‘What Staten Island is for Italian cookery in New York, I’d like to see that but for Spanish cuisine in Hong Kong’
Edgard Sanuy on making it as a Spanish chef in Hong Kong
There’s an unusual synergy between Hong Kong cuisine and Catalan cooking.
Perhaps it’s the focus on small plates of food - pintxos, tapas, dim sum - designed to be eaten slowly over a long period of time. Or the way the two cultures go about eating: think round tables with a centrepiece of paella (or roast goose), cooked and served for sharing, and arranged below eye-level so it’s clear that it is secondary to enjoying the company of your guests. Either way, the popularity and quality of Spanish restaurants in Hong Kong is better and more rife than in much of Europe. So much so that at least one tends to feature in the region’s Michelin Guide each year.
At the opening of Wan Chai’s newest Spanish eatery, Pinxtos, inspired by the food of the Basque country, I sat down with its Head Chef, Edgard Sanuy (who boasts a whopping fourteen Spanish restaurants in Hong Kong) to talk about Hong Kong’s diverse culinary scene and what it takes to stand out as a restaurant here.
Hong Kong’s Michelin Guide was published just last month. Is it something you keep track of as a chef?
There is a restaurant called ARBOR just up the road from here which has two Michelin Stars. It was awarded its second just this year. As a chef I see the personality involved, what they’re trying to do, there’s no question that it’s very different to everybody else. This chef isn’t following trends: it’s Nordic cuisine mixed with Japanese, all using French technique. But if you then look at where national and international media is handing out its awards - where the majority of people look for recommendations - ARBOR doesn’t feature. Nor do the other stand-out, technically brilliant restaurants.
It’s a lot of coverage of the same restaurant groups, many of which are great, but aren’t outstanding or Michelin-worthy. There’s a disparity between being the cooking worthy of a listicle on Instagram, which has the power to fill your restaurant, and the cookery that will get you a Michelin Star. The latter doesn’t have the same appeal to the average Hong Konger.
Has the rise of social media’s foodie influencers and fast journalism impacted restaurants negatively in that respect?
I think food journalism is tricky now. Tricky to do effectively from an editorial perspective, and tricky to know who you should be speaking to from a restaurant one. For online food magaines, there’s a focus on churning out click bait quickly, often for social media, rather than spending lots of time doing research for a column that might be published just once a month. Time is money and few people have either.
Because of that, I often see the same restaurants in Hong Kong make it to a Top 50 list. And they’ll always do well as a result. Tourists visit Hong Kong, Google where to go, and then make a booking based on one of those lists. Whether they enjoy the meal or not, they’ve visited, eaten there and paid for it, which is a huge commodity in a city like Hong Kong, where you need to attract "out of towners". The “Best of” lists aren’t really promoting the independent restaurants but they’re perpetuating the success of places that we’re already popular. It can be difficult to break into that space as someone first starting out.
You recently talked about not being as creative as you once were. Why is that?
When I started out in this industry, I was determined to show people what I could do. Working in hospitality, the draw isn’t money or a flexible lifestyle, it has to be a real love for cooking that drives you. When you get your first head chef job, that’s all you can think about: how do I put across the best of what I can do? Now, I see things a little differently. I wonder now if that version of me was doing what he did for the clients, or just for himself - to serve his own ego. It’s certainly an artistic expression, but it isn’t a business model.
A lot of restaurants focus on that artistic expression, but fail to think about their audience. And that hurts them in the long run.
Which chefs in Hong Kong do you most respect?
Antonio at 22 Ships is one of my favourites. I love the Spanish food he cooks. He is an artist. He is so meticulous in what he does. And yet, he opened on Ship Street and soon after, he was forced to close on that same street. He is a better chef than most Spanish chefs out there, he’s extremely detail orientated, but that comes with its draw backs from a business perspective. He has to close for half the week for prep, he can only take one sitting on an evening, and his costs will be extortionate. That’s all pressure and will likely end in closure.
Everybody now wants efficiency and “good enough”. People lead busy lives and, living in a place like Hong Kong, there’s not much money left over at the end of the month. I keep that all in mind when I’m designing a menu and looking at costs because I know it will keep people coming through my doors. That’s how you get regulars in a place like this.
The chefs I respect the most aren’t necessarily the ones that prioritise those things to the extent I do. But then again, they tend to have a shorter shelf life than I do.
You now have fourteen restaurants in Hong Kong. How do you approach opening a new one?
We’ve been open for eight years and, in that time, I’ve learnt a lot. Not so much about food, but about business. Take today, we’ll do 200 covers just at lunch. It’s my job to marry the best of Spanish cooking, with a price point the majority of Hong Kongers can afford, and ensure its simple enough that our food is consistent across each one of those covers. That’s not the same checklist a Michelin star chef will be working to.
It’s maybe not the romantic ideal of cookery people want to hear about, but its the cooking people want to eat. It’s the cooking that locals can afford. I’ve not travelled all the way to Hong Kong from Barcelona to cook for privileged people. I like cooking for everyone.
Looking ahead, what would you like to see more of in Hong Kong?
There’s a definite love for Spanish food here in Hong Kong. It’s because there are so many overlaps between Catalan and Cantonese cooking. The sharing, the focus on family, and conversation, while tucking in. In the future, I’d love to see a whole Spanish neighbourhood in Hong Kong. Somewhere you can get some great neighbourhood Spanish cooking at an accessible price. Maybe one of the islands like Llama would work - something away from central Hong Kong, where price points can go right down and we can use local produce.
What Staten Island is for Italian cookery in New York, I’d like to see that but for Spanish cuisine in Hong Kong.