11 years on since its founding in Central, Jacky Ng wants to reinvent Taiwanese cuisine with a colourful and fusion twist across Hong Kong
When Check In Taipei opened their first location in Central in 2014, Jacky Ng and his co-founding team aspired to construct a new identity of Taiwanese food in Hong Kong – bar the country’s night market typical typecast.
The restaurant lit up with a fluorescent colour palate and smooth concrete finishing. The food served was tapas infused with Taiwanese ingredients and cooking techniques. The space largely attracted a Westernised palate.
Growing up eating Taiwanese food in Vancouver, Jacky was thrown into the chaos of managing the former Central restaurant when the founding team bowed out in 2016. “I was interested in cooking after [college] graduation, but I didn’t want to get into the restaurant business,” he says.
With no prior restaurant or business experience, Jacky preached the lore of Taiwanese food in a cityscape with lacking options for the cuisine. “I was working 12 to 14 hour days to learn the craft. It was a s***-show [laughs].”
Since its founding 11 years ago, the restaurant chain has expanded to four locations and contracted now to two – funky restaurant locations inside Causeway Bay and Tsim Sha Tsui malls.
Hong Kong’s relationship today with Taiwan is one of pure obsession. The cuisine is now craved here and the culture is sought after abroad: the Hong Kong-Taipei flight route was the world’s busiest in 2024 with 6.78 million passengers traveling the two cities.
“We don’t want to be a regular Taiwanese restaurant [in Hong Kong]. There is a perception of the cuisine being homely or [carrying a] strong night-market-style in the city. We want to bring creativity to the cuisine here, we are trying to reinvent Taiwanese food. With everything, we try to put our own Check In Taipei touches on it.”
You won’t find simple dark bowls of beef soup, pork floss-packed pancakes, scallion pastries, or an overwhelming beige colour palate on the menu. Their physical menu is lit up with fluorescent colour, interior design refreshed with modern motifs, and dishes injected with creativity.
Their dan bing Taiwanese egg roll flexes the brand’s creativity, with items featuring seafood okonomiyaki, pulled beef shank and Taiwanese pickles, and salted egg yolk with taro.
For larger plates, the menu comprises century egg dry noodles, aromatic beef noodle bowls, ornately dumpling plates, crispy, sweet, and sour street market favourites, and fine-dining-like presented fried chicken dishes.
Probably “the only Taiwanese restaurant in Hong Kong that has their own pastry team,” Jacky claims, the chain has earned virality online for their Taiwanese pineapple pastry mochi egg tart, fusing together Hong Kong and Taiwanese dessert cultures. Equally, their taro ball dessert bowls and milk mochi crunchy plates are paired up with Hong Kong touches, namely grass jelly and black sesame crunch.
A key modern motif is followed in both of Check In Taipei locations. Their Tsim Sha Tsui location in Harbour City is inspired by Taiwan’s Shifen Sky Lantern Festival and the pink flowers and blue water tracing alongside Tamsui River in the capital.
Across the harbour, their Causeway Bay location inside the WWWTC Mall takes its inspiration from Taiwan’s verdant Alishan country park and Aboriginal communities dotting the east and centre of the country. Housed in two popular malls, their grand interiors go a long way to make guests forget they are dining in a mall.
“Our interior and environment is unprecedented in Hong Kong, you wouldn’t imagine a Taiwanese restaurant to be anything like our Causeway Bay or Tsim Sha Tsui shops.”
For all intents and purposes, Jacky does not want Check In Taipei to be seen as a chain. “We want people to have an all new experience when they are eating Taiwanese food at both of our locations. We have approximately 40% of the dishes on each menu exclusive to each location too.”
Jacky is constantly on the hunt for new viral savoury items and pastries popping up in Taiwan, a strategy to invigorate his brand during a challenging period affecting Hong Kong’s hospitality sector.
“With this recent economic downturn, we are seeing changes in consumer behaviours. We have to embrace this new economy. Our prices have come down about 10 percent to help increase customer spending.”
“People in Hong Kong are not spending less, but spending more selectively. It is about how you capture your own market and aim for the right demographics to succeed in this new economy. Never compromise and lose your initial drive for what you want to do.”
Dine at Check In Taipei today for a taste of the modern side of Taiwanese cuisine
