Find a Humble Taste of HK at Grassroot Canteen, Yoolee Plaza

Cantonese cuisine is (in)famously ... interesting. Home of the eight animal stew (which includes anteater, swan and snake), the adventurous tastes of southernmost China have launched one of Prince Phillip’s many memorable mildly insensitive off-the-cuff remarks, as he declared, “If it has got four legs and it is not a chair, if it has got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane, and if it swims and it is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it.”

Here at the Beijinger, however, we are far more enlightened than His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh, and know that the sometimes alarming and unusual ingredients that go into Cantonese food come together to create a world of delicious, complicated flavors. As such, we paid a visit to HK Grassroot Canteen, a typical small Cantonese cha chaan teng (literally tea restaurant) that can be found on the first floor of Yoolee Plaza.

The baked fish intestines with egg (RMB 58)

As well as standard fare of fried rice, noodles (RMB 45-58), soups and sui mei (barbecue meat), choices include the ubiquitous clay pot rice (RMB 48-128), which we love for the way the rice around the pot’s edges gets all crispy and stuck together. We settled on the signature baked fish intestines with egg (RMB 58), a dish, perhaps, not for the squeamish. Although the scrambled egg and intestines were served in a hot clay pot, they went cold fast, leaving the fishy flavor to dominate the dish with an unpleasant strength. We also chose another classic of Hong Kong’s low-income workers in the old days, braised beef offal (RMB 22). This bargain dish was more successful, with the five-spice-strong seasoning giving it an intensely flavorful base, and plenty of tender beef brisket, beef liver, and beef intestine swimming in the broth.

The braised beef offal (RMB 22) was authentic

Follow your Hong Kong classics with a favorite choice for dessert: tong sui, or sweet soup. The red bean soup (红豆沙 hóngdòu shā, RMB 20), is especially worth your time. The beans have been pre-boiled, ensuring that they’ve ruptured into a softness suitable for soup, before sugar, herbs and dried orange peel are added to ensure a spicy, zesty flavor. While hot soup for sweets can be a shock to western palates, tong sui is a specialty believed to have medicinal properties, and what’s not to like about dessert that’s good for you?

The sweet red bean soup (RMB 20)

With lazy staff idling by the counter and asking us to speed up our dinner so they could have their own, soap operas on the TV and irregular wooden tables, Grassroot Canteen has certainly captured the atmosphere of an authentic Cantonese canteen. On the plus side, they do have a bilingual menu, so it’s a good choice for linguistically-challenged expats looking for a bona fide taste of the South.

HK Grassroot Canteen 香港草根食堂
Daily 11am-10pm. 1/F, Yoolee Plaza, 21 Gongti Beilu, Chaoyang District (5801 0138)
朝阳区工体北路21号永利购物中心1层

Photos: Tracy Wang

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