurants always serve whole fish, but at DIVA, they are meticulously filleted and cut into bite-sized pieces, sparing guests the hassle of picking out bones at the table. For the popular Stir-fried Sole Fillets, Shallots, Garlic, Chef Cheng specifically selects Macau sole, deftly removing the two whole fillets and then using precise knife work to cut them into twenty evenly sized, square pieces. “Because they are so thin, frying them
requires concentration,” he says. “A careless two or three seconds extra, and the flesh will toughen.” The resulting sole, achieving deliciously consistent flavor and texture, is both crispy and meltingly tender.
From a perusal of the restaurant’s winter menu, it’s clear that Cheng, as he continues to explore bold presentation, always honors the Cantonese tradition of “Tasting the Seasons.” Dishes from Braised Lamb Belly and Fish Maw in Clear Broth to Roasted Goose with Taro, Soya Sauce demonstrate his deep rapport with the seasonal sensibilities of Cantonese and Chaozhou cuisines. His creativity within tradition offers fresh perspectives to guests while reinforcing the restaurant’s new positioning around “precise knife work, traditional craftsmanship, and innovation.”
Chef Cheng’s leadership points a way forward for modern Chinese fine dining, not in imitating Western forms but in delving ever-deeper into Asian culinary traditions and applying masterful skills to writing a new chapter in an age-old story.
excavating flavors
In Hangzhou Botanical Garden, Ru Yuan has become Chef Fu Yueliang’s workshop for cultural memory.
Chinese Celery and Snow Pear
WITHIN A GARDEN’S VERDANT DEPTHS, Chef Fu Yueliang is conducting what might be today’s most important “archaeological dig” in the field of Chinese cuisine – except that his tools are cleavers, not brushes, and his artifacts are flavors buried beneath decades of standardization.
“Call me Chef Fu,” he says. This simple preference defines a man who walked away from the gleaming towers of international hospitality to found Ru Yuan, his “lonely restaurant – my deliberately imperfect translation of ‘guardian,’” a name suggesting both solitude and duty.
At Ru Yuan, which claimed a Michelin star within seven months and a second within a year, Fu methodically rebuilds Hangzhou culinary traditions nearly worn down by the logic of efficiency. His Pagoda Braised Pork Belly, for example, represents not innovation for its own sake but rather a “restoration project across time.”
INTERVIEWED BY EDDIE CHEUNG • WORDS BY JOEY CHEANG
He transformed the classic by slicing a six-centimeter cube of pork belly into a four-hundred-centimeter-long ribbon two millimeters thin in under three minutes, a feat of knife work that turned rustic comfort food into edible architecture. But the real breakthrough came when he began varying the filling seasonally: smoked bamboo shoots in spring, chestnuts in autumn, ginkgo nuts in winter. “Diners expect tradition,” he explains, “but they also deserve surprise.”
Analytical precision married to seasonal improvisation defines Fu’s approach to reviving Hangzhou cuisine. Take his Poached Marble Goby with Sweet Vinegar Sauce, refined through seventy-five versions, or Longjing Shrimp, based on research that justified his insistence on smallbatch wok cooking and was later confirmed by food historian Li Ke in Liang Shiqiu’s writings.
Ru Yuan’s loud acclaim tells one story, but the real narrative unfolds in Fu’s quieter moments – perfecting the balance between tea fragrance and shrimp sweetness, consulting texts to understand why vinegar fish should evoke crab, refusing to let servers explain dishes: “The first bite belongs to the guest.”
His partner, Iris Tan, brings operational exactitude honed through two decades in luxury hospitality. A certified sommelier who approaches wine
pairings with the same rigor Fu applies to recipes, she ensures that Ru Yuan’s service matches its culinary ambitions. Even the restaurant’s design by Taiwanese architect Liu Ronglu mirrors the cuisine’s tension between preservation and progress. Traditional materials meet contemporary techniques; shadows and light create what Fu describes as “rustic serenity.”
Fu’s definition of authenticity challenges contemporary obsession with the new. His Four Happiness Dumplings, for instance, honor Qing Dynasty imperial banquets with a skin-to-filling ratio that speaks to technical mastery serving historical accuracy. His Eight Treasures of Hangzhou soup reimagines Buddha Jumps Over the Wall as something lighter, cleaner, but no less complex. “Hangzhou’s essence,” he notes, “is restraint within richness.”
Fu’s recognition as 2026 Black Pearl Restaurant Guide Chef of the Year validates this approach and suggests that China’s food culture hungers for depth alongside novelty. In the Mainland’s rapidly evolving dining landscape, where chains scale overnight and social media creates instant sensations, Fu represents something almost anachronistic: the chef as cultural custodian, the restaurant as research institute, the meal as historical dialogue.
Bean Curd Stick Soup with Lotusshaped Bird’s Nest, Snow Pear Pastry, Lotus Seed and Quail Egg 燕窝莲花酥莲子云衣羮
Kaeo “sea tulip”
Kaeo 的海郁金香
HONOR THE WILD
At Amisfield, chef Vaughan Mabee translates the rugged terrain of New Zealand’s Central Otago into an unforgettable culinary narrative of artistry and respect.
Little oak trees
IN THE DEEP SOUTH of New Zealand, where the razor-edged peaks of The Remarkables pierce the sky and the glacial waters of Lake Wakatipu lie like polished stone, a region declares itself without apology. This is Queenstown’s backyard – Central Otago – a landscape of theatrical beauty and clear, cold light. Here, amid the pioneering vines of the Amisfield Winery on the shores of Lake Hayes, a restaurant conducts a singular dialogue with this untamed place. And the interpreter is a chef who speaks its raw, alluring language.
Vaughan Mabee, a man of glorious contradiction, is a chef with the hands of a hunter and the heart of a poet, a culinary figure of global repute who finds his truth in solitude. To dine at Amisfield is to be guided by him along a culinary plotline where respect is not a garnish but the foundation. His ethos, though disarmingly simple, demands everything: “When you kill something, you honor it. You see its beauty.” From this principle, a twenty-five-course odyssey is born.
At the outdoor hearth, burning birch wood slowly renders the whole beast in its own fat, the rich aroma of wild game scenting the alpine air.
味在自溶脂油中缓缓炙熟，山 林间弥漫着馥郁的香气。
Wild New Zealand duck salami
To understand the meal, you must first understand the sourcing, a web of relationships woven into the fabric of land and sea. It begins on the wind-whipped coast at Bluff, the mainland’s southernmost tip, where Mabee’s fifteen-year partnership with free-diver Aaron transcends commerce. It’s a pursuit of the pristine, exemplified by the blackfoot pāua, a decadeold abalone that becomes the star of an audacious years-long experiment. This is a cuisine built on community and patience, a philosophy that flows as naturally as the estate’s celebrated pinot noir from the schist-rich soils of the vineyard itself.
The story unfolds with a forager’s grace. An opening gesture of smoked tawaka fungus, delicate as a pale flower, nestles in the thorny embrace of a matagouri branch. Then, in a signature act of technical poetry, white asparagus from Amisfield’s long-standing grower is shaved into hundreds of strands and reassembled into a fragile sweet bundle – an elegant thought on a plate.
But the true drama awaits upstairs. The transition is a sensory jolt as the refined hush of the main dining room gives way to a darker, more primal space. The heavy door swings open to AC/DC’s electrifying “Thunderstruck,” a sound cue for what comes next. This is Private Taste of the Wild, and Mabee presides with a butcher’s focused authority. Here, that Bluff pāua, combined with wild boar fat and fermented for more than sixteen months, is presented as a saucisson. A translucent slice held over glowing charcoal blooms with a smoky, umamirich fragrance, the embedded pāua glowing like amber glass. The taste is a stunning convergence of forest floor and ancient ocean.
The room is a cabinet of culinary curios that challenge form and feeling. A mallard beak – its edible counterpart a liquid-nitrogen-set consommé – is stuffed with duck rillette and fermented elderberry. Mabee heats his knife to a blaze to slice it clean. Then, the piece that steals breath: the Flying Salami. A meticulously taxidermied duck – its bones removed, its form preserved with sail-making stitches learned by Mabee from his father – is stuffed with forcemeat of its own and its mate’s flesh.
“These ducks mate for life,” explains the chef, whose flying bird of love is the ultimate, poignant testament to his philosophy, an artistry that generates awe.
The narrative pivots effortlessly seaward. A jewel from the Southern Ocean, New Zealand king crab, is presented with minimalist precision. The sweet, delicate meat is adorned only by a drizzle of its own clear broth – a study in pure flavor.
The culmination arrives outdoors, beside fire.
