Highlights of the 2023 Michelin Awards

The three-Michelin star restaurants honoured yesterday

Yesterday the latest Michelin star unveiling was held in Macau, the first in-person event in three years.

There were a few surprises, with stalwart Lung King Heen, the Chinese restaurant at the Four Seasons Hong Kong lost a star. I don't find this surprising, as a Singaporean foodie friend went there over a month ago and was not impressed by the quality of the dim sum she ate.

Chef Sato's Ta Vie has been awarded three stars

The other reason is the head chef, Chan Yan-tak is getting on in age. While he claimed to me over a year ago that if he retired he would have nothing to do, perhaps this is a good way for him to bow out and allow someone else to take over the reins.

A shock surprise was French-Japanese restaurant Ta Vie garnering the coveted three stars. Chef Hideaki Sato is a low-key person, but he is extremely passionate about cooking. During the pandemic, he used the time to experiment and even learned how to make Peking duck! Everyday he would make a new one and post it on Instagram.

The rest of us salivated over his pictures of these beautifully roasted ducks, but he would humbly say they were not good enough. Needless to say they were not wasted -- he carved the meat and with the bones made a stock to serve his own handmade ramen.

I was very lucky to try it once and wished I could eat it every week!

Chef Merone of Estro now has one star

Periodically Sato would get visits from chef Cheng Kam-fu who used to be with Celebrity Cuisine and is now at The Demon Celebrity (a partnership with 'Demon chef' Alvin Leung), who would inspect his roast duck and give him some pointers.

Other well-deserved stars include chef Antimo Maria Merone for his restaurant Estro that serves contemporary Italian food. He has thought long and hard about figuring out new ways to present Italian dishes while retaining the traditional taste.

However, one restaurant in Wan Chai, called DHK Seafood Restaurant was given a star, but it had announced it was closing just before the Michelin stars were handed out. As a result no one from the restaurant came to claim the award.

DHK was headed by former chefs of Fook Lam Moon and Guo Fu Lou, but the restaurant had financial difficulties, as staff told HK01 that they had not been paid for months.

DHK was shuttered before it was given a star

A Michelin star probably would not have saved the restaurant either -- greedy landlords would have jacked up the rent, the biggest headache for businesses in Hong Kong way before the pandemic.

A bit embarrassing for Michelin to include a restaurant that has already shuttered, but that just illustrates the precariousness of the industry in Hong Kong, and that its economic revival is a long way off.