Tea Magic provides the local bubble tea (boba milk tea) fix for Columbia University students.  They also sell steamed Chinese buns and have a cooler with cooked boiled dumplings and noodles in to-go containers.  They will microwave the dumplings for you to eat in, but I got some to go and pan-fried them at home.

The Dumplings: Boiled shrimp, pork and chive and pork and cabbage dumplings are available, as are an assortment of steamed Chinese buns.  The dumplings are brought in each day from Flushing Queens’ Chinatown; I’m not sure of the origin of the buns, but I assume they are also from Flushing.

Pan fried to-go Pork and Chive Tea Magic dumplings

The pork and chive dumplings are flavored with soy, ginger and garlic and even cold, right out of the to-go container, they were delicious.  I tried pan-frying the dumplings I didn’t immediately snack on, but got a little distracted and so I ended up with a few burned ones.  As expected the non-burned ones tasted even better than the cold ones and came out really juicy.

I also tried the BBQ pork steamed buns, which are fist sized and stuffed with a roughly chopped Char Siu Pork.  The bun I tried was quite light and fluffy and the stuffing was fairly sweet.  It was the perfect snack to eat while walking down Broadway on a spring afternoon.

The Sauce:  Tea Magic doesn’t seem to provide any dipping sauce for the dumplings.

The Location:  Tea magic is located on Broadway just south of the Columbia University campus.