{"id":37839,"date":"2026-03-20T13:24:37","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T05:24:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=37839"},"modified":"2026-03-20T13:24:37","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T05:24:37","slug":"how-a-hong-kong-fish-ball-maker-from-kowloon-walled-city-became-a-thriving-family-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=37839","title":{"rendered":"How a Hong Kong fish ball maker from Kowloon Walled City became a thriving family business"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Kowloon Walled City, with its triad gangs and lawless reputation, remains a symbol of Hong Kong\u2019s underbelly more than three decades after it was demolished in 1994.<\/p>\n

What many forget, however, is that it was also home to tens of thousands of ordinary residents who lived ordinary lives trying to make ends meet.<\/p>\n

Ha Ming Kee, a Chiu Chow-style fish ball<\/span> noodle restaurant and manufacturer, was founded decades ago by Roger Ha\u2019s parents, Ha Fan-ming and Chan So-hing, in the narrow alleyways of Kowloon Walled City<\/span>.<\/div>\n

\u201cI have memories of my mother cleaning the fish by the pump on the street,\u201d Roger Ha says. \u201cThere was no running water in the buildings, and the pump was our only water supply.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Pedestrians<\/div>
Pedestrians walk on a street outside the Kowloon Walled City before its demolition in 1994. Photo: courtesy of Roger Ha<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Chiu Chow fish balls date back to the tail end of the Qing dynasty<\/span> (1644-1911) in Chaozhou \u2013 or Chiu Chow, as it is called in Cantonese \u2013 in the east of China\u2019s Guangdong province. They were later introduced to southern Guangdong, and in the 1950s and 60s, innovative Hong Kong chefs began deep-frying them and serving them in curry sauce in what was to become the quintessential Hong Kong snack<\/span> we know today.<\/div>\n

According to Ha, the flavour of fish balls that many Hongkongers know can be traced back to his parents\u2019 business. \u201cAt its height, Ha Ming Kee was the supplier of 70 per cent of the restaurants in the Yau Tsim Mong district,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Kowloon Walled City, with its triad gangs and lawless reputation, remains a symbol of Hong Kong\u2019s underbelly more than three decades after it was demolished…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37840,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[3442,1107,540,238,979,3569,5231,18589,4595,7399,18590],"class_list":["post-37839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bored-interesting","tag-ball","tag-business","tag-city","tag-family","tag-fish","tag-hong","tag-kong","tag-kowloon","tag-maker","tag-thriving","tag-walled","wpcat-33-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}