Mabee’s Whole Beast Presentation renders the philosophy tangible. A Fiordland deer is offered in totality, its loin barbecued over flame, its bones, hung vertically for hours, dripping into a foundational sauce glazed with Bluff seaweed. Mountain meets ocean in woodsmoke.
This high-wire performance takes place in deliberate counterpoint to Mabee’s private world. He retreats to a rustic mountain home, his “hobbit hole,” where a self-hunted pheasant becomes a golden pithivier, or a whitebait omelet is served on cheap white bread, to be eaten – by family rule – with hands.
Farther still, in a secluded cabin with Duke, his dog, time expands. He might barbecue a whole lamb for seven hours for the ultimate sandwich or patiently curate his catches in a personal charcuterie room. These are not escapes from his craft but its essential source code, interior monologues that fuel the public conversation.
At Amisfield, Vaughan Mabee works at the farthest edge of exegesis. His technique, honed from European culinary structure to the foragingled avant-garde, is applied not to impress but to listen. Every partnership, every gathered ingredient, every patient year serves the single goal of clearing the noise so that the fiercely beautiful voice of Central Otago can make itself heard. What one takes away, more than the memory of extraordinary food, are the echoes of a tale of the wild, deeply felt, intimately understood, and faithfully honored.
Chef Rasmus Munk organizes a five-day culinary conference of sharing, comparing, and learning.
There’s a moment of collective excitement, where the absolute stillness of a crowd’s concentration can also feel like vigorous movement, their silence like the loudest of cries.
On a snowy January morning, as the rich notes of a tenor voice drifted onto the stage of Copenhagen’s DR Koncerthuset, an audience of culinary students, international chefs, gastronomy media, and food enthusiasts were at once motionless, quiet, and energized. Speakers were preparing to discuss the intersection of gastronomy, art, and ethics at a oneday symposium, part of CONVERGENCE, a larger culinary conference held in the Danish capital and organized by Alchemist Restaurant and Chef Rasmus Munk.
Chef Josh Niland of Saint Peter in Sydney wheeled a large trolley displaying a perfectly butchered pike perch onto the stage to demonstrate just how many parts of the creature are suitable for consumption – an object lesson in avoiding waste. Chef Vicky Cheng from Wing in Hong Kong delivered a paean to cultural collaboration, explaining how his use of Chinese ingredients with French cooking
悉尼 Saint Peter 餐厅的主厨 Josh Niland 将一 辆展示着完美分割的梭鲈的大推车推上舞台，亲身 示范这条鱼有多少部位适合食用 这是一节关 于避免浪费的实物教学。香港永餐厅的主厨郑永麒 则赞颂了文化协作，他解释自己如何以中国食材 结合法式烹饪技法，展现烹饪如何联结而非分裂
In Alchemist’s kitchen, chefs take a break from mise en place. 厨师们忙里偷闲，暂停备料工作。
人们。意大利 Al Gatto Verde 餐厅的主厨 Jessica Rosval 深入探讨身份的定义，让与会者热泪盈眶。
techniques shows how cooking can unite rather than divide. Chef Jessica Rosval of Al Gatto Verde in Italy brought the audience to the brink of tears as she delved into the definition of identity. She shared the philosophy of ubuntu – the idea that our existence matters only in relation to others, that our identity is at once personal and communal.
Anne-Claire Yemsi Paillissé, an academic from Toulouse, France, got the audience to pondering the definition of art and how gastronomy may be viewed as artistic expression.
The idea for CONVERGENCE came about at the end of 2025, when Munk was feeling unsettled about world events threatening to fracture communities. He decided to invite more than sixty chefs from six continents to share ideas by day and cook together at night from January 29 to February 2, 2026.
Every year international culinary events like the Michelin and 50 Best awards offer wonderful opportunities for busy chefs to meet, cement friendships, and share ideas. The main purpose of these ceremonies, however, is to present industry awards, something that generates an atmosphere of healthy competition among the attending chefs. Munk wanted this gathering to be free from any individual quest for success, choosing the name to evoke a sense of
coming together in the spirit of sharing. On this occasion there are equal rewards for all participants: inspiration, new ideas, and extraordinary culinary experiences.
The symposium, which took place on Friday, was open to the public. On other mornings, participants made their way to SPORA , the research laboratory close to Alchemist for a series of more intimate talks from chefs who would be cooking at the event. Between the talks, attendees discussed big ideas – diversity, geography, migration, climate, seasons – and their effects on food identity, as well as the ever-present question of the definition of art, and whether gastronomy can be considered as such.
The idea emerged that, in every form it takes, art involves some level of interaction, that art is best experienced in company and that there is beauty in the comparison of perceptions. And if art can offer a learning moment, so much the better. It became clear as the speakers took turns that over the course of the five days, CONVERGENCE participants would indeed share, compare, and learn together.
One argument against gastronomy as art is often the utility of cuisine, the fact that we need food, that it is not optional, and that the act of eating changes our cellular structure in a way that listening to music or admiring a painting does not. But, while food affects the body on a physiological level, other art forms also have a transformative effect. Art provokes emotions, and emotions display themselves physically: breathing quickens or pauses, skin warms or cools, tears fill our eyes, we laugh or feel fear, disgust, or shock.
Each night, no fewer than twelve international chefs joined Munk and his large brigade to create a special feast. Guests at Alchemist can usually expect fifty “impressions” – small bite-sized courses designed to provoke thought, spark the imagination, and delight the palate. Moving through different zones of the restaurant, they met chefs and performers and are entranced by projections on the ceiling of his hemisphere-shaped upstairs dining room.
Denmark has plans to recognize gastronomy as an art form.
By contrast, during the five nights of CONVERGENCE, there were thirty to forty dishes. Dining was more static than usual. Guests began in the downstairs area of the restaurant with a selection of snacks, then moved upstairs and were seated to enjoy creations by both visiting chefs and the Alchemist team. The floor space was packed with chefs presenting their dishes directly to diners, the domed ceiling quietly mesmerized, a seascape changed from colorful activity to pale decay, a huge heart surrounded by blood vessels pulsed, petals fell, and the names of participating chefs rotated above diners’ heads.
In this environment, a powerhouse of creative energy, it was hard to argue against gastronomy qualifying as an art form in light of the theatrical nature of the space; the care, precision, and emotion behind each perfectly designed dish; and the performance elements of service that came together like a multidisciplinary installation.
In this environment, a powerhouse of creative energy, it was hard to argue against gastronomy qualifying as an art form.
在这个充满创意能量的环
Back at the symposium, when the opera singer left the stage, Danish Minister for Culture Jakob Engel-Schmidt announced that his government would be exploring the possibility of formally recognizing gastronomy as an artistic expression, placing it in the same cultural realm as music and the performing and visual arts.
This news took both audience and organizers by surprise, provoking a spontaneous burst of applause for a message which seemed nearly as lyrical as the singer’s aria. Alchemist Head of Communication/Scriptwriter Lena Ilkjaer took the stage and mimed dropping her microphone with palpable delight. Thanks to the New Nordic Food Movement in the early 2000s and, more recently, the creative and socially conscious influence of Alchemist, Denmark has long been seen as a destination for culinary innovation. With the government now considering the recognition of gastronomy as art, the country is positioning itself as global front-runner.
Legendary chef Wolfgang Puck brings iconic dining brand Spago to Shanghai.
Grilled and roasted Australian rib-eye steak, served with cheddar-cheese-topped baked potatoes, celery root purée, and a reduced red wine sauce
PERCHED HIGH ATOP THE ST. REGIS on the Bund, Spago, Shanghai, offers guests the trademark culinary style of one of the world’s most celebrated chefs accompanied by spectacular views of the city skyline.
Wolfgang Puck believes that Shanghai – a place where tradition and innovation collide every day – is a city that authentically manifests the everevolving art of cuisine. And it’s precisely because Puck’s California cuisine is not confined by boundaries that it has found an apt new expression on the Bund, not by replicating Spago’s Beverly Hills flagship but by rediscovering the balance between the familiar and the fresh in the context of Shanghai.
BY REGINA LI • PHOTOGRAPHY BY DAVID HARTUNG
One example of a brilliantly fresh Spago idea that has become a familiar favorite is its famous smoked salmon pizza. The combination of dill sour cream, red onion, chives, and smoked salmon, established when Spago Beverly Hills opened in 1982, has remained virtually unchanged, and in Shanghai, it lives on. “A classic remains a classic because it has stood the test of time,” notes Executive Chef Luke Omarzu. “And we wouldn’t change it just because we’re in a different city.”
The Spago brand, operating in multiple global locations, has taken Omarzu around the world. With his international experience serving as a vast pool of culinary inspiration, he encourages employees from diverse backgrounds to propose ideas and share family memories and regional traditions. Each Spago restaurant makes use of worldwide resources in selecting the perfect elements for its local context.
