In Hong Kong and China, chopsticks used at formal dinners are often paired with chopstick rests, a quaint kitchen accessory that prevents chopsticks from being dirtied and a place for rest between courses.
They are simple and do not traditionally elicit much attention. That is until A Freaking Dumpling burst onto Hong Kong’s food and beverage industry in early 2021, marketing a neat and cute ceramic dumpling acting as a resting place for your tired chopsticks.
A Freaking Dumpling is a grassroots side-project created by Hong Kong-born Kingsley Wong to celebrate Chinese dumpling heritage, with an added twist of supporting of Hong Kong’s underprivileged and hungry.
In collaboration with a fine-dining client based in Melbourne, Kingsley brought the ceramic dumpling to the shores of Hong Kong for a unique gift marking an important part of Chinese culture – the dumpling!
Kingsley, a Melbourne-lived consultant in the food and beverage industry, merged a partnership with Feeding Hong Kong in Christmas last year, Hong Kong’s first food bank supplying surplus food from retailers and distributors to people in need.
The idea for A Freaking Dumpling is simple: for every handmade ceramic dumpling bought through their Instagram store, six real dumplings will be donated to those in need.
Food is allocated by Feeding Hong Kong and donations to the charity are made monthly. By October 2021, A Freaking Dumpling have helped to donate over 10,000 real dumplings as a result of 2,300 ceramic dumplings purchased.
A Freaking Dumpling sprung out of Kingsley’s business consulting for several fine-dining venues based in Melbourne.
Bracing for the impact of COVID-19 in early and mid-2020, which saw a complete stop of dining for many Melbourne restaurants as a result of state-wide lockdowns, Kingsley needed to innovate to keep his clients afloat.
The original ceramic dumpling was born out of one of his client’s restaurants. A famous Western-Chinese fusion restaurant, the main chef oversaw a special 12-course set menu that included one course for wonton dumplings soaked in chilli oil and vinegar and employed Kingsley’s designed dumpling chopsticks holder.
The dumplings were designed as a product from Tajiki Room, his ceramic business in Melbourne partnering with local ceramicists to sell kitchenware that would otherwise be sold to restaurants and distributors.
With the impact COVID-19 had on the restaurant industry in Melbourne, Kingsley’s business functioned as a revenue stream for ceramicists in the F&B industry in sourcing an additional revenue stream.
“[The dumplings were] not meant to be for general sale to the public, just simply an add-on to another fine dining restaurant,” Kingsley explains.
In July 2020, Kingsley and a team of ceramists and designers created the first batches of ceramic dumplings, originally meant to be marketed for his Melbourne-based friend and business circles.
After a length of time working in Melbourne during their long and restrictive lockdown, Kingsley travelled back to Hong Kong in September 2020. “I wanted to return with the smallest [ceramic] product I could bring back without being damaged. It was not quite possible to have 20 plates fit in my luggage, so I brought 12 dumplings back to show friends and family.”
Ideas began to circle about what Kingsley would be able to do with his side project selling ceramic dumplings to hold chopsticks. A month after he arrived back in Hong Kong, he saw an advertisement for Feeding Hong Kong and reached out to them.
“I thought ‘damn, maybe we could do something with [Feeding HK],” Kingsley told The Beat Asia. He quickly envisioned a project where people could buy his dumpling chopsticks holder and get six edible dumplings to donate to the charity for the hungry of Hong Kong to eat.
“A lot of people want to do charity work and contribute to the community, but it is difficult on where to start and sometimes complicated with the [bureaucracy] behind all the form-signing. The project, A Freaking Dumpling, makes it easy to give back.”
“Nothing has changed since day one,” Kingsley says, “the product, price, donation amount, and charity partner has not changed.”
Orders can be placed solely through Instagram DMs and the project has expanded naturally simply through word of mouth of people within the food and beverage industries of Hong Kong and Melbourne, and those who simply love the project.
In addition to selling A Freaking Dumpling’s ceramics, Kingsley also works with corporate teams and local design businesses to create Hong Kong-specific packaging for the ceramic dumplings and creating dumpling workshops for companies at private venues such as SOHO House and TownPlace.
“We are dumplings for dumplings,” Kingsley says.
Since the founding of the project in January 2021, Kingsley’s initiative has grown exponentially in 2021 with orders flying during Chinese New Year, Mid-Autumn Festival, and the upcoming holiday season.
For orders of the ceramic A Freaking Dumpling chopstick holders, message their Instagram page directly for queries on local and international orders.
A regular “lunch box” set costs HK$268 for two pieces, HK$768 for six pieces, and HK$1410 for 12 pieces. A limited-edition set of two pieces in a handmade bamboo steamer from Tuck Ching Sum Lee Bamboo in Sai Ying Pun is HK$298.
