The Best Roast Goose in Hong Kong – Yung Kee Restaurant
English Address: 32-40 Wellington Street, Central, Hong Kong
Chinese Address: 中環威靈頓街32-40號
Opening Hours: 11.00am to 11.30pm (Daily)
Click here to view my full Hong Kong Food Itinerary and the 8 must-know about Hong Kong Cafe Culture
Introduction
Yung Kee (鏞記酒家) is a multi-award winning restaurant that specializes in roast goose. Together with Yue Kee Roast Goose (裕記大飯店), Yung Kee has a reputation of selling the best Roast Goose in Hong Kong. Although Yung Kee also has a reputation of selling over-priced dishes, it actually started from a humble background.
It started off as a road-side stall (dai pai dong) in the 1930s selling roast meat. After some success, they moved to a shop in the 1942 and finally settle in the current location in the Year 1964. They built up their business steadily and it’s currently owned by Yung Kee Holdings Ltd, a company with more than HK$100 millions in asset. Yung Kee also received one Michelin star in the Year 2009, 2010 and 2011 in the Hong Kong and Macau edition.
The posh ambience of Yung Kee. The service was great as well.
Although i already know of the exorbitant price of Yung Kee, i am just too curious on how does this infamous roast goose taste. The general advise that i heard is “Just order the goose and century egg and forget the rest”.
Therefore, i decided to do the touristy thing to visit Yung Kee to try out this one of the top twenty restaurants in Asia. I have to emphasis that i visited Yung Kee in Year 2012. I didn’t have a blog then so i am only writing it now.
Price of their Goose (2012). Click to enlarge.
Quarter Roast Goose (HK$150)
Unlike other roast meat joints that sell individual plate of Roast Goose rice, Yung Kee offers minimally a quarter of goose (lower quarter without drumstick) that cost HK$150+. There are options of half goose at HK$240+ and whole goose for HK$480+.
The small problem with ordering a quarter goose is Yung Kee only gives you the top quarter that is mostly breast meat. That’s not much of a problem for me as i’m a breast lover.
Yung Kee goose is much more meatier and more succulent than a roast duck. The highlight of the whole dish is the goose skin. It is really crispy, almost crackling and the thin layer of oil and fat that comes along with it. It’s oily, but not greasy for my stomach.
As it’s the breast (top) quarter, it is slightly drier and this problem can be solved by dipping their meat into the braised sauce that comes along with it. I thoroughly enjoyed the rich and savory flavours of the sauce, as well as the braised peanut that comes with it.
Four of us shared this dish and we can’t get enough of it. Each piece of meat was snapped up swiftly and all of us agreed that it’s not as bad as what we read online.
Yung Kee also sells Roasted “Jet” Goose where they vacuum pack their roast goose for you to “da bao” back to your country. Each goose costs HK$500.
Preserved Century Egg
I am not exactly a fan of Century Egg actually but my friend told me she had the best century egg of her life in Yung Kee so i decided to see what’s the deal.
Yung Kee’s century egg is really really soft and smooth and it’s almost like biting through tofu. The egg yolk’s texture is like an Onsen Egg – soft, creamy and very flavourful. I am going to say it – best century egg ever. It’s not difficult to understand why there a demand for them to sell their century egg in gift boxes to be brought back. Six century eggs with ginger cost HK$78
Conclusion
In April 2014, my same friend visited Yung Kee with his family and said that the roast goose standard had dropped and they switch the braised peanut to some beans for their Roast Goose that don’t taste as good and the roasted goose skin don’t taste as crispy. Price wise, it’s still as expensive. He tried the Char Siew and some other dishes and thought it’s still a good idea to just order their Roast Goose.
For me, i think there is a need to at least try the famous Yung Kee roast goose once regardless of the online bashing and i am glad that my visit in 2012 was a good experience.
Although it was a little “paisay” (embarrassing) to only order a quarter roast goose and HALF a century egg with four people, at least we saved our pockets from burning a hole. Probably i will try to visit again in my next trip to Hong Kong to see if the food standard really “deteriorated” as per what some people had said.
For friends who like to try a less expensive roast goose that is more welcomed by their locals, you may want to check out another of my post on Yat Lok Roast Goose.
Click here to view my full Hong Kong Food Itinerary and the 8 must-know about Hong Kong Cafe Culture
Map and Directions
Direction to Yung Kee is very straight forward
1. Come out from Central Exit G
2. Walk against the traffic until you reach Queen’s Road Central
3. Cross the road and walk along the traffic until you see d’Aguilar Street
4. Turn left into d’Aguilar Street, walk straight until you see Wellington Street on the right 5
5. Turn right into Wellington Street and you should see Yung Kee on your right
Click to enlarge
Chin Chai Jiak 