The results of this cultural fusion are on delicious display in every dish. Spago Shanghai’s grilled and roasted Australian rib-eye steak, served with cheddar-cheese-topped baked potatoes, celery root purée, and a reduced red wine sauce, meets the city’s predilections for charcoal-fired cooking and top-tier ingredients while also aligning with the tenets of Wolfgang Puck’s culinary philosophy – high temperature, rapid cooking, and preservation of natural flavors. “Here in China, we stay true to our methods,” says Omarzu. “Charcoal fire, premium meats, classic sauces – these are the foundations of Spago.”
Luke Omarzu
传奇名厨 Wolfgang Puck 将其标志性的烹饪艺术带到坐落于上海外 滩瑞吉酒店之巅的 Spago，并伴以城市天际线的壮丽景致。
Wolfgang Puck 认为上海这个传统与创新每天碰撞的城市，正 是餐饮艺术不断演进的最佳诠释之地。因他开创的加州料理本身并 不设限，才能在外滩找到新的表达方式 不是复制 Spago Beverly Hills，而是在上海的语境中再次找到熟悉与新鲜之间的关系。
TIAO’s creative cocktails, layered with rich storytelling, promise the authentic flavors of Beijing. time and taste
Caochang Hutong
TIAO
十条
NESTLED AT THE CORNER where Caochang Alley meets the bustling thoroughfare, TIAO, the contemporary cocktail bar at Mandarin Oriental Qianmen, Beijing, evokes the traditional charm of old Beijing hutongs with stylishly modern flair. In its uniquely imaginative cocktails, the authentic essence of Beijing blends seamlessly with contemporary life.
Spanning two floors, the bar, named for the hutong on which it resides, conjures a sense of reflection on past and present. The cocktail menu, now in its third edition, Worlds Apart, finds inspiration in the concept of “Parallel Timelines.” By drawing on the fourand-a-half-century legacy of Caochang Hutong, it intertwines meaningful chapters in the city’s story with global historical events.
“We see Beijing’s heritage from a ‘worldview’ perspective,” says Head Bartender Matt Guo, who honed his skills in the UK, has worked for several international luxury hotel brands, and has been widely recognized in global bartending competitions, including placing among the UK’s top fifty in the 2024 World Class bartending competition. “At the time Newton was discovering gravity, for instance, fascinating things were also happening here.
“Hutongs,” he notes, “are like time tunnels, allowing one to explore the profound historical and cultural heritage of Beijing.” By building on
首席调酒师郭威说：「我们以『世界观』 来看待北京的文化历史。」郭威在英国积累 了丰富经验，并曾就职于多家国际顶级酒店 品牌。他的才华在国际调酒赛事中屡获认可， 2024 年在 World Class 世界调酒大赛中更成 功入围英国前五十。「比如说同一个时间，牛 顿发现了地心引力，北京也正在发生一些有 意思的事情。」
classic cocktail frameworks and incorporating local flavors, Guo creates one-of-a-kind experiences that are complex in taste and rich in storytelling, offering guests a glimpse into the vibrant daily life of the city.
One of the bar’s signature drinks is the Caochang Hutong. “There’s a local Guizhou sour soup hotpot, known for its fermented sour taste,” says Guo, “and we wanted to express this with a Tiki-style cocktail. We use whiskey and baijiu as the base, infusing it with frozen green Sichuan peppercorns for added flavor and soul. The baijiu is first coldbrewed with jasmine tea to amp up the floral and tea notes, and then we add a touch of fermented sourness found in Guizhou sour soup.”
Much like Beijing’s winding and intersecting hutongs, brimming with history, the story of TIAO flows through every glass. And, says Guo, Worlds Apart is hardly the denouement, because future chapters are already brewing.
LIÁNG celebrates Lingnan heritage with dramatic design and creative cocktails.
The interior design reimagines the classic Lingnan architectural element with sleek modernity. 简约现代的空间设计重绎传统岭南建筑精髓。
WRAPPED IN THE EVENING’S EMBRACE, Mandarin Oriental, Guangzhou’s newly opened cocktail bar, LIÁNG, brings architectural elegance and innovative flavors to a metropolis that is both open to the world and deeply rooted in traditional Lingnan culture. Every raised glass is a toast to the bar’s fresh interpretation of the city’s vibrant Pearl River nightlife scene.
LIÁNG ’s interior, drawing inspiration from the allimportant crossbeam of traditional Lingnan architecture, is crafted by renowned Steve Leung Design Group. A magnificent horizontal beam stretching across the room serves as both structural support and visual focal point, prompting a dialogue between contemporary design language and classic Lingnan structural themes. What historically was an indispensable element of mechanical stability becomes a contemporary artistic form that bridges past and present and achieves a satisfying balance between age-old structural necessity and modern luxury.
Beneath this iconic feature, the main bar transforms into an immersive theater of light and shadow where wooden finishes of varying textures mingle harmoniously with polished metals. The indoor space gracefully extends to an open-air courtyard with an ambiance that blends elegance and ease.
The main bar showcases textured woods in varied finishes, engaging in a harmonious dialogue with polished metals. 在主吧台，不同质感的木饰与抛光金属相映成趣。
Amid this striking setting, skilled mixologists perform their liquid alchemy. Following the bar’s unique “Structural Mixology” approach, based on architectural aesthetics and Eastern philosophy, they construct each drink with the same meticulous attention to detail that was practiced by the master builders of traditional Lingnan structures. The five Chinese elements of wood, fire, earth, metal, and water are symbolically integrated into the flavor profiles and presentations of eight signature cocktails that embody the essence of Lingnan culture.
Among these is Wood’s Respite, whose base of calvados is infused with the delicate aroma of jasmine tea liqueur. Evoking a spring breeze in a Lingnan courtyard, it is fresh, invigorating, and perfectly quenching.
For whiskey enthusiasts, Vermilion Beam offers a vivacious blend of strawberry jam and Ratafia Rossi cherry liqueur. Adorned with a fiery flourish of red chili threads, it conveys the passionate intensity of Yang.
Yin Harmony, which reimagines the classic Lingnan beverage zhu zhe mao gen, features freshly pressed sugarcane juice, pear, and gin. Its soothing sensation and herbal fragrance offer a pleasurably sweet experience that seeks to harmonize the body’s “hot air” with the cooling power of Yin.
Beneath LIÁNG’s central beam, glasses clink in celebration, and each sip becomes an encounter with tradition. The bar – in everything from interior design to its cocktail menu – carries on Mandarin Oriental, Guangzhou’s signature aesthetic ethos of understated sophistication. And, in tribute to Lingnan culture, it eloquently expresses the East’s philosophy of “finding beauty in structure, attaining harmony through balance.”
Wing Lei Bar & Friends celebrates global connection in the heart of Macau by transforming Wynn Palace into a year-long platform for international bartending talent.
MACAU HAS ALWAYS THRIVED on exchange. For centuries, cultures have intersected here, shaping a city defined by dynamism and dialogue. At Wing Lei Bar, that same energy now finds contemporary expression.
With Wing Lei Bar & Friends, the twenty-nine seat salon positions itself as a deliberate convergence point for the international bartending community. Across four quarterly volumes in 2026, acclaimed bars from Asia and the world’s most influential cocktail capitals – including New York, London, and Tokyo – will take up residence behind the bar. Rather than asking guests to travel the globe in search of great drinks, Wing Lei Bar brings the world to Macau.
BY JOEY CHEANG
“Wing Lei Bar & Friends” 计划让这仅设 29 个座 位的酒吧，成为国际调酒界的交汇点。在 2026 年的四个季度中，来自亚洲及全球 最具影响力的调酒之都（包括纽约、伦敦、 东京）的顶尖酒吧，将轮席驻场。永利吧 不再让宾客远渡重洋寻访佳酿，而是将世 界带到澳门。
This is exchange in its purest form. Techniques are shared, 澳门一直在交流中茁壮。数百年来，文化在此交汇， 形塑出一座以活力与对话著称的城市。如今，这股能 量在永利吧以现代形式得到了展现。
local ingredients meet international perspectives, and classics are reinterpreted through varied cultural lenses. More than a guest shift, each weekend becomes a conversation.
That philosophy extends beyond what is poured. Inspired by football culture, the campaign introduces a year-long collectible sticker series featuring visiting bartenders and their signature cocktails. “We’re turning guest shifts into a collector’s sport,” says Head Mixologist Mark Lloyd. “It’s a way to make these moments tangible, something you can take home, trade, and return for.” Playful yet intentional, the concept reflects a belief that great bars are built not only on craft but also on connection.
