Sucker for congee that I am, I had eaten a few bowls in Hong Kong that varied in quality. On a late night wander around Mongkok the day after they lit fires below my hotel room, I found the streets calm. I had researched and read on Openrice that Good Hope served a delicious bowl of congee despite being famous for noodles.

Checking my vital signs before walking in the door, after 10 days of gluttony, I pushed forward to conquer one last restaurant before heading west to Cambodia. Dumplings are my lifeblood, and having lived in both Taiwan and Hong Kong, have become a part of my daily rituals. Tho they vary in quality, I can even find joy in a 7-11 Siu Mai, that's how far i'll go for the lifestyle. 

The Michelin guide are good for some aspects of culinary life. They can hype humble chicken rice establishments to dizzying new heights, or illuminate the hard work of a dedicated chef....

Aching calves are a thing in HK. Tho the public transport system is second to none, you rarely give up the chance to walk around Kowloon or Central craning your neck up to see the tips of skyscrapers, immersed in the fight for elbow space and kamikaze fast walkers. After a long and rewarding wander, the only acceptable resting spot is a Dim Sum house. No matter what time of day.

What do you get when you mix a creative duo with a derelict apartment and blend it all together with a good dose of LSD? Mum's Not Home!

This riotous splash of colour and compositions sits above a suspiciously empty looking apartment in downtown Yau Ma Tai, on Shanghai Street. You'd easily walk past it a thousand times unless someone knew where it was. I was fortunate enough to be in town with a friend who knew the way, and up we went to the second floor and rang the doorbell and waited.

In the enchanted realms of worldly cuisines, the Indian kitchen stands tallest in terms of familiarity. I spent more than a decade living in India, stuffing my face at every given moment with the morsels of many kitchens. From home cooked meals to five star hotels, roadside dosa shacks to streetside pav bhaji stalls; i've tried it all. Leh to Kanyakumari, Amritsar to Imphal, your dhaba's have lain waste to the appetites of a man unleashed. ​

It's too easy to draw comparisons to Wong Kar Wai when you step into Mido Cafe. Based on proximity alone, it wasn't too far from where Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung flung their tailored clothes around in nostalgic epochs. However, the past always seems more vivid than reality, and spending time lost in these dizzying rooms makes you pine for the intangible.

Rent prices in Hong Kong make it virtually impossible to run anything fringe. The underground scene is small as it is, that confounded by the costs of running anything downtown throws up serious hindrances in the pursuit of pleasure. White Noise has had to move a few times already due to this exact problem. Recently they have bounced around the Sham Shui Po area, and seem to have settled, for now.

Not everyone decks out their house with Ikea furniture. Some people take their hobby to a whole new level.

Meet Paul. Sham Shui Po's resident hoarder. However, this house isn't filled with useless junk found on the markets that litter the neighborhood, no, this house is a shrine to wax. Over 300,000 records make up his collection, 100k of those being for personal use. The rest lie scattered around the house in boxes, piles, shelves and literally every available floor space that would still allow a human to pass by, sideways.

On the proverbial hunt for a decent burger, yes, even in the culinary megalopolis of Hong Kong, rumours had reached the table of a new joint hidden up in the concrete steppes of Wan Chai. With a slight wind steering the humidity in any direction I turned, I made the vacant journey, subterraneously, under the sea to the side of business and capitalism. Waiting rather a few tram arrivals to catch an old skool one (lost in perpetual memory and nostalgia) I rattled from Central - Wan Chai in the packed downstairs. 

In my younger and less vulnerable days, I marched past this restaurant in blind defiance knowing nothing of the glories that lay within. I was too hell-bent on getting to Sheung Wan to photograph old buildings and focused more on my Lomo LCA than I did on shopfronts. These days, armed with slightly better taste, and the wonders of the internet, I happened to peruse the Michelin Guide to steer my radar, whilst spending a solid week of culinary hedonism in Hong Kong. ​