Hong Kong Buy: Heartwarming (暖心芝作) Black Sesame Desserts @ Mong Kok

Heartwarming (暖心芝作), another Michelin-accoladed store, specialises in making all sorts of low-sweetness desserts and products using black sesame seeds. The store is located to the north of Mong Kok, not far from Prince Edward MTR Station (太子站).

In the small store are two traditional stone grinders that have been automated to grind black sesame seeds into powder for use in their desserts or for sales.

Heartwarming's desserts are made using mostly ground black sesame seeds and some of them are added with white sesame seeds for flavours too. Out of 6 items on the recommended desserts menu, the black sesame paste is a traditional dessert whereas the others are novel desserts by Heartwarming. Aside from the popular desserts, there are a series of nutritional products using black sesame too.

There are two queues outside the shop: one queue specifically for Black Sesame Film Roll, and the other for all other desserts and products.

The Black Sesame Pudding (流心黑芝麻布甸) has an ultra-fine and smooth black sesame pudding sitting on black sesame lava. It is of low sweetness with two different textures.

The Black Sesame Paste (石磨黑芝麻糊) is a mixture of both ultra-fine and grainy ground sesame to make it slightly thicker rather than using more flour. A layer of oil from the sesame seeds floats on the paste. It is very rich in black sesame flavour and mildly sweet also.

The Black Sesame Soya Milk (黑芝麻豆浆) uses both black and yellow soya beans to make soya milk to add with black sesame and tuned to taste with brown sugar. It is similarly rich in flavours and mild-sweet.

The limited-quantity Black Sesame Film Roll (黑芝麻菲林卷) are available from 2pm to 7pm daily and only 25 boxes will be handmade per hour — and limited to 1 box per customer.

Each "film roll" is made by rolling a thick sheet of black sesame cake, about 2mm in thickness, and topped with roasted white sesame seeds. It is of low sweetness too with flavours of both black sesame and roasty white sesame seeds with soft chewy texture. It is definitely a healthier choice for dessert and no worries about sugar.

The Black Sesame Soft-Serve Ice-Cream (特浓黑芝麻软雪糕) is rich in black sesame flavours with black sesame ice-cream, dribbled with thick black sesame syrup, in a black sesame biscuit cone — I am sure it is not made with charcoal. The ice-cream is mild-sweet as usual, not milky and, best of all, the biscuit cone does not turn soft and has remained crispy till the whole ice-cream is finished.

Heartwarming's black sesame desserts are really good and of healthier choices. They are must-tries when in Hong Kong.

Address:

23 Yu Chau Street, Mong Kok, Hong Kong

Opening Hours:

10am to 10pm | Daily

Nearby: Hong Kong Eat: Man Kee Cart Noodle (文记车仔面) @ Sham Shui Po