The spirit of exchange is equally distilled in UNITY, Lloyd’s newly reintroduced signature menu. Created after a year of international travel and collaboration, UNITY reads like a collection of friendships translated into liquid form. Precision and creativity sit alongside personal narrative, reinforcing the idea that the best bars evolve through communication.
Following Wynn’s role in hosting the Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2025 awards, Wing Lei Bar is no longer simply celebrating global talent – it’s convening it. In doing so, it reinforces Macau’s status not just as a luxury destination but as a gathering place where ideas interact and the art of exchange comes alive.
这份理念，延伸至杯中物以外。活动受足球文 化启发，推出一系列全年可收集的限量贴纸，收录驻 场调酒师及其招牌鸡尾酒的肖像。首席调酒师 Mark Lloyd 表示：「我们把客席调酒变成一项收藏游戏，让 这些瞬间变得触手可及，成为你可以带回家、交换、 甚至为此再度回访的纪念品。」这个概念既有玩味而不 失深意，亦反映了一个信念：优秀的酒吧不只建基于 技艺，更系于人与人的连结之上。
这种交流精神同样浓缩于 Mark 重新推出的招牌 酒单「众味合一」之中。这份酒单酝酿于一整年的国 际游历与合作，如同一段段友谊的液态珍藏。精准与 创意并存，个人叙事交织其中，再次印证：最好的酒吧， 总在对话中演进。
Wing Lei Bar & Friends celebrates the art of exchange with guest bartending talent from around the world.
“Wing Lei Bar & Friends” 计划汇聚全球调酒人才，共谱交流艺术。
local liquid wanderlust
ARGO’s new cocktail menu takes guests in two directions on a flavor-filled Hong Kong expedition of discovery.
THE CAREER of ARGO Beverage Manager Jonathan Gabbay has been one long worldwide professional tour – from the French city of Lyon where he was born to Hong Kong, via Paris, Geneva, and Miami. Now the multitalented mixologist has decided to press pause and drink in the extraordinary beauty, culture, community, and industry that Hong Kong has to offer.
Ranked No. 11 on the list of Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2025, ARGO is known for its restless curiosity and a penchant for creating drinks that tell compelling stories. Gabbay’s latest menu, Exploration, carries on that spirit with twelve new cocktails in two chapters. Six drinks are the products of collaboration with Hong Kong craftspeople, and six speak of the region’s terroir and seasonal local produce.
For chapter one, “Local Encounters,” Argo’s bartenders crafted thought-provoking cocktails that feel reflective and personal by joining forces with six local artisans: herb-infused spirits producer Magnolia Lab, wildly popular Big JJ Seafood Hotpot, modern cha chaan teng Tai On Coffee & Tea, agrofood brand LoCoFARMS, nature-inspired artist Tam Mei Yi Amy, and traditional tattoo master Marcus Yuen of The 59 Tattoo studio.
Layered, textured, and playful, these drinks are exemplified by the joyous Hong Kong Punch. A co-creation with Tai On Coffee & Tea in tribute to the city’s sophisticated beverage culture, it’s a blend of Rémy Martin V.S.O.P, Iichiko Shochu, and Magnolia Lab Magnolia Oriental Botanical Liqueur topped with black tea and egg tart foam and served with a butter tartlet for scooping the foam.
Chapter two, “Seasonal Journeys,” turns to the land with six cocktails that are shaped by all that the city and its surroundings offer naturally throughout the year. Clean and direct, they align with the contemporary appetite for simplicity – with surprises. Based on the structure of modern classics, each is anchored by a seasonal ingredient: roots, herbs, florals, nuts, pickled notes. It’s a menu that shifts with the calendar, bringing guests new delights with every visit.
ARGO 酒水经理 Jonathan Gabbay 的职涯是一场漫长的环球巡礼 从出生地里昂，途经巴黎、日内瓦、迈阿密。如今，他决定在香港 稍作停驻，细细品味这里的美景、文化、社群与行业魅力。
在第一章 “Local Encounters” 中，ARGO 与六位本 地匠人合作，调制出引人沉思又充满个人色彩的鸡尾酒： 草本烈酒「五味杂陈」、珍姐海鲜火锅饭店、大安茶氷厅、 农食品牌「本地种植」、以自然为灵感的艺术家谭美怡，以及 The 59 Tattoo 的纹身大师 Marcus Yuen。
这些调酒层次丰富、质感鲜明、玩味十足。其中 Hong Kong Punch 是与大安茶氷厅共同创作的佳作，向香港的饮品文化致敬。 它融合了人头马 V.S.O.P 干邑、亦竹烧酒与「五味杂陈」同名烈酒， 顶部覆盖红茶与蛋挞泡沫，并伴以一块用来舀取泡沫的牛油挞。
Perhaps the best thing about a journey, however diverting, is the comfort of returning home. And in cocktail terms, homecoming arrives in the form of “Timeless Passages,” a lineup of ten classics with an ARGO twist that have been on the menu since opening day.
e had barely settled into our first game drive when the radio crackled. Lions on the high plains. Our guide, Tele – lean, angular, binoculars on a chest harness –
looked back to ask if we wanted to try and catch them before the sun set. He put the Land Cruiser in gear and off we went.
The drive up the escarpment took fifteen minutes: we bucked across red dirt ruts, everyone holding onto whatever they could reach, and at the top, the world opened up and went quiet.
Five lionesses had arranged themselves on a mound of red earth at different heights, like a band posed for a portrait by Annie Leibovitz. The matriarch was at the summit with an arrogant air while the others sat around her in various attitudes of solidarity, but also some with expressions that hinted at private, ongoing grievances. For several minutes nobody moved. Then the matriarch gave an enormous yawn and walked off. The others followed one by one into the tall grass until there was nothing left but the empty red mound and the last of the light.
Tele passed back wool blankets and hot-water bottles. The highland air at eighteen hundred meters has an edge to it once the sun drops, and as everyone digested what they had seen, there were long stretches when the diesel clatter of the engine was the only sound on the drive home.
Suyian Lodge is &Beyond’s first new lodge in fifteen years, set on a forty-four-thousand-acre conservancy with fourteen suites and a maximum of twenty-eight guests. “In The Mara, you might have fifty vehicles at a single sighting,” says Pixie Iuel, the general manager. “Here, you might not see another soul all day.” To open the lodge, Pixie drove into the four surrounding communities and interviewed people on instinct – two hundred in Kinamba in a single day. Seventy-eight percent of the staff come from those communities and some were herding cattle the year before.
“I joined &Beyond in 2006,” Charity Cheruiyot tells us over dinner, arms crossed, bracelets catching the candlelight, her eyes scanning the room with the unconscious rhythm of someone who’s spent twenty years reading the bush. “Coming to twenty years now. As the first female guide in Kenya.”
Vulturine guinea fowl. The largest of the guinea fowl species, native to East Africa’s dry grasslands and thornbush.
A lioness readies her muscles for a hunt with a downward dog pose – claws dug in, spine at full extension, everything taut. Her companion stays low, alert with ears pitched forward. Laikipia lions are leaner than the prides in the Mara, shaped by rougher country and longer distances. The grassland is sparser and the prey scatters wide, so a pride can cover more ground in a night than most visitors will drive in a day.
Her mother wanted her to be a teacher or a nurse. Her father paid for her to study tourism – six months, then another six, then another six. She graduated into nothing. It was 2002.
She picked up a waitressing job in Nairobi. At the restaurant, someone mentioned a company called Conservation Corporation Africa, which later became &Beyond. Charity walked off the street into their office, left her CV with a receptionist, and walked out. “I was like, maybe by the time I get home, my CV will be in a dustbin.”
Months later, they called. Could she drive a vehicle?
She could not.
They told her to enroll in driving school. Before she could finish the course, they called again for a trainee guide position. She got a temporary travel document and a license in a week and showed up with both in hand. “They looked at me and said, I’ve never seen a sense of urgency like you have.”
They sent her to Tanzania for training. The roads had flooded. She spent her first night outside in a stuck vehicle. In the morning they crossed the Grumeti River on ropes tied between trees, the water swollen and brown below.
“They told me after we crossed that there were crocodiles and hippos in that river. I’m happy they told me after, because if they’d told me before, I don’t think I would have crossed.”
Two weeks into the selection course, she called her father and told him she was done.
“He told me, ‘Listen very carefully. If you come home defeated, you are not welcome home. Look for another home.’”
She went back to her tent and sat with a small mirror and asked herself: why exactly do you think this is so hard? Slowly, concentrating on one thing at a time, the pieces started fitting.
She was posted to &Beyond’s Kichwa Tembo Tented Camp in the Maasai Mara.
