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Is it a free giveaway? Is it people rushing last-minute to get crisp banknotes to stuff lai see packets before the Lunar New Year ends? Well, there are not many reasons why you might see a long queue snaking out of a bank branch, but it turns out, OCBC in Central is hiding a secret: it’s where you can find the Old Seng Choong pop-up in Hong Kong.
For those unfamiliar with the name, Old Seng Choong is a beloved Singaporean brand that traces its origins all the way back to Seng Choong Confectionary, a heritage bakery established in 1965. Daniel Tay, whose father founded Seng Choong Confectionary, set about reimagining the old-school shop, and though his first attempt to modernise it was ahead of its time and faced many challenges, his eventual revival of the Seng Choong brand transformed it for a contemporary audience. Old Seng Choong continues to specialise in premium baked goods such as cookies, cakes, and confections while retaining a focus on preserving and reflecting its Singaporean heritage. Best-sellers include their iconic pandan chiffon cake, pandan coconut cookies, gula melaka cookies, and laksa cookies, beautifully presented in nostalgic, souvenir-worthy tins.
In Singapore, Old Seng Choong’s chiffon cake flavours include not only pandan, but also Jeju yuzu, coconut blue pea, and dark chocolate. Its pandan chiffon cake is notable for using naturally extracted pandan leaf juice, Japanese flour, Japanese sugar, coconut milk, and Melaka coconut sugar, with no artificial colour or preservatives. For the Hong Kong location, Old Seng Choong will offer its signature pandan chiffon cake ($200) as well as limited-edition mille-feuille-like kueh lapis cakes ($280) and four different cookie options ($160 each).
Just 250 pandan cakes are delivered daily directly from Singapore, and when they sell out, that’s all for the day, so arriving early to get your hands on one is absolutely crucial. Each customer is only allowed to purchase one pandan cake daily, but luckily there is no requirement that you have to be an existing OCBC client, either. Since the pop-up opened about a week ago, the daily queues have been formidable. Good luck out there!
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