魚初心 (Mother and Daughters)

by Kit, Vanessa, and Kay

Hong Kong is synonymous with street style food — from the fishballs to stinky tofu and fried chestnuts to egg waffles. As a little girl growing up in Hong Kong, this was Kit’s playground. Kit used to hang out at the local open-air market where her parents sold garments from a stall. She and the other children at the market would play and explore together while their parents were hard at work. She remembers the smell of freshly made fried foods, steaming hot buns, and curry soups that would fill the market air. Eating at these carts was special for Kit because during brief breaks, she would eat together with her parents as a family. Even as a young adult, Kit continued to eat cart noodles four days a week, when she would be able to see all the people she had known for years eating together as one big neighborhood.

Now living in the US and a mother herself, Kit has teamed up with her daughters Vanessa and Kay to start a food business. Kit and her family are full of culinary enthusiasts. Kit’s daughter, Vanessa, attended an intensive summer pastry camp at Laney College, while Kit worked at local Oakland restaurants in Chinatown.

Together, they currently run a small neighborhood catering business (M & D / Mother and Daughters) that offers a range of items, from French pastries and sushi platters for local Chinatown restaurants and community parties, to unique HK comfort foods and sweets. They would love to continue to offer authentic HK street food to a wider audience of adventurous eaters. Most Americans know Cantonese and Hong Kong cuisine only as dim sum and lo mein, but there’s so much more to explore.

As part of the Open Test Kitchen, Kit and her family would like to test and share some of Kit’s signature HK street food dishes: curry fishball, grilled turnip cake, golden coconut honeycomb cake, and curry cart noodle soup.

Follow and Support Kit, Vanessa, and Kay:

• Instagram: @mandd_food