Cheung Sing Cafe

Luckily there’s upstairs seating too. At the entrance there’s a variety of bread on display and you can even order your drinks and bread at the window if you don’t need to sit in.
I forgot pineapple buns even had a pineapple taste until I ate one here. Warm and fresh out.

Though not my favorite cha chaan teng in Happy Valley, Cheung Sing Café satisfies my cravings for hot milk tea and sweet pillowy carbs in a pinch.
The pineapple buns are pretty good but I prefer the coconut buns at Cheung Hing Coffee Shop. Theirs aren’t as massive and have a better proportion of coconut filling to bun, which is important to me since I’m not a big fan of so much dough.
I recently tried their cream bun and was shocked to find out the ‘cream’ tasted like a stick of soft margarine. No! Sadly, my carb-​fueled mission was aborted only one bite in.
The walk-​up window is quite convenient for when I’m walking my dog, but I think I’ll just stick to the perfectly-​executed hot milk teas.

This place has your traditional Chinese baos — xa xiu bao, pineapple bao, sweet bao, and fluffy pork bao. It’s not your traditional Chinese bakery because the baos fly off the shelves the moment they come out of the oven. It’s rare to have a fresh out of the oven bao. There’s usually a line. I went here three or four times during the duration of my stay in Happy Valley.
My favorite was their pineapple bun filled with xa xiu (or char siu for the Chinese translation). Sweet and savory. Deliciousness. They also serve milk tea so this combined with the xa xiu pineapple bun makes a great afternoon snack!

Very reliable Hong Kong café in the Happy Valley, near the horse race course.
A couple of the other HK cafes in the area have shuttered (including a very famous old run down one that was frequented by celebrities that live in the area, I’ve visited but fail to see the appeal other than its stuck in time run down interior which gave it some character).
Real estate tends to change hands very frequently, so a new restaurant business has to sink or swim very quickly. The Hong Kong style yakitori shop that is still around, somewhat puzzles me. Oh well.
Cheung Sing 祥勝茶餐廳 has all the right things going for it on Sing Wor Road. At the time of the various visits, and as of last year, the only remaining indoor HK café (sure there are the wet market cooked food stalls upstairs, but those are a different breed).
Bright vibrant signage makes it look inviting even from across the street.
This place has a small bakery selection of the usual classics, which in itself is already a floater. Because every Hong Konger at heart who grew up in any part of the hood, likes a hot coffee or tea, and a small plate with sweet baked carbs (ideally piping hot out of the oven). It’s one of life’s simplest pleasures over there for any time of the day. Breakfast for fuel, a post lunch snack, 3:15 pm (which is slang term for «milk tea time» or if you are running errands for a company, a chance to slack off). Any excuse will do.
Milk teas and coffees are solid enough for this area. Strong yet flavorful enough. Scrambled egg sandwiches (or scrambled egg with canned corned beef) do the job in a jiffy. The latter you can probably find a better rendition in Sham Shui Po, or heck Tai Hang.
Pineapple bun with butter or egg tarts? May have to ask them to toast it, because for some reason on two visits ordering these items at random during breakfast hour, they were cold :-(
Very reliable standby for this area. Predictable yet not excellent. Yet this 3 star would easily be 4.30 overseas…