“Nobody was ready to receive me. They said, I think you better change your career now. Don’t waste time.” One afternoon, while she was driving, a male colleague threw a blanket over her windscreen from behind.
“I hit the brakes. I said, why are you doing this? He said, I just wanted to see your reaction.”
She kept showing up. She took the luggage runs and airstrip transfers and bush dinners – the unglamorous hours nobody wanted. When vehicles got stuck, she got out and pushed. Her first clients took one look at her and refused. “They said, I cannot be guided by a woman.” She was reassigned. “But I did my game drive like it was the last drive I’d ever do. And my guests saw everything.” At dinner that night, everyone at the table wanted to know who their guide had been.
“The man who refused me came back the next morning. He said, I’m so sorry. I underestimated you.”
Her father passed away before she could take him on safari. She took her mother instead – booked a flight to The Mara, the first time her mother had been on a plane, and put her up in a tent as a guest.
“My mom told me at the end, I’m so proud of you. I’m happy.”
From Charity’s salary, three of her sisters went through university. When asked what achievement matters most, she doesn’t mention any awards.
“The best thing I’ve left The Mara with is knowing that four female guides came after me. I’ve paved the way.”
TELE ONCE STOOD ten meters from seven lions on a walking safari, holding their gaze for thirty minutes while they decided what to do about him. “Lions are born with an instinct to go after anything that runs. So if you stand, they’re like – what is this thing?”
On our second morning we tracked a leopard along the road. Tele leaned forward over the wheel, reading marks in the dust, then suddenly drove off the road and through the brush. “I saw the tracks didn’t cross the road. So the only option was that direction.” There, beneath a thicket, was a male leopard. Tele looked as happy as if it was his first leopard sighting ever.
He carries a pouch of ash to check the wind on walking safaris, and one morning he led us on foot to read stories in the dust –giraffe tracks, hyena ovals, the two-toed marks of kudu. A flock of vulturine guinea fowl crossed our path, with their skull-like heads and plumage an electric blue that looked too fantastical for the landscape. A francolin exploded out of the brush at our feet and everyone jumped. Leopard urine, Tele mentioned, smells like buttered popcorn.
The walking safari, like the bush breakfasts and the sundowners by the river, shared one quality that seems obvious: you were outside the vehicle. We’d been told that inside the Land Cruiser we registered to the animals as a single large animal. Step out and the calculation changes: you become an individual, and more specifically, a soft, slow, and pink one at that. We’d been coming across unexpected animals all day long—couldn’t the same happen while having a bottle of craft beer by the river? It never did, and it’s an argument for hiring the most experienced guides you can afford.
Charity Cheruiyot, the first female guide in Kenya, out on a game drive with a new &Beyond colleague. 肯尼亚第一位女性导游Charity Cheruiyot正带着新加入&Beyond的同事，驰骋于旷野之间。
NOT EVERY DRIVE produced sightings. “You can stand somewhere in The Mara and see lions moving, see a cheetah on a hill,” Charity said. “Here, the bush is thicker. We’re still learning the patterns.” After two decades in a place she knew completely, she’d come to Suyian to know what it felt like to learn again. There were stretches when nothing moved but the clouds, and we learned to treasure the silence.
On our last night, a biryani appeared. We’d mentioned the day before, in passing, that we loved biryani. Someone heard, and a pot of saffron rice over lamb came to the table late and unannounced. We ate family-style and it was extremely spicy, which everyone handled with varying degrees of composure.
“That’s the attitude Pixie was looking for,” Charity said quietly. “That wasn’t the person’s job. But they saw something they could do for someone, and they did it.”
On the third night a blood moon rose and we stood on the terrace in blankets watching the Milky Way come out in stages.
On our first afternoon, there’d been giraffes on the hillside across from the lodge, a scene so effortless we assumed they came every evening, the way commuters take the same train. We never saw them there again.
“You don’t always see what you came for,” Charity said. “But you should always feel that your guide never stopped thinking about you.”
Suyian offers the chance to be part of something completely fresh – the guides still learning the land, the land still learning to trust – and if you return, the story will be new again.
The conservancy sits on what was once a cattle ranch, and the relationship between livestock, land and wildlife is evolving every day.
这个保护区坐落在曾经是一个牛牧场 的土地上，牲畜、土地和野生动物之 间的关系每天都在变化。
Scenes from a Samburu community near the Suyian Conservancy. A herder holds his son outside their home.
来自Suyian保护区附近的Samburu社区 的场景。一位牧民在他们家门外抱着他 的儿子。
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Across the village, a boy carries a kid goat back from grazing — a job he likely inherited the day he could walk.
在村子的另一边，一个男孩抱着一只小山 羊从放牧地回来。这份工作可能是他一学 会走路就继承的。
Ranger breakfast on the conservancy. The kitchen team drives out early to set up under whatever tree offers the best shade and sightline – the chairs face the open plain so nothing approaches unseen. The breakfast spread is generous: fresh juice, pastries, eggs cooked to order on a gas burner.
As you arrive for sundowners on the Ewaso Narok River, staff wave as if they’ve been expecting you all day. The craft beer was cold and the hippos stayed in the river.
The Rock Sanctuary, the ancient granite formation that dominates the view from Suyian’s terrace and inspired the lodge’s curved architecture. Its surfaces bear rock paintings from early pastoral communities, and its crevices shelter hyraxes and nesting raptors. Leopards use kopjes like these as lookout points. On a clear day, the view beyond runs unbroken to Mount Kenya. 「岩石圣所」是古老的花岗岩 山丘，矗立于Suyian露台的视 线中央，更是整个弧形建筑的 设计灵感。岩壁上，依稀可 见早期游牧民族留下的岩画。 岩缝之间，蹄兔栖息，猛禽筑 巢，花豹则常以此为了望台。 天气晴朗时，视野无边无际， 一直延伸至肯尼亚山的山顶。
Warthogs on the move across the highland plateau. They run with their tails straight up like antennae, which makes them easy to spot even in tall grass – a design flaw they compensate for with surprising speed and a willingness to turn and fight with their tusks. 高地平原上，疣猪们成群奔驰。它 们的尾巴笔直竖起，像一根根天 线，这让它们即使在长草丛中也 无所遁形。这个「缺陷」，却 被它们惊人的速度与敢于转身以 尖锐獠牙迎战的勇气所弥补。
| TK | canton & beyond
SOIL, SEA, AND SOVEREIGNTY
NEGROS SPENT A CENTURY EXPORTING SWEETNESS AND IMPORTING FOOD. NOW IT’S REBUILDING THE CAPACITY TO FEED ITSELF.
WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY MARK
HAMMONS
“FARMERS DESERVE TO BE RICH.”
Ramon “Chin-Chin” Uy Jr. said it standing over a mound of soil at his farm on the outskirts of Bacolod. He plunged both hands into the heap and came up with a fistful of material so dark and crumbly it looked like coffee grounds.
“Black gold,” he said.
Uy’s farm is called Fresh Start Organics. In 2005, when he took over land that had been chemically farmed into exhaustion, agronomists told him nothing would grow. The soil was acidic, compacted, effectively dead.
He composted instead. He built vermiculture beds where African nightcrawlers process waste into castings so dense a handful can transform a planting bed. He calls them his “first employees,” a crew working around the clock, asking nothing but decomposing matter. The piles, he said, reach temperatures around 70°C, hot enough to kill pathogens and accelerate decomposition.
He brought in native black pigs – “happy pigs,” he calls them – who snort and roam in muddy pastures rather than cages, wallowing and socializing. They’re never given
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Fresh Start
Founder Ramon
“Chin Chin” Uy Jr.
antibiotics or growth drugs. Their rooting turns crust into living soil; their manure creates fertility.
“One teaspoon of healthy soil,” he told me, “has more organisms than all the people on Earth.”
We feed the soil, Uy likes to say, and the soil feeds the plant.
Negros Occidental now has roughly sixteen thousand hectares of certified organic farmland and around five hundred certified organic farmers, according to provincial agriculture officials. They’ve branded it the Organic Capital of the Philippines – a title Uy treats as an assignment, not an award.
「农民理应富足。」
Ramon “Chin-Chin” Uy Jr. 站在巴科洛德郊外自家农场的土堆旁说 出这句话。他双手插入土堆，捧出一把如咖啡渣般漆黑松散的泥土。
他说：「这是黑金。」
Ramon 的农场名为「有机新生农场」。2005 年，当他接手这片因 化肥耕作而耗竭的土地时，农学家告诉他这里将寸草不生。土壤酸化、 板结，几乎已成死地。
Since 2005, according to Uy, Fresh Start has trained more than twenty thousand Filipino farmers in organic practices, many through government partnerships, turning a farm into a kind of curriculum. Today he serves as a slow food international councilor for Southeast Asia and sits on the board of IFOAM Asia.
