Chinese desserts like red bean, black sesame and sago soups are having their moment again

Several years ago, I opined about the misguided hate towards Chinese desserts, and how a subset of Hongkongers were attempting to buck the stereotype of sweet soups and puddings as boring, one-dimensional or too sweet.

In the time since, the usual wave of sugary trends has waxed and waned: from croffle madness to the rise and fall of doughnut shops to the dominance of Dubai chocolate and all of its iterations.

Now, Hong Kong is seeing a resurgence of dessert specialists that are honing in on more classic local flavours and techniques, while some are playing with the blueprints a little. Meanwhile, dessert soup stalwarts such as Kai Kai Dessert – so popular it inspired post-punk rockers NYPD to pen a song about it – are expanding with new branches on both sides of Victoria Harbour.

In Kowloon, Prince Edward’s Yup Moment, which specialises in Chinese dessert soups with a modern touch, opened a new branch in Kowloon City. It serves signature desserts such as coconut and pistachio cream sweet soup, longan shaved ice and mango sweet soup with mini mochi – the last a bit of a hat-tip to the item popularised by now-defunct mango dessert chain Hui Lau Shan.

Most recently, Oi Man Sang, the popular dai pai dong in Sham Shui Po , unveiled Oi Sweet, its own desserts parlour that is distinct from its visual DNA. Instead of serving the expected sweet endings, the team has dreamed up a series of fashionable desserts that are old favourites with a nip-tuck and a new stylist.