Hakkasan Mayfair

The pass keeps its Cantonese line

The pass at Hakkasan Mayfair in Mayfair, London, still carries Chef Tong Chee Hwee’s discipline through a modern Cantonese kitchen built for pressure. Tong came to London in 2001 as head chef at Hakkasan, after beginning at Happy Valley Chinese restaurant in Singapore, moving through its Kuala Lumpur kitchen, and overseeing the Chinese restaurant at the Ritz Carlton hotel. By 2010 he was Executive Head Chef of the Hakkasan group, a role that turned one station into a wider standard: sauces held clean, roast meats cut with purpose, dim sum made to carry both detail and pace. His current title sits with the house as Chef, while his broader career now includes Chef Owner at Gouqi in London. The through-line is not a change in taste, but a way of handling Chinese cooking under scrutiny. Tong has said, “I always follow the most traditional and authentic flavours possible when I’m cooking a particular dish.” At Mayfair, that principle meets a room designed for scale, formality, and late-service velocity.

Traditional flavour in a modern frame

The kitchen’s public language is modern Cantonese, but the method depends on older Cantonese controls: heat, texture, timing, and the clarity of a sauce once it reaches the table. Peking duck, crispy duck salad, Chilean sea bass, and dim sum are the named signatures here, and each asks for a different kind of bench-side attention. Duck needs lacquer, rest, and the clean cut of skin against meat. Dim sum asks for small adjustments in folding, filling, and steam. The sea bass carries the Mayfair side of the program, a premium ingredient set inside the house’s polished register rather than treated as ornament. The dining format moves between à la carte, set menu, and small plates, so the pass has to hold rhythm across several kinds of order at once. The beverage side extends that rhythm through a curated wine program, craft cocktails, and sake, all supporting a kitchen whose main discipline remains flavour before display.

Two floors behind wooden screens

Hakkasan Mayfair opened on Bruton Street in November 2010, across two floors and with room for up to 220 guests. Christian Liaigre’s design gives the room its familiar tension: intricate wooden screens, dim light, traditional Chinese motifs, and a clubby pulse that rises as service deepens. The room is opulent, but the craft happens in smaller increments. A plate leaves the pass. A tray of dim sum arrives before the conversation has fully settled. Music keeps the room lively without changing the kitchen’s obligation to control. Mayfair brings its own theatre, and the house keeps Cantonese precision inside a large, formal restaurant. Since 2012, Hakkasan Mayfair has held a Michelin star at this address. The lasting signal is still the cut skin and caviar on the Peking duck.