Vegan food in London gets a Cantonese twist: say hello to dumplings made by former graphic designer and her Hong Kong chef father

Chubby Dumpling customers tuck into a serving of dumplings in London. Its menu includes vegan dumplings, which former graphic designer Chantel Yeung and her Hong Kong-born chef father came up with to satisfy the palates of the many Londoners who follow plant-based diets. Photo: Chubby DumplingLifestyleFood & DrinkVegan food in London gets a Cantonese twist: say hello to dumplings made by former graphic designer and her Hong Kong chef father

• Chubby Dumpling began as a side project for Chantel Yeung, who had been working as a graphic designer in the fashion industry, but soon became a full-time job
• The food van sells noodles and dumplings, including vegan ones. When the pair launched their first bricks-and-mortar pop-up, tickets sold out in minutes

Chinese food is difficult to make vegan – much of the cuisine depends on animal products such as bone broth, chicken powder, fish sauce and minced pork to enhance its flavour and fragrance profile.

Initially a side project, Chubby Dumpling began with Chantel Yeung, who had been working as a graphic designer in the fashion industry but could not find enjoyment in her day job.

“I prefer being outside on my feet, moving around and talking to people and found it really hard to be sitting down on a computer all the time,” she says, “I wanted to leave and go into hospitality, which I grew up in and is much more interesting to me.”

Yeung spent much of her youth in the Chinese restaurant her Hong Kong-born father owned in Salisbury, southern England.

She and her two siblings “grew up quite involved” in the business and would go during the summer holidays to help with chores such as “folding napkins and putting chopsticks in holders”, she says.

“We would always eat there and spend every Sunday together, which is my dad’s one day off in the week.

“He’d make us dim sum and wontons, and I just loved them so much as a kid that he started calling me a ‘chubby dumpling’,” she laughs.

“I was a little fat kid.”

After 31 years of running the restaurant, Joseph Yeung Wai-hung retired and got into making dumplings.

“He was just so restless and was talking about opening another restaurant, so I convinced him to start a little business with me,” says Yeung.

I don’t think he’d ever be able to retire fully. He just needed a change but he’s classic Hong Kong – grew up working and wants to work all the time

Chantel Yeung

And so the father’s childhood nickname for his daughter carried over into her adult venture – in 2018, she bought a 1992 fire engine and a year later converted it into a food van she named Chubby Dumpling to serving her favourite childhood foods – handmade by her father – to crowds all over London.

In its first year, Yeung kept her design job while operating the food van two to three days a week at different markets.

She went full-time in 2020 as Chubby Dumpling began to receive more events catering requests.

Now, the van appears at the same London markets almost every weekend – Saturdays at Brockley Market and Sundays at Victoria Park Market. “Sometimes we’d have office lunches during the week, but mainly it’s events, festivals and work parties, especially in the summer. It’s fun getting to go to different places,” Yeung says.

Since there is limited space to cook in a food van, Chubby Dumpling’s menu is limited to dumplings and noodles, with the three dumpling options being pork, chicken and mushroom, and vegan. Sometimes there will also be a special dish, depending on “what Dad is making”, such as prawn and bamboo shoot dumplings, Yeung says.

Her English mother, on the other hand, has a more Western palate and was able to help the father-daughter duo co-create a vegan recipe of pan-Asian flavours. The vegan fillings include butternut squash with satay flavouring and shiitake mushroom.

Yeung divulges that “it took a long time to make delicious vegan dumplings”, but once they achieved it, the dumplings became extremely popular with Londoners who follow a plant-based diet.

“Every restaurant in London has to do some kind of vegan food, so it’s about finding options that don’t taste like mashed up vegetables,” Yeung says.

The food truck is currently geared to catering for the people working on film sets of production companies such as Pinewood Studios and Warner Brothers. Because the meals are prepaid with a set headcount, which usually varies from 100 to 600, there is little wastage at the end of the day.

Limited tickets for the two-day pop-up went on sale on January 12, and all had been bought within 10 minutes. Yeung tells the Post she “wasn’t sure what to expect”, as she had never hosted an event of this nature, but is glad how well Londoners have responded to Chubby Dumpling.

She adds: “My dad really enjoys coming up with new menus, so I want to see how this goes and see if we should do more. It’s nice to have some variety, especially since we need to be indoors in this English winter weather.”

As for her father, who was supposed to retire from hospitality but now makes dumplings full time, Yeung says: “I don’t think he’d ever be able to retire fully. He just needed a change because he’d had that restaurant for 31 years, but he’s classic Hong Kong – grew up working and wants to work all the time.

“It’s his strong work ethic and mentality of always doing something.”