“Sustainable is no longer enough,” he said. “Regeneration is the future. If you just sustain, you keep things as they are. We have to heal what was broken. No matter what happens outside the island – wars, pandemics, supply chain collapses – Negrenses can eat. That is sovereignty. That is what we’re building.”
Aged wild boar glazed with guava jus, Negrense cheese cannoli, and river prawn kinilaw open Chef Don Colmenares’s hyperlocal degustation at Sauma. 以番石榴汁釉面的陈年野猪肉， 内格罗斯奶酪卷，以及河虾生鱼片。
这是Don Colmenares厨师在Sauma 餐厅提供的超本地化品鉴菜单。
“ADD VALUE OR VANISH.”
Reena Gamboa said it over a bowl of kansi at a local eatery in Bacolod. The setting was a simple table, ceiling fan overhead, with beef shank and marrow in a broth sharpened with batwan, the native souring fruit that makes the soup taste like Negros.
Gamboa is the executive director of Slow Food Philippines and one of the organizers bringing Terra Madre Asia & Pacific to Bacolod. Organizers welcomed more than two thousand delegates from around twenty countries to gather at the Provincial Capitol for five days, the event built around a theme of “From Soil to Sea.”
“Not everyone can afford to go to Turin,” she told me. “We wanted to bring the movement closer to the communities shaping it.”
But that evening, she wanted to talk about what the delegates would actually find when they arrived.
“People still hear Bacolod and think sugar,” she said. “They don’t think organic vegetables, they don’t think fine robusta, they don’t think heirloom cacao or protected reefs, but that’s what we’ve been building.”
For more than a century, Negros Occidental was a single-crop economy. Sugarcane
dominated the landscape and food was something imported. When global prices crashed in the 1980s, households that had grown nothing but cane stood on land that they didn’t know how to use.
Gamboa knows the industry from inside. Her family owns a sugar farm, still conventionally managed. She walked me through its complexity: warehouse receipts called quedans (paper claims on sugar stored in a mill) that function like currency, permits stacked on permits, a prohibition against farmers selling their own sugar without a trader’s license.
“Even as a sugar farmer,” she said, “l can’t sell my own sugar. I can only claim a small number of sacks for personal use. The rest, I have to sell a piece of paper to traders, and they’re the ones who can withdraw it.”
Her aunt, the late Doreen Gamboa Fernandez, spent decades documenting Philippine foodways, writing about dishes like kansi and ingredients like batwan. She was among the first to insist that Philippine cuisine deserved the same scholarly attention as French or Japanese, that it had structure, regional variation, and a vocabulary worth preserving. Gamboa grew up with that inheritance.
“If we keep the flavors,” she told me, “we keep the stories. And if we keep the stories, we keep the people.”
She told me about asin tibuok, a traditional salt from Guimaras that requires burning driftwood, filtering the ash through a basket, adding coconut milk, and cooking for eight hours until it becomes a compact block. The community that makes it was thinking of stopping. “Nobody was interested in taking it on,” she said. Then Erwan Heussaff arrived, filmed their story, and the craft suddenly had value again. Heussaff won a James Beard award for his reporting and now they’re producing once more.
She pressed a wedge of batwan against the bowl with her spoon. “This is why we did any of it.”
Reena Gamboa, executive director of Slow Food Philippines
Reena Gamboa
【帕哈诺科伊】 PAHANOCOY
BEFORE DINNER, Uy walked us through the farm.
He plucked leaves for us to try: lemongrass stalks that we chewed like gum, intensely citrus; a tiny leaf he called “root beer plant” that tasted of sarsaparilla; a fresh stevia leaf, delightfully sweet. One guest bit into wild oregano and laughed – “That’s crazy, like herbal candy.”
By the time we sat down at Lanai, the restaurant at Fresh Start Organics, we had already sampled the landscape.
Chef Patrick Go’s menu sources 98 percent of its ingredients from Negros Island. A salad of farm greens arrived with burrata made from waterbuffalo milk fifteen kilometers away and dressed in calamansi vinaigrette.
Humba, the Visayan sweet-savory pork stew, arrived reimagined as toast: braised black pig from Uy’s own herd, shredded and piled on brioche, gratinéed with shavings of a three-year-old cheese from the mountains of Murcia.
Adlai, an indigenous grain also known as Job’s Tears, arrived cooked risotto-style in batwan broth with native pork. The dish split the difference between arroz caldo and risotto: comfort food that had learned some Italian.
Dessert was something Uy calls “Chocolate Immigrant” – heirloom Criollo cacao, muscovado sugar, and carabao milk. The name acknowledges the journey while the taste emphasizes a sense of place. A pinch of asin tibuok, the rare sea salt Gamboa had told me about, arrived on top – a tiny crunch that awakened everything.
Each dish related the same story that Uy had been telling all day: the plate was the final proof.
维萨扬甜咸猪肉炖菜（humba）以吐司形式呈现： 来自 Ramon 牧场的炖黑猪肉，撕碎后堆在布里欧修面 包上，撒上来自穆尔西亚山区的陈化三年的奶酪，烤 至金黄。
每道菜都讲述了 Ramon 一整天都在讲述的故事。
盘子是最终的证明。
Ma Divina Ocular cutting sugarcane at Fresh Start Organics. Ma Divina Ocular
【坎拉翁】 KANLAON
“WE DIDN’T KNOW WHAT WE WERE GROWING.”
Teddy Cañete shared this from the slopes of Mount Kanlaon, where coffee trees grow under shade canopy and the farms look more like forests than fields.
Cañete’s grandparents and parents farmed coffee here, but for most of that history, the family treated it as a bulk commodity. “We picked everything – green, yellow, ripe,” he said. “We sold it to traders for whatever price they gave us. They told us our coffee was bad, so we believed them.”
In the 1980s, during the height of the insurgency, their area was declared a no-man’s-land. “Every time we got caught by the military in that area,” Cañete said, “we were considered members of the New People’s Army, or sympathizers. We were forced to transfer.”
He eventually returned, acquired a small property through agrarian reform, and began working with Thomas Sproten, an international coffee grader who’d made Bacolod home. He’s been working with Negros coffee growers since 2004, and in 2016 he opened Coffee Culture, an artisan roastery that runs cuppings and classes so enthusiasts and hospitality students don’t have to go to Manila or Cebu to learn the craft.
Sproten taught selective harvesting (only ripe cherries picked by hand), controlled fermentation (timing, temperature, sanitation), and slow drying (weeks instead of days). In Minoyan, “slow” can mean forty to forty-five days on drying beds, with the beans disturbed three times daily.
The logic, Cañete realized, was simple. “Coffee is a fruit,” he said. “How can you imagine eating a good fruit mixed with unripe fruit, eating a ripe mango compared to an unripe mango? It’s the same.” He developed what he calls a “see, then touch” philosophy for quality control – if you can see defects, you can feel them too.
“Thomas doesn’t know how to grow coffee,” laughed Cañete. “But he has a lot of information about processing. And he has connections outside. I’m a good farmer, but my understanding about the market? I don’t know. That’s the beauty of this collaboration.” Sproten sources beans from Cañete’s network and others, and the farmers learn what the market values. What began as a survival crop has become something closer to craft.
The environmental math matters to him. By his estimates, a productive coffee tree absorbs around twenty kilograms of carbon dioxide per year, and the shade trees – rambutan, cacao, banana –absorb far more. He believes his farm sequesters significant carbon annually, though the numbers are hard to verify.
In 2020, Minoyan joined the Slow Food Coffee Coalition, the first such community in the Asia-Pacific. Two years later, Cañete traveled to Italy to meet coffee farmers from other regions and countries.
“That really gave me more inspiration,” he said, “more eagerness to produce good, clean, and fair coffee as our contribution to preserving and protecting our environment.”
Chris Fadriga laughed as he said it, walking through his nursery outside Bago City. His cacao trees grow in rows under partial shade. He selected a ripe pod, cracked it against a stone, and held up the result.
The beans inside were pale – not the expected purple of commodity cacao, but white and pinkish, almost ghostly.
“Criollo,” he said. “Ancient line.”
「可可很风流。」
Chris Fadriga 笑着说，一边走在巴戈市外的苗圃中。 他的可可树在部分遮荫下生长。他挑选了一个熟透的可 可豆荚，在石头上敲开，展示里的成果。
里面的豆子是淡色的 不是预期中商品可可的 紫色，而是白色和粉红色，几乎像幽灵一样。
他说：「这是克里奥罗，一个古老的品种。」
克里奥罗是最受珍视的优质风味可可：花香、果香，
Criollo is fine-flavor cacao at its most prized: floral, fruity, complex in ways bulk varieties rarely match. It’s also fragile, low-yielding, and easily diluted by cross-pollination. Over centuries of hybridization, genetically pure Criollo has become rare.
