Hong Kong Chinese food

In 2017, I wrote my MA thesis in the Anthropology of Food on what makes a ‘Made in Hong Kong’ food brand. I started thinking about food, city and postcolonialism but eventually ventured off to look at food, provenance, quality and identity.

I revisited this again recently as events unfolded in Hong Kong. What’s so interesting about food studies is that it is extremely multi-faceted – how we eat affects our nutrition, but it’s only as useful if we understand the reasons why we eat?

My MA thesis for the Anthropology of Food at SOAS looked also at this through the lens of food safety in the same year. A 'Hong Kong food' brand says a lot about its people, and has always been labelled in tandem with mistrust in Chinese standards.https://t.co/Vsv49I5Zoc

— Georgine Leung (@georginechikchi) June 30, 2020

When I wrote this, the same year year marked the 20th anniversary of the city’s handover to mainland China. I was invited to a few celebratory events with the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (HKETO), Hong Kong government’s trade representative office in London, aligned with key Chinese traditional festivals from Dragonboat Race to Mid-autumn Festival.

What became obvious was the ways Hong Kong was portrayed. It was very much drawn upon the imagination and nostalgia for the ‘good, old days’. When I looked further into this, Hong Kong foods are strongly attached to the way of life during colonial times under the British, and a miracle economy which allowed many Chinese refugees to thrive in the tiny city that is Hong Kong.

This nostalgic idea of foods is very much used by food companies based in Hong Kong as a way of fusing the East and the West, sometimes described as ‘soy sauce western dishes’. One such example is Lee Kum Kee, with whom I have projects with, and a key sponsor to many of the events for the overseas Chinese based in London.

View this post on Instagram

Been doing some modelling work. Next time when you are out scouting for Chinese condiments such as #oystersauce check out this very limited edition ##nequals1 #chinesefood #aprilfools @lkkeurope

A post shared by Georgine Leung 梁植芝 (@georginechikchi) on Mar 31, 2019 at 6:04pm PDT

I have found the area of provenance a fascinating one because it is tied so closely to the social history of a place. But Hong Kong also has a complex relationship with the mainland in terms of food quality due to the extent of food safety scandals which have occurred in the past two decades. As most food imports come from the Mainland, however this comes as a complicated issue – and what it’s considered as a ‘dangerous other’. This is so important to understand what is ‘Made in Hong Kong’.

An excerpt of my thesis is available here: https://www.academia.edu/38356883/_Made_in_Hong_Kong_food_labels-_two_case_studies_to_uncover_identity_politics_and_the_dangerous_other_.pdf