The best Sichuan restaurants in Hong Kong

With over 500 locations worldwide, Liu's Chong Qing Hot Pot is a famous chain from Chongqing that specialises in Sichuan-style hotpot. While they have a small selection of hotpot broths to choose from, Liu's is best known for their signature mala spicy soup that's made with beef tallow and plenty of chillis. Aside from the usual hot pot add-ins like sliced meats, vegetables, or fishball varieties; this hotpot spot also offers delicacies like tripe, pig hearts, pig blood and intestines.

This dining parlour offers a build-your-own mala pot experience that allows you to choose various meats or seafood, along with vegetables you want to enjoy stir-fried with chilli and pepper. One of the restaurant’s signatures is the tangy golden soup poached fish with pickled cabbage and chilli – a definite must-try.

Jing Alley serves up a large variety of dishes from the Chengdu region; such as squid poached in green soup, seabass with homemade pickles and chillies, double-cooked lamb in Sichuan style, and many more.  Additionally, you can find fiery appetisers like Sichuan sliced beef and ox offal in chilli sauce or smoked pork intestines on their menu.

Twelve Flavors is a casual restaurant chain with locations across Hong Kong that offer authentic Sichuanese fare. Here, you can customise your own bowl of dry mala hot pot or a non-spicy alternative if you want all the flavour without burning your tastebuds. Pick and choose your favourite add-ins like sliced beef, pig intestines, squid, and tofu skin, among others, before having everything tossed in an aromatic blend of spices. 

Just a stone’s throw away from Times Square is Yu, a quaint restaurant that specialises in Sichuan cuisine. This joint offers a wide variety of dishes that start from light bites such as hot and cold appetisers or marinated innards to entrees like sea bass cooked with cabbage and chilli or specialty mao xue wang – assorted offal with duck blood in a spicy broth. If you want to try a little bit of everything, Yu also offers noodle sets where you can enjoy a portion of their dan dan noodles or hot and sour potato noodles, along with your choice of plates such as smashed cucumber, chilled Sichuan-style spicy chicken, or pig intestines.

Deng G’s menu is chock full of authentic Sichuan fare like smoked fish, duck blood in hot and spicy broth, dan dan noodles coated in a rich peanut sauce, and plenty more.  The chefs here believe in using traditional cooking methods in order to highlight the distinctive flavours of each dish. Aside from food, Deng G’s menu also features a large variety of baijiu and original Chinese cocktails that customers can sip on to cool down their tongues. The Sichuan kick is there, but it doesn't punch you in the face, making Deng G definitely worth a visit, particularly for those who like their spice level dialled down.

Aside from presenting a gorgeous interior that exudes nostalgic glamour, Grand Majestic Sichuan and its head chef Theign Phan serve up tongue-tingling Sichuan cuisine with a menu consulted on by Chinese food historian Fuchsia Dunlop. Diners of the restaurant can indulge in sumptuous meat entrees such as sizzling Kurobuta pork slices with rice crisps or beef slices in fragrant chilli oil; seafood dishes like pan-seared whole fish in chilli bean paste or whole mud crab fried in Sichuan chillies and peppercorns; and refreshing plates like cold noodles with pickled red radish and cucumbers.

Twins Liangpi specializes in serving Sichuan spicy noodles. It provides a wide range of options, including the iconic Chongqing liangpi, sour and spicy noodles as well as other authentic Sichuan dishes like saliva chicken. Twins has been receiving great reviews, and there is definitely a good reason for that. The kick of heat from the spicy broth with the al dente bites of cool liangpi should complete a meal that powers up your day.

If you're not shy of firey flavours, then head to River Sichuan Restaurant in Sai Ying Pun. Specialising in authentic Sichuanese cuisine, River Sichuan Restaurant offers plenty of dishes at affordable prices. But if you can't handle spice well, River Sichuan Restaurant also has plenty of dishes that aren't spicy and can be enjoyed by everyone. 

 Apart from serving up your usual Sichuan faves like dan dan noodles, spicy and sour potato noodles, chilli marinated chicken and more, this Central joint is most famous for its Boot Boot chicken. A traditional Sichuan dish, this dish first started out as chicken skewers in a bowl of tongue-numbing spices, oils, and broths. Over time, people got bored of just eating chicken, and so they began adding different vegetables and meats into the mix. The Boot Boot chicken we see now usually consists of various meats and seafood like squid and prawns, as well as vegetables such as mushrooms, lotus roots, potatoes, and even quail egg.

A family-run business, SiJie is a classic for those who love spicy food. Highlights from the menu include Sichuan style prawns with garlic and spicy salt, poached fish in Chongqing style, Sichuan cold noodle, dry-fried string beans, and cucumber with hot and sour sauce, among others.

Making diners’ tastebuds happy – or afire – is San Xi Lou, best known for its authentic Sichuan dishes. Try the wok-fried chicken with chillies, mapo tofu with prawns, and stewed Mandarin fish with green chillies and Sichuan peppercorn. In case you need to cool your taste buds down after your meal, San Xi Lou’s menu also provides a selection of Chinese desserts like almond sweet soup and red date pudding.