Fadriga didn’t believe that story applied everywhere. For more than a decade, he traveled across the Philippines, visiting backyard trees and neglected plantings, collecting samples from varieties ignored for generations. He sent leaf tissue to the University of the West Indies in Trinidad and Tobago for DNA analysis.
Since 2020, Fadriga’s nursery has documented more than two dozen cultivars. Some are high-Criollo hybrids (more than 80 percent Criollo DNA) bred for better vigor. Others tested as pure ancient lines, with one sample coming back at 99.97 percent Criollo.
Fadriga says cacao reached the Philippines early via the ManilaAcapulco galleon trade. Because the country is an archipelago, isolated stands survived without as much cross-pollination. The old genetics persisted in backyards.
“If we lose the old varieties,” he said, “we lose future aromas. The next great chocolate may be hiding in a backyard tree.”
His propagation method is both scientific and practical: grafting Criollo
“IF WE LOSE THE OLD VARIETIES, WE LOSE FUTURE AROMAS. THE NEXT GREAT CHOCOLATE MAY BE HIDING IN A BACKYARD TREE.
Chris 说，可可很早就通过马尼拉 - 阿卡普尔 科大帆船贸易到达了菲律宾。由于菲律宾是一个 群岛国家，孤立的种植园得以幸存，没有太多异 花授粉。古老基因在后院中得以延续。 他说：「如果我们失去了古老品种，我们就 失去了未来的香气。下一款伟大的巧克力可能就 藏在一棵后院的树上。」
Chris Fadriga, Criollo Cacao Nursery & Plantation
scions onto hardy Trinitario rootstock. “Vigor below, perfume above,” he said. “So delicate flavor can survive on sturdier legs.”
He isn’t building a plantation, but rather distributing seedlings to dozens of smallholders across Negros and teaching fermentation and drying along the way. “Not by locking it up,” he said. “By spreading it out. You save a variety by giving it away.”
His partner Debbie handles much of the post-harvest work – fermentation, drying, transformation from pod to product.
“Single-cultivar ferments let chocolatiers compose, not just blend,” she told me. When beans are separated by variety, a chocolate-maker can orchestrate flavor rather than average it out.
In 2021, beans from his network were named among the top fifty in the world at the Cocoa of Excellence competition. A head judge called him afterward.
“She told me opening the sample gave her goose bumps,” Fadriga recalled. “Aroma can make the body recognize rarity before the mind catches up.”
“The award didn’t change the beans. It changed the way people perceived them.”
2021 年，他的其中一款可可在「卓越可可（Cocoa of Excellence）」竞赛中被评为世界前五十。一位首席评 委后来给他打电话。
Chris 回想：「她告诉我，打开样本让她起了鸡皮疙 瘩。因为香气能让身体在大脑反应过来之前就意识到稀 有性。」
「奖项没有改变可可，而是改变了人们对它们的看法。」
THE BOAT PILOT IN SAGAY was explaining how to tell male crabs from females. Males have a narrow apron under the shell, females, a wide one. If a female was gravid – heavy with eggs – she’d go back into the water.
“She carries millions of eggs,” said Richard Aquino, president of the local crabbers’ association. “If we keep her, we steal from next year.”
We were tasting fresh crab under a tarp strung between wooden poles near the shore of the Sagay Marine Reserve, a thirty-two-thousand-hectare sanctuary off the northern coast of Negros Occidental. Around seventy families belong to the local crabbers’ association, but only about twenty boats go out each day, rotating turns so everyone gets a chance to earn.
The blue swimming crabs they catch are a regional delicacy –sweet, briny, prized in markets from Manila to Hong Kong. But prices here don’t match export demand. The best crabs leave and locals can
rarely afford to taste what they catch. The irony isn’t lost on anyone.
“We export what we can’t eat,” said Aquino. “But if we don’t protect it, there’s nothing left to export – or to eat.”
Sagay’s reserve was established decades ago, but enforcement was uneven until the community itself began to patrol. Fisherfolk who once resented the boundaries began to split their work. Some continued with regulated gear in legal areas. Others trained as guides, boatmen, or cooks for community-run ecotourism.
Reserve records show thirty-five local sea guardians now patrol. In one five-month stretch, a community-led project generated more than PHP 2.5 million – money that went into households, engine repairs, school fees.
“So we have a reason to protect,” the boat pilot said.
Nobody pretends that protection solves everything. Waters are warming; storm tracks are shifting. “The catch is smaller now,” said one fisherman. “But we keep protecting, because what else can we do?”
Kiko Torno laughed. He was walking the dikes at 7 Hectares, a farm built on abandoned prawn ponds about eight hundred meters from the Visayan Sea. The property had sat empty for thirty years before he revived it.
Torno came to aquaculture from a successful career in advertising. He took a two-month course at SEAFDEC in Iloilo, then learned the rest by trial and error.
“I’ve wiped out stock. Lost a lot. I knew that if you adopted artificial practices, in three or four months you’d start making money. This way, I projected a loss for five years.”
Instead of monoculture, he cultivates many species: milkfish, sea bass, mud crabs, oysters, clams, seaweed. Filterfeeders clean the water. Predators regulate populations. The tide brings in wild fry and micro-life that become part of the food web.
Kiko Torno at 7 Hectares, Saravia
He calls it self-healing: “When one species collapses, the other species compensate. We’re not trying to control every detail. We’re trying to listen.”
He’s as particular about freshness as he is about ecology. “We don’t sell anything less than five hundred grams – a pound,” he said. “And the day we ship it, that’s the only time we harvest it. From the ponds around 3 a.m., it’s in your home by nine or ten in the morning.”
The system’s wildness can surprise him. Once, a three-meter moray eel snuck into the ponds through the tidal channels. “It almost wiped out my entire stock,” Torno said. “It was well-fed.” They eventually caught it – and cooked it.
7 Hectares hosts tasting meals at wooden tables beside the ponds: thirteen courses built entirely on the daily catch. One signature dish is horn snails, a “pest” that other farms poison, slow-cooked in coconut milk with banana blossom. They arrive in a shallow bowl, tender and briny, the coconut sweet against the mineral edge of the shell meat.
“They throw these out,” Torno said. “But if you guys love escargot, this is better.”
A UP Visayas study found the snails to have nutritional properties that surprised researchers, but Torno’s point is simpler: what one system treats as waste, another recognizes as value.
He charges what he believes the food is worth, around PHP4,500 per person.
“When we underprice,” he said, “we tell people our work doesn’t matter. I refuse to tell that story.”
He’s trying to establish Slow Fish in Asia. “Unknown to many,” he said, “75 percent of fish supplied globally comes from Asia.” The stakes, in other words, are not just local.
The problem he’s trying to solve goes deeper than farming practices: “There were two generations that forgot what a fresh fish looks like, tastes like, smells like, feels like.” He means in Manila, where fish arrives frozen or farmed in ways that optimize yield over flavor, where the memory of the sea has faded.
When someone mentioned that a Michelin inspector might visit Bacolod during Terra Madre, Torno shrugged.
“I couldn’t care less. I just want to tell my story.”
And when people ask how his model can scale, he corrects the premise: “It doesn’t scale. It diversifies.”
BY THE TIME the delegates arrived, the Provincial Capitol Lagoon had become a village of food stalls and conference tents. Twentyfive hundred people from more than twenty countries gathered over five days – farmers and fisherfolk, chefs and activists, researchers and Indigenous seed-keepers. All were drawn by some version of the same conviction: that food systems could be rebuilt from the ground up.
The centerpiece was the Community Kitchen, all sixty-one of Bacolod’s barangays cooking for one another – not one menu designed for visitors, but dozens of dishes made from what each neighborhood still knows how to make. Street food stands from Japan, Singapore, Korea, and across the Philippine archipelago stretched across the grounds, all with their own versions of “local.” A farmers’ market ran alongside with local grains, dried seafood, root crops – the island’s proof of concept.
Evenings meant kitchen takeovers in Bacolod-area restaurants, where visiting chefs cooked shoulder-to-shoulder with local talents at sold-out events. Taste workshops ran during the day: chefs demonstrating kinilaw techniques, others discussing heirloom rice preservation, panels exploring farmer-chef partnerships.The gathering came in the wake of two typhoons that had recently struck parts of Negros Island. The damage was still being assessed, and some farmers and fishers were rebuilding even as the event opened. Organizers chose to continue. Slow Food’s presence, they argued, would support the local economies that urgently needed it.
A political position emerged as well. The proposed introduction of GMO crops on Negros drew organized opposition from delegates. The public stance was unanimous: the island’s status as the Organic Capital of the Philippines was not negotiable.
The program’s final day closed with the launch of Sarap & Palayok, a reissue of the work of Doreen Gamboa Fernandez, the aunt that Gamboa had told me about over kansi
There were echoes of something Gamboa said that first night: “Slow Food is for anyone who eats. The work is making sure everyone gets to eat well, not just the people who can afford to fly in for a festival.”
The question of who benefits ran as an undercurrent beneath everything. Minoyan’s coffee commanded higher prices that didn’t always distribute evenly across the chain. Criollo networks remained fragile, dependent on obsession and markets that might lose interest. Terra Madre Asia & Pacific would return every two years, organizers announced – a commitment to continuity.
The island that once exported sweetness and imported food had begun to tell a different story, one built at the level of soil and sea.
TK publisher Mark Hammons talks with General Manager Charles Treutenaere of Domaine de Long Dai about the remarkable development of a Rothschild wine with a Chinese soul. § TK 出版人 Mark Hammons 与瓏岱酒庄总经理 Charles Treutenaere 对话，畅谈一个拥有中国灵魂的罗斯柴尔德葡萄酒的非凡发展。
What sort of wine is Long Dai?
There’s not one wine in China that’s more East-meetsWest than this one. Even though technically there’s a lot from Bordeaux, it’s really a Chinese wine at heart. The intention is to sell 80 percent of the volume in China.
What is the production volume?
Depends on vintage, because it’s really a vintage wine. It’s from Penglai in Shandong Province. “Qiu Shan Valley” is becoming an appellation – it should be recognized as the first small appellation of China.
Why did you choose Penglai?
We’re the only appellation in China on the seashore. The sea brings temperate climate. In other regions, you need to bury the vines in winter because it’s too cold and dry, so a vine may need to be changed every fifteen to twenty years. Penglai is the Holy Grail for terroir in China.
Tell us about your team.
It’s bilingual, French and Chinese, even though they’re all Chinese. Most studied in France. It’s a bicultural company, which is super-important because wine is about cultural traditions. And we use very traditional techniques, no over-intervention. We have six hundred terraces, small plots of planted vines producing different tastes of grape. We analyze each terrace before we plant. We now have forty-two hectares, mainly with cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, and marselan.
Why marselan?
There’s so much more to Long Dai than just what’s in the bottle. It’s the people, the teams at the winery, at the vineyard, in hospitality.
瓏岱的内涵远不止于瓶中的美酒。
它更在于人，在于酒庄的团队，在于葡萄 园的工作人员，在于热情周到的服务。
Marselan is becoming the emblematic varietal for China. It was introduced in 2000 through cooperation between the French and Chinese governments. It adds spicy notes you can’t find in a classic Bordeaux blend. Interestingly, six years ago, Bordeaux officially introduced marselan as an approved varietal.
We used to have more than 80 percent cabernet sauvignon. Now it’s less than 50 percent, because cabernet franc and marselan have great expression. And we’re trying petit verdot now.
Have you adopted any Chinese growing traditions?
The terrace system was already in Yantai for centuries. We kept that, just remodeled the terraces to fit our way of working grapes. With the monsoon influence in summer, it helps drain water. What those people were doing centuries ago makes complete sense.
How did you go about starting Long Dai?
This is the first fine wine that the Rothschilds have built from scratch. None of their other châteaux, including Lafite, was from scratch. DBR could have chosen to make a commercial wine, but, no, we wanted to produce a great wine from China for Chinese wine lovers.
What would you say makes it a truly Chinese wine?
It’s about the identity of the place. We don’t invent stories – we find out what is there, and we have very deep relationships with the local people. It’s all about local culture, and when you come to Long Dai, you feel it. We serve Lu cuisine, one of China’s eight great cuisines.
château. The Grand Hall is a traditional Chinese wooden structure with no nails, like in the Forbidden City. Everything is kept stable by balance, like the wine we make.
And what about balance with the environment?
Last year, the whole group, including Long Dai, became certified HVE (Haute Valeur Environnementale). We respect the environment, embrace ESG , and support the community. We’re testing different irrigation approaches – it’s science, so you experiment.
What’s your vision for the winery?
There’s so much more to Long Dai than just what’s in the bottle. It’s the people, the teams at the winery, at the vineyard, in hospitality. It’s the architecture. Combining art and wine is in the DNA of the family. We’re working on creating a jazz festival, and we invite the local handicapped association to the winery every year for arts events. The next step is to attract even more people to Long Dai.
The Nikka Limited blends more than one hundred spirits to create a whisky that carries forward the pioneering vision of Masataka Taketsuru.
KNOWN AS “the father of Japanese whisky,” Masataka Taketsuru founded Nikka Whisky’s predecessor company in 1934 in Yoichi, Hokkaido, a place reminiscent of the Scottish Highlands. “Masataka learned the art of whisky-making in Scotland and then challenged himself to create it in Japan, a land with very different climate and culture,” notes Junji Iseki, recently named Nikka’s chief blender. “He constantly embraced trial and error and opened new frontiers. We’ve inherited that by creating spirits with a wide range of aromas and flavors and blending them in pursuit of a taste that had never existed before.”
That’s exactly what the renowned distillery has accomplished with the release in 2025 of The Nikka Limited. But beyond its fresh, multilayered flavors, this remarkable whisky symbolizes the passing of the torch in 2025 from Chief Blender Hiromi Ozaki to Iseki, as well as a celebration of Iseki’s appointment. And through its creation, Nikka Whisky continues a long tradition of excellence shaped by patience and precision.
Development of The Nikka Limited was a collaborative process between the two blenders. “By exchanging ideas and discussing it together,” says Ozaki, “we were able to achieve flavor profiles that would not have been possible through individual work alone.” Adds Iseki: “There were no radical changes in our approach. We focus on harmony, blending a wide range of spirits with different aromas and flavors. This time, however, we aimed for greater depth and breadth by incorporating newer spirits from Moji Distillery and Satsuma Tsukasa Distillery, as well as newly developed flavor profiles from Yoichi and Miyagikyo.”
Ozaki offers tasting notes regarding what whisky lovers should expect: “You’ll find the deep richness of well-aged Yoichi and Miyagikyo whiskies, the fullness of Ben Nevis, and a balanced array of fruity aromas. They’re accented by the sharp, green bamboo-like character of relatively young Mizunara cask whisky, which adds a crisp edge.”
As for what comes next, Iseki returns to cultural fundamentals: “We hope to enrich our customers’ lives as we strive to create even more delicious and distinctive spirits, blends that emphasize harmony – in the Japanese sense of wa, a unique Japanese ideal of harmony and balance.”
Cris Song is named champion at Campari Red Hands Mainland China Regional Finals 2025.
LAST NOVEMBER IN SHANGHAI, a cocktail exploration themed around the “Negroni Family Tree” reached its climax at the Red Hands Mainland China Regional Finals. Under a competition format focused on the five senses, bartender Cris Song from Shanghai’s Pony Up won the championship with his original cocktail, Concerto Negroni. Second place went to Chase Yang and third to Craft Luo. This January, Song, representing Mainland China in the Campari Red Hands APAC 2025 competition, was again declared champion.
BY JULIE TU
During the Mainland China Regional Finals, eighteen contestants had demonstrated their exceptional skills and boundless creativity as they confirmed Campari’s remarkable versatility in cocktail creation. Song’s Concerto Negroni began with a clear artistic concept, drawing inspiration from the “hunting” scene in the “Autumn” movement of Antonio Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons: porcini mushrooms evoke the earthy scent of the forest, the smokiness of mezcal simulates traces of gunpowder, and the rich texture of butter symbolizes the harvest. The Negroni’s classic structure was transformed into a vibrant, narrative-driven expression of local flavor.
“Campari,” says Song, “is like the indispensable interlude in a concerto, connecting the past with the future.” The thought reflects Campari’s dual role as an eloquent base spirit that fulfills classic paradigms and also prompts cutting-edge creativity.
Since its inception in 1860, Campari, with its iconic red hue, has been sparking the passion of bartenders in their exploration of flavors. And since its debut in China in 2018, Campari Red Hands has spearheaded a multidimensional competition process that includes online video competition, practical bar tastings, and on-site final competition.
“Campari Red Hands cocktail competition is about honoring classics
with our original aspiration and empowering the future with craftsmanship,” says Pauline D. Cha, managing director of Greater China at Campari Group and board member of Campari Academy. “Jointly created by the Campari brand and Campari Academy, it’s not only a competition but also our effort to empower the sustainable development of the bartending industry.”
