This Lunar New Year in Hong Kong the likes of wu ha (taro fritter balls), yau gok (fried sweet dumplings), and roasted melon seed will sit upon tables at family gatherings, nourishing guests as they outwit their siblings at the mahjong table or reconnect with a distant cousin they haven’t seen in ages.
Yet the title of the ultimate seasonal snack goes to an improbable candidate: cookies made in Denmark by the nearly century-old brand Kjeldsens. Few Hongkongers have a clue about how the brand name is pronounced—they’re locally called “blue tin cookies” after the emblematic container—nor does the tin’s navy shade complement the red palette dominating Lunar New Year celebrations. All the same, myriad cookie box sets are stacked like fortresses at supermarkets before finding their way into virtually every household. People debate over whether the ring-shaped pastry is superior to its pretzel-like, sugar-adorned counterpart, and vice versa. Even the tins are turned into objects of sentimental value, kept for storing trinkets.
“It’s like an old childhood friend you never noticed, but oddly miss when you live thousands miles away from home,” says Calif Chong, a born-and-raised Hongkonger who now lives in London. “The cookies are delicious, but the best part is the tin! My mom has put needles, patches, and buttons she uses for sewing inside since I was in primary school.”
According to Kjeldsens, we have Roger Lobo, a Hong Kong businessman, to thank for this remarkable episode of cultural exchange. In 1963, Lobo obtained a product catalog from a Danish trade executive and found himself drawn to a small ad for “cookies like grandmothers used to bake them.” He ordered a sample from Kjeldsens, only for the cookies to arrive in crumbles in a cardboard box. Lobo then asked for a second shipment to be packed in a tin container. Little did he know his request gave birth to an enduring food symbol.
When they first arrived in Hong Kong, Kjeldsens’ cookies were enjoyed by small, affluent circles. “Snacking wasn’t popular in the ’50s and ’60s, when much of the population was more concerned about staying afloat,” says Ka Chun Lui, a longtime Hong Kong food writer and the founder of Word by Word Collective, a publisher and bookstore specializing in food culture.
That all changed with Hong Kong’s economic boom of the 1970s. “Living standards grew rapidly since then, and people started looking for something to munch on in between meals,” Lui says.“This led to the emergence of Chinese-style pastries, followed quickly by Western snacks.”
With the middle classes able to afford the imported treats, Kjeldsens kicked local marketing into high gear, especially when it came to promoting their product for Lunar New Year and other holiday celebrations. The hook? That signature tin: A prestigious gift that helped buyers assert their social status among their peers on big occasions.
“Substance determined how a gift was received back then. Filling butter biscuits, for instance, were preferred to candies,” Lui says. “But form carried just as much weight. The sheer size of the container was enough to make its presentation a spectacle. Its glossy surface and elaborate graphics turned the theatrics up another notch.”
Since 1977, the company has churned out local commercials almost every year emphasizing the value of gifting a Kjeldsens cookie tin. The early ads of the ’70s and ’80s featured children at family gatherings, sometimes showing off their Western musical chops to boot, passing the baked delights to a group of beaming relatives. Catchy jingles hammered the message home. Lyrics such as “it’s poor manners to bring a bunch of bananas [a metaphor for empty hands] to visit families and friends” and “Danish blue tin cookies always impress” essentially laid out the dos and don’ts for Hongkongers if they were to score social points at important celebratory rituals.
“In that era, there weren’t many platforms other than television for the public to access information, especially on imported goods, so people often took what they saw there at its word,” Lui adds.
Kjeldsens still releases commercials tied to the Lunar New Year. And Hongkongers from each generation distinctively remember the commercials they grew up with (Chong specifically recalls a cute boy who donned a blue blazer in an early ’00s ad). According to Kjeldsens, their message was clearly received: 86 percent of Hongkongers either purchase or consume their butter cookies around the Lunar New Year. This aligns with the United Nation’s trade data, which indicates exports in the “sweet biscuits” category from Denmark to Hong Kong skyrocket every October and November, as retail stores stock up the cookies just in time for the January shopping frenzy leading up to the big holiday.
Success in Hong Kong inspired the brand to shift its focus from Denmark to the Asia-Pacific region. Currently, over 80 percent of Kjeldsens’ output is shipped abroad. You might register a few confused looks when handing out the brand’s buttery treats around Nyhavn, but thousands of miles eastward, a “blue tin cookie” can earn you an auspicious red packet from an auntie as the Year of Snake rolls around.
Gastro Obscura covers the world’s most wondrous food and drink.
Sign up for our regular newsletter.