The century-old ‘fragrant lotus’ restaurant on the corner of Wellington and Aberdeen streets in Central may be closing.
If, like for many residents and visitors, Hong Kong’s Lin Heung Tea House is one of your favourite old school dim sum joints, then get over here pronto.
The century-old ‘fragrant lotus’ restaurant on the corner of Wellington and Aberdeen streets in Central may be closing.
Why? Not because of the reported drop in trained dim sum chefs thanks to the long hours and demanding nature of the work. Instead, it is because of a typical modern Hong Kong issue; the building has been majority bought by a developer.
CSI Properties have acquired more than 90% of the 47-year-old building. Buying the ground floor and first floor where Lin Heung Bakery and Lin Heung Tea House have resided in since 2015, the company invested US$45.4 million (HK$355 million) more in 36 units last July. Once a company owns more than 80% of a property’s units it can force the sale of the rest of the units, and speculation is rife that this is CSI Properties’ intention.
Lin Heung Tea House has been a popular dim sum brand since 1889 when the first restaurant opened in Guangdong. The brand opened three more restaurants in Hong Kong in the last 100 years, and this branch has been enticing customers to its corner restaurant since 1996.
The restaurant’s lease won't run out until the second quarter of 2019, but this is no comfort to its fans. The cramped restaurant is now even more difficult to navigate, trolleys of traditional dim sum competing with waiting customers ready to pounce on a vacated chair for a shared-table meal that could be their last in the gastronomic institution.
But the chaos has always been exactly what draws regulars, and new customers, to its nostalgic interiors. The packed round tables, ancient tea kettles, landscape and calligraphy pictures and trolley service have been kept according to the current owner’s late father’s wishes, who ordered current owner Ngan Cheun-fai not to change anything before he died in 2008.