Tai Cheong Bakery
Hong Kong
Order: Egg tart
The Michelin Guide article of December 15, 2025 describes this bakery's egg tart, with a cookie-style crust rather than a flaky one.
Checked on 2026-11-02
Dim Sum · FFET10264
Dan tat (Cantonese egg tart)
The egg tart is a small baked shell of flaky or cookie-style crust holding a set egg custard, made in Hong Kong bakeries and tea restaurants.
Mural guide
A round white porcelain plate holds egg tarts with golden butter crusts around pale yellow, set custard made with eggs, evaporated milk and vanilla extract, with wooden chopsticks resting beside the plate.
The small dishes served with tea in a tea house.
The egg tart holds a baked custard of egg, sugar and milk in a flaky or cookie-style shell. The British brought it to Guangzhou in the 1920s, and it grew popular in Hong Kong after the war. This chronology comes from a December 15, 2025 article; no dated primary text was found to corroborate it. Guangzhou restaurants offered weekly special dim sum, and the egg tart was adapted from the English custard tart. Several Hong Kong bakeries and restaurants serve it.
What
The egg tart is a small tart shell holding a smooth, lightly sweet custard, baked until set. The shell comes in flaky and cookie-style forms; both recipes make a flaky laminated shell and a custard of eggs, sugar, evaporated milk and hot water.1,4,5
When
The British brought the tart to Guangzhou in the 1920s, and it grew popular in Hong Kong after the war. This chronology comes from a December 15, 2025 article; no dated primary text was found to corroborate it.3
Where
Guangzhou, then the bakeries and tea restaurants of Hong Kong. In Hong Kong, it was first made in upscale places around the 1940s and reached tea restaurants in the 1960s.1,2,3
How
The shell is a butter and flour dough that is rolled out and folded; the filling combines eggs, sugar, evaporated milk and hot water. Both recipes use butter dough (one also adds shortening) and bake at 160 to 190 degrees Celsius for roughly 25 to 30 minutes. See the recipes below.4,5
Why
Guangzhou restaurants used weekly special dim sum to attract customers, and the egg tart was adapted from the English custard tart.1,2
Impact and influence
A December 2025 article lists several places that make egg tarts in Hong Kong and Macau. Hong Kong bakeries and tea restaurants serve them.1,3
No tale about this food has been found.
Grandma Li
This is a simplified home version, not the traditional restaurant method.
This is my home egg tart, with a flaky butter-laminated shell. The amounts follow a recipe blog by a named author, who makes 16; I converted the cups and spoons to grams and milliliters. Another recipe by a named author makes a water dough and an oil dough separately and folds them in layers, which takes more steps, and I did not follow it. The folds, how I divide the butter and the baking time are my own choices.
Ingredients
- Flour, for the shell 250 g
- Salt a pinch
- Cold butter 170 g
- Cold water 30 ml
- Sugar, for the filling 100 g
- Hot water 240 ml
- Evaporated milk 120 ml
- Eggs 3
- Vanilla extract 1 teaspoon
Steps
- Put the flour and salt in a bowl, add 40 g of the cold butter cut small, rub it in with your fingers to fine crumbs, pour in the cold water, bring it into a dough, wrap it and chill it for 30 minutes.
- Press the remaining 130 g of butter into a flat square and chill it.
- Roll the dough into a rectangle, set the butter in the middle and fold the dough over it like an envelope. Roll it out, fold it in thirds, chill for 30 minutes, then roll and fold in thirds once more.
- Roll the dough to about 3 mm thick, cut rounds slightly larger than the tart molds, press them in and shape the edges, then chill them. This makes 16.
- Stir the sugar into the hot water until dissolved and let it cool to warm, then mix in the evaporated milk, eggs and vanilla and pass the mixture through a sieve to remove foam.
- Preheat the oven to 175 degrees Celsius. Pour the custard into the shells, about four-fifths full, and bake for 25 to 30 minutes. I take them out when the middle has set and no longer wobbles.
- Leave them in the molds for a few minutes, then unmold them and let them cool before eating.
Tips
- Chinese Wikipedia says the Guangzhou form used lard pastry; both recipes I looked at use butter (one adds shortening), so this is a butter version.
- I always pass the custard through a sieve so it turns out smoother; this is my own habit.
Allergens: wheat, milk, egg
Grandpa Li
Picks come from public lists and guides and were checked on the dates shown; places can change, so confirm before you go.
Fung Shing
Hong Kong, North Point
Order: Egg tart
The same Michelin Guide article lists this Michelin-recommended restaurant among the places whose egg tarts are worth trying.
Checked on 2026-11-02
Sources (1)
Seventh Son
Hong Kong, Wan Chai
Order: Egg tart
The same Michelin Guide article lists this restaurant among the places whose egg tarts are worth trying.
Checked on 2026-11-02
Sources (1)
Yat Tung Heen
Hong Kong
Order: Egg tart
The same Michelin Guide article lists this restaurant among the places whose egg tarts are worth trying.
Checked on 2026-11-02