How Hong Kong chef Oliver Li subtly combines Chinese and French styles in his complex menus

Oliver Li does not take the easy route, you could say. While most fine-dining chefs and restaurateurs might ease into a new opening by introducing one dinner service, Li’s restaurant Jee in Hong Kong’s Central district launched right into opening six days a week, serving lunch and dinner. On top of this, Li is serving a highly complex arrangement of courses that are laboriously constructed and above all require a lot of time to prepare. His dinner menus – diners can choose between eight courses or 1o – cover a lot of ground in terms of Chinese culinary techniques; there are slow braises, double boiling, stuffing and many, many things made from scratch. The menus also show the influence of Li’s years of training in classical French cooking: in Hong Kong, he was the sous chef at L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon, then chef de cuisine at Whisk, L’Envol and finally Feuille in 2023, which earned a Michelin star within a year of its opening. It’s an accomplished résumé considering Li did not initially set out to pursue French gastronomy, although he always knew he was going to be a chef. “When I started out [cooking], I decided that I did not want to do Western food or French cuisine,” the chef says. “In fact, I did Chinese cuisine for a few years.” He began cooking at hotel restaurants, which was where he learned about the world of Michelin. He subsequently changed his mind, and decided to branch into fine dining, heading straight to the storied kitchen of L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon, which at that time was on the cusp of gaining its third Michelin star. “It was a lot of pressure. If something wasn’t perfect, the entire plate would be thrown away. If you made a single mistake at the end of the line, you would have wasted the entire team’s chain of effort,” Li says. He got to hone his skills and meet Robuchon before the celebrated chef’s death. He also made important connections and friends during those years; some of the latter have joined him at Jee. Opening the restaurant has taken Li back to his roots in Chinese cooking, which he reinterprets through the lens of his culinary experience. Working with sister restaurant Ying Jee Club’s venerable chef Siu Hin-chi, Li has created menus that deftly combine the techniques and traditions of French and Chinese cuisines. The inaugural menus feature dishes that are primed to become instant classics. Putting a fun spin on prawn toast, Li decided to replace the main protein with meaty crab, and use a house-made bread done in the softer style used in the classic French dessert baba au rhum. “We make it from scratch and it’s designed so that it can absorb more of the egg mixture, like a sponge,” Li says. “I’m very persistent in hoping that we can make at least 90 per cent of our ingredients in house.” The dough is also infused with aged vinegar (a nod to the traditional combination of hairy crab with sweet vinegar), and the slice of toast is very slowly and carefully fried in plenty of butter for half an hour until perfectly golden. The crab is mixed through with a seasoning inspired by typhoon shelter crab – a rich blend of fried garlic and chilli – and the entire thing is topped off with tiny “crabs” cut out of pastry and fried in chilli oil. It’s a bite or two at most, yet the dish has literally been constructed over hours, from start to finish. A similar level of dedication is applied throughout the menu – Li likes to set himself and his team challenges. To make one dish, they soak dried sea cucumber in water for at least a week to achieve the ideal texture (the water must be changed regularly). “Although chef Siu is a master, he accepts new techniques and enjoys eating Western cuisine,” Li says of his mentor. “I’ll think of a dish and he’ll try it out. He is quite open.” Siu says: “I’ve been cooking Chinese food for 40 years, and I’ve realised how diners’ tastes have changed. So I’ve become bolder. I thought, let’s try to do a restaurant that uses more innovative approaches to cook Chinese cuisine. “It turns out that Cantonese food can be reinterpreted with a Western approach, but still have that authentic flavour.” He adds: “This is a new generation of young people who are really talented.” I’m doing my best to balance everything, because I don’t want to make the menu too over the top and ‘fusiony’ Oliver Li, head chef at Jee, in Central, Hong Kong The two have enjoyed their cross-cultural exchange, with the younger Li presenting little puzzles to be solved, and riffing off some of Siu’s signature dishes. A case in point is Ying Jee Club’s lobster with shallot and scallion dish. At Jee, it is turned into a dish that wouldn’t look out of place at one of Robuchon’s restaurants; instead of lobster, Li has opted for a meaty grouper that is wet-aged for five days to gain the tender texture favoured in French cuisine. “Usually, Chinese restaurants will butcher fresh, live fish [like grouper] and stir-fry it in pieces for that bouncy texture,” Li explains. “But it’s hard to do that here because there is a lot of preparation involved. So I asked our supplier to provide the fish whole for us to process ourselves, and age it for about five days.” For the sauce, Li uses a combination of Japanese scallions, fresh green onions and shallots. On top of the scallion sauce is a rich sabayon made with chicken oil, shallots and a bit of French vin jaune – chosen for its flavour, which calls to mind huadiao wine. “When we cook the fish, we’ll also use some ginger in the frying oil, which is a bit different to how we would usually fry fish [in a French kitchen],” Li says. He was also inspired by chef Siu’s signature crispy chicken, which is soaked in a superior stock infused with dried prawn for an extra level of umami before frying. At Jee, however, he has surprised diners by using a rather atypical ingredient: silkie chicken, which is leaner and has dusty black skin. “It’s an ingredient I’ve always wanted to use, because it’s something that is normally used for soups,” says Li. As the chicken tends to be on the smaller end compared to those typically used for the dish, he opted to cook the bird sous vide before frying to maintain a more succulent texture; the second presentation on the plate is the chicken leg, which comes stuffed with some local preserved sausage “for a salty sweet aroma”. The next menu change will come in the autumn, and Li already has a list of dishes and techniques he is keen to explore and experiment with, although he wants to remain grounded. “I’m doing my best to balance everything, because I don’t want to make the menu too over the top and ‘fusiony’,” he says. “I really hate this word. I’m not saying I’m challenging a generation of well-respected [Chinese] masters, but I hope we can find our own taste.” Jee, 2/F, 8 Lyndhurst Terrace, Central, tel: 2389 3288

How Hong Kong chef Oliver Li subtly combines Chinese and French styles in his complex menus

Li talks about his dedication to perfection, French restaurant history and his work with mentor Siu Hin-chi on menus at new restaurant Jee