Yes, I like Spam. I like it, as Hong Kong people do, in soup, with macaroni and frozen mixed vegetables. For breakfast. Preferably with Horlicks (an unfortunately-named malted milk drink, originally from Britain, but now consumed only in former colonies), and puffy toast spread with salted butter and sweetened condensed milk. You can take your eggs benedict and your watery bloody maries and [expurgated].

Hong Kong has some interesting breakfast habits, ranging from 4-inch cubes of crustless Wonder Bread to intricate latte art straight out of manga.

This is Ding Dong (or Doraemon, as he is known elsewhere):

This is his latte:

Now, as any Hong Konger worth her monosodium glutamate knows, Ding Dong’s favourite snack is dorayaki, a sort of pancake filled with the sweet red bean paste loved by Chinese and Japanese palates alike. Surprised to see Ding Dong’s likeness in frothed milk, I asked my barista if I’d be getting a free dorayaki to dip in my coffee. You know, like how they love to give you speculoos with your coffee in Europe. Judging by his bewildered–and, indeed, faintly disgusted–expression, I gathered that I would have to order and pay for my own scone. (Scones, in Hong Kong, are sized as they should be: to resemble a satsuma. In America, as we all know, they look like ruby grapefruits.)

My inability to get at all excited by 85-grain sprouted spelt bread and its sombre ilk surely stems from childhood overexposure to pillowy, crustless, Chinese-style white bread. It can come slathered with sweetened condensed milk, smooth peanut butter, or both. Or it can be bright yellow with salty butter and crunchy with granulated sugar. It is soft, it is cheap and it is utterly delicious. On this visit to Hong Kong, I had it in both standard and super-thick variations.

(This is the simple butter-and-sugar version, from a market stall in Happy Valley justly famed for this all-day snack.)

(And this is a more modest slice, dripping condensed milk–my personal favourite. Note the cup that my mother is holding in the background, containing another classic Hong Kong breakfast item, the yin yang. Half coffee, half tea and all jolt, it’s sweetened with…you guessed it…condensed milk.)

In New York, when desperate, I will sometimes go to Egg Custard King on Grand St in Chinatown for their Horlicks or toast. They’re all right in a pinch. (Gothamist raves about their signature fluorescent egg custard tarts, which I prefer to leave unsampled.) If any transplanted Hong Kongers can recommend a bona fide SAR-style breakfast, in any borough, please leave the address in my comments. You might think that I could just get a grip, buy a can of condensed milk and a loaf of Wonder Bread, and make it myself, but you would be wrong. Condensed milk is one of those delicious but slightly tainted foods, like honeycomb tripe, that one will eat but would rather not stoop to preparing.

If that sounds eccentric to you, remember that I grew up on Spam.

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