Lin Heung Tea House 蓮香樓 ... Old School Dim Sum, Central, Hong Kong

The million dollar question when one foodie visits Hong Kong would be "Where can I get good dim sum?" This will be a difficult question to answer in the land of dim sum. Between HY and I, we were divided when faced this same question. It's the same for roast goose where my cousin who's residing in Hong Kong would swear by 深井裕記 Yue Kee in Sham Tseng but we prefer 鏞記 Yung Kee as we find it more refined. As for dim sum, HY prefer sitting in the comforts of Maxim Palace @ City Hall whereas I prefer the local traditional Lin Heung Tea House.

As you walk up the stairs of the tea house, you'll be welcome by the crowd and the chatter. For all the 3 times that I visited the tea house, all tables were occupied. You'll always be one of the many people standing between the space between tables to wait for any vacant seats. On one occasion, I was there with HY and my parents, suddenly an old man from one table ask us to share the table with them. There were 3 different families on that table for 10. HY and I had to sit sideways to be packed into that table. As we were pretty late, the waiter told us there no har gao and siew mai anymore. However, the same old man who was obviously a regular cajoled the waiter to get the kitchen to prepare some for us. We finally got our har gao and siew mai. Although they may be speaking in a manner that may seem unfriendly but the old man was absolutely helpful.

Like in Singapore's Redstar Restaurant, you have to be unfazed by the need to waylay a dim sum cart in order to get what you want.

On the table there was steamed rice flour rolls 肠粉 and I 'm grabbing at some water chestnut cakes 马蹄糕. The water chestnut cakes were chewy and interspersed with crunchy water chestnut.

This was my favorite, the steamed curry cuttle fish. Just love the mild curry flavor with the steamed cuttle fish.

The tasty juicy sweet Chinese Sausage bun. Good fluffy bun and delicious sausage.

Even though, Lin Heung Tea House is an old school traditional dim sum place, I suspect they have some "R&D" activities going on behind the scene to create new dim sum dishes. This is a fish cake wrapped in cabbage that I've never eaten else where. There was also rare dim sum dishes like steamed pig's stomach that mum regretted that she didn't order as we had already ordered too much food. 

I've only shared the highlights of the dim sum items that is more interesting. The rest are familiar stuff that we dim sum lovers can order with our eyes closed. Even though I like the dim dum in Maxim Palace, I still prefer the idea of "fighting" for food and seats and eating with the local crowd. I love feeling the real Hong Kong, it's heart beat and the passionate Hong Kongers in places like Lin Heung Tea House.

I had no intention of sharing Lin Heung Tea House since it's already famous. So famousr that I can even meet my high school classmate during one visit to Hong Kong. However, I am please that there are people who actually follow this food diary and use my food recommendations in Hong Kong and love it. Because of that, I decided to create this entry so as to add on to my favorite HK food haunts despite Lin Heung Tea House being so "over" recommended in the food bloggers world. By doing so, those who just follow my favorite HK haunts will not miss out on this one. Glad that this food diary is actually being used the way we want it to be. For the Love of Food. Any one who loves food is welcome.