Sustainable dining: Hong Kong restaurants that source food locally, cut waste, recycle and compost

If the carbon footprint of your meal troubles you – and with 90 per cent of Hong Kong’s food imported, why wouldn’t it? – these chefs find ways to lower theirs

Not only that, using locally grown vegetables and locally raised chickens means the dishes they serve are fresher and more nutritious. What’s not to like?

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Peggy Chan at Zen Organic Farm in Ta Kwu Ling, near Hong Kong’s border with China, where she picks ingredients for use at her new fine-dining restaurant Nectar. Photo: Jonathan Wong

Published: 12:14pm, 26 Jul 2019Updated: 1:10pm, 26 Jul 2019

At Nectar, the Hong Kong fine-dining vegetarian restaurant that evolved from chef and founder Peggy Chan’s first project, Grassroots Pantry, more than 90 per cent of the ingredients are locally grown. Considering that Hong Kong imports more than 90 per cent of its food, this is impressive.

It has taken six years, basically since Chan founded Grassroots Pantry, for her to be able to source this way.

“We have some of the best, freshest produce. The fresher it is, the more nutrients there are, and the [lower the] carbon [footprint] we’re creating. It lasts much longer, too. I can keep fresh [local] produce in the fridge for five to six days, whereas if it’s air-flown, then it [won’t last as long] and you can taste the difference for sure,” says Chan.

Richard Ekkebus, culinary director of the Landmark Mandarin Oriental, agrees. At the hotel’s recently revamped Amber restaurant, teardrop peas grown in Hong Kong’s New Territories are used because they “reduce carbon footprint and there are gains in freshness”, he says.

Chicken with Ramson and its ingredients, at Roganic, Causeway Bay. The restaurant sources all its vegetables, chicken and seafood in Hong Kong. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

At Roganic Hong Kong, an outlet of chef Simon Rogan’s Roganic in London, sourcing locally is part of the DNA. Rogan has a farm and casual restaurant in Cartmel, a village in the Lake District in the northwest of England, where great produce is almost a given, but that vision was harder to execute in Hong Kong.

“[Sourcing locally] takes getting used to, but it’s what we try to do,” says Oliver Marlow, head chef of Roganic Hong Kong. The restaurant in Causeway Bay, which opened early this year, has been committed to sourcing locally since day one, and has a member of staff whose sole job is to procure high-quality local supplies.