National Empanada Day

Posted on April 9, 2016 by rundlea
Jambalya Empanadas

Jambalya Empanadas

Dammit, Friday the 8th was National Empanada Day and I missed it.  Despite some disagreement from readers, I have maintained that empanadas (and related products – Pasty, Piroshkies, and Samosas) are a form of dumpling worthy of hunting.  Empanadas have been with us for a long time, a cookbook published in 1520 in Catalan, the Libre del Coch by Ruperto de Nola, mentions empanadas filled with seafood.  It is unclear who originally created or sanctioned National Empanada Day, but the web is crowded with stories about the Best or Top empanada;  NJ.Com posted an article on the ten best Empanadas in NJ.  On of my favorites in NYC is Nuchus Empanadas.

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The Bao, New York, NY

Posted on April 4, 2016 by rundlea
Wontons in spicy Sauce

Wontons in spicy Sauce

The Bao is the East Village outpost of the Flushing Queens dumpling restaurant, Kung Fu Xiao Long Bao.  The Bao is a calm retreat from the hustle and energy of Saint Marks Place, the ceiling is a lattice of dark wood and the walls are roughened cement with bamboo steamer lids re-purposed as wall decorations.  The decor centerpiece is a print by the Sichuan-born avant-garde artist Yin Jun, from his series of images of children with their heads thrown back shrieking and tears spritzing from their squeezed-shut eyes.

The Dumplings:  The Bao sells the classic Xiao Long Bao varieties – pork and pork and crab – and nouveau forms including, hot chili flavor, another variety spiked with wasabi, and for desert, dumplings filled with liquid chocolate and banana.  They also sell pan fried pork dumpling, steamed vegetable dumplings, and pork and vegetable wontons in spicy sauce.  I tried the classic pork Xiao Long Bao and the wontons in spicy sauce. Continue reading →

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Mom’s Dumpling and Noodle Restaurant in Amherst, MA Closes

Posted on March 30, 2016 by rundlea
Pan-fried mini-pork dumplings

Pan-fried mini-pork dumplings

According to Masslive.com, Mom’s Dumpling and Noodle Restaurant in Amherst MA has closed.  I enjoyed their mini-sized pan fried pork and vegetable dumplings and really liked their dipping sauce.  Mom’s House Chinese Market will continue on College Street, but it doesn’t sell dumplings from its hot counter.

It looks like a Tibetan restaurant will open in the space, so Lhasa Cafe in Northampton, MA might have some competition.  If everything works out for the new venture I will post a report on their momo.

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Vanessa’s Frozen Vegetable Whole Wheat Dumplings

Posted on March 28, 2016 by rundlea
Vanessa's Vegetable Whole Wheat Dumplings

Vanessa’s Vegetable Whole Wheat Dumplings

Rating:  stars_2

Vanessa’s Dumpling House is a family run, New York City institution that has been selling Beijing style dumplings and sesame breads from Elderidge Street in Chinatown since 1999.  I gave Vanessa’s a full review back in 2012 and would add to that review that the sesame bread stuffed with roast pork is excellent.

Vanessa’s also sells a variety of frozen boiled dumplings; at their Elderidge Street location they sell bags of 50 and at their 14th Street Union Square and Williamsburg, Brooklyn locations they sell bags of 30 and the varieties available differ across these locations.  I tried the Vegetable Whole Wheat Dumplings which are available at the 14th Street location.  These dumplings are filled with chopped mushrooms, carrots and bok choy and are cloaked in a green colored dough wrappers.  After a brief micro-waving the dumplings pan-fried up well and the dough got golden crispy and crunchy.  The problem I had with these dumplings was that they were way over-salted and I couldn’t taste any of the vegetables.  Vanessa’s vegetable dumplings are vegan.

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Dojo, New York, NY

Posted on March 21, 2016 by rundlea

DojoDojo has been an Greenwich Village institution since 1973 when it was born out of the Ice Cream Connection on St. Mark’s Place.  Shortly after it’s opening Dojo introduced its Soy Burger and Tofu Hijiki Burger and its awesome carrot ginger dressing, all of which remain on the menu today.  In 1991 Dojo West opened next to the NYU campus, but in 2007 the original location, then called Dojo East, closed due to escalating rent.  The original Dojo on St Mark’s was one of the first restaurants I ate in during my first trip to New York City back in the summer of 1989.

The Dumplings:  