Duddell's
Comfort Cantonese Dim Sum in Hong Kong
Duddell’s is a one-Michelin-star Cantonese restaurant and cultural salon in Central, just off Hong Kong’s main business district. It opened in 2013 on the third and fourth floors of the Shanghai Tang Mansion, and has always been more than just a dining room. The premise is part restaurant, part art space, part private-club fantasy for Hong Kong’s collector class.
The founding group explains the concept. Yenn Wong of JIA Group, Alan Lo of Press Room Group, and wine importer Paulo Pong built Duddell’s out of Hong Kong’s overlapping restaurant, art and money circles. The pitch was never simply Cantonese food. It was a social room with a serious art programme and a kitchen good enough to carry the whole idea.
The address also helps. Duddell Street is one of those odd Central pockets that still feels like old school Hong Kong, best known for its granite steps and surviving gas lamps. The original Ilse Crawford interior leaned into that sense of lived-in polish: an art collector’s apartment rather than another glossy Hong Kong dining room. Mid-century furniture, warm tones, a garden terrace, enough softness to make the place feel human.
By 2025, though, the room needed work. Duddell’s closed for a full refresh by André Fu Studio, its first major renovation since opening. Fu recast it as a contemporary collector’s maison, drawing on Lingnan culture and the 1920s diaolou watchtowers of Guangdong. Sensible move. The old room had started to feel tired, and Duddell’s depends heavily on the room feeling current without losing its clubby identity.
The food is modern Cantonese, but not in the gimmicky sense. Under Chef Chan Yau Leung, the kitchen talks about reviving forgotten flavours and old Cantonese techniques. Chan has the right background for that. Before Duddell’s, he cooked at Fook Lam Moon in Hong Kong and Macau, ran Fook Lam Moon kitchens in Tokyo and Osaka, and led Guo Fu Lou in Central, where he helped earn and hold a Michelin star. He joined Duddell’s in 2022 and rebuilt the menu again after the 2025 renovation.
Duddell’s has changed chefs several times since opening. The restaurant’s identity sits as much with the room, ownership and art programme as with any single chef. Previous chef Li Man-Lung brought Ritz-Carlton Macau and Tin Lung Heen experience, but Chan is the current figure to watch. His cooking is disciplined, classical, and more interested in Cantonese continuity than show-off modernisation.
The art programme is still central. Duddell’s has rotating exhibitions, talks, screenings, performances and lectures, with parts of the programme open to the public. That matters because it keeps the place from being just another expensive Cantonese restaurant with nice chairs. The cultural salon positioning is the differentiator.
The meal started with the dim sum staples: har gow and siu mai. Both were properly executed, especially the siu mai with a generous slice of scallop on top. This is the kind of thing Duddell’s should be good at, and it was.
The steamed rice roll with dough cruller was more interesting. Adding daikon gave it a little lift and texture, enough to make a familiar dish feel adjusted rather than messed about with.
The mala lobster spring roll was the more overtly contemporary dish. Crisp, rich, a little punchy, but still recognizably Cantonese rather than fusion for its own sake.
The taro puff came with abalone instead of scallop. A small luxury substitution, but a good one. It fits Duddell’s well: not revolutionary, just more expensive and more polished.
Then Peking duck, served two ways. First the skin in wraps, which basically turns the table into a test of everyone’s burrito-making competence.
The second serving was the meat finely chopped, cooked with pine nuts, and served with lettuce wraps. Classic, tidy, and exactly the sort of thing that works well in a room like this.
Overall, I have been to Duddell’s countless times over the years. The food has always been consistent, although before the refurbishment the interior was starting to look dated. The menu has shifted slightly, and the room now has its polish back, but the basic proposition is unchanged: no-frills, reliable, high-end Cantonese dim sum in Central, with enough cultural dressing to make it feel like somewhere to bring visitors.
Total Damage: 2600 HKD/3 people