Yun Jing

Seventy floors above Shenzhen Bay

Yun Jing means cloud iridescence, and its position makes the name literal: the restaurant is on the 70th floor of a 72-storey tower, and Michelin’s entry describes 270-degree views over the city and the sea. It is the signature Chinese restaurant of Raffles Shenzhen, and in August 2026 it was one of two restaurants to win two stars in Shenzhen‘s first Michelin guide.

The other two-star, The Bay by Chef Fei, is also a hotel restaurant, which makes the pairing instructive. It sits on the first floor of Mandarin Oriental Shenzhen and carries the name of a Chaoshan-born chef whose Guangzhou restaurants built their reputation in the guide first; its cooking joins Chaozhou and Lingnan traditions. Yun Jing has no such imported name. Its identity comes from the hotel’s own culinary lead and from classic Cantonese dishes shown beside more creative ones, in the hotel’s own description.

A chef from northern Guangdong

That chef is Gordon Guo, listed by Michelin as Guo Yuanfeng, who oversees all of Raffles Shenzhen’s restaurants and bars. He trained at Lei Garden, in Hong Kong and then Guangzhou, but the cooking is better explained by his family. His grandfather traded in wild mushrooms in the mountains of northern Guangdong; his father, a former teacher, widened the business to cured sausages, dried fish, bamboo shoots and tofu skin, and took his son foraging as a child.

Guo’s creed is “from nature, with nature”, and he puts seasonal character ahead of novelty. In his account, Cantonese cooking depends on clarity, freshness, crispness and tenderness, reached by steaming, poaching and soups simmered slowly, with heat and timing doing the work that heavier sauces do elsewhere.

Poached, wok-fried, chilled

Michelin picks out two dishes that sit at opposite ends of that range. Chicken fed on sunflower seeds is poached, the plainest Cantonese method, so the bird itself must carry the plate. Mantis shrimp is sautéed with basil and golden fried garlic, a livelier wok preparation. The South China Morning Post’s coverage of the results pictured a third register, chilled sea snail with horseshoe bamboo shoots and Thai basil, lighter and more vegetal than either.

The wine list follows the same instinct for local counterweights: a programme called Terroir Resonance places international bottles beside Chinese ones, including aged Shaoxing huadiao, and offers seasonal teas as an alternative. The room is staged as carefully as the menu: ten private dining rooms, each inspired by a different gemstone, and artworks by the Colombian artist Gustavo Veléz in a light-filled space on the 70th floor.

Sources: Michelin Guide; Raffles Hotels; Mandarin Oriental; South China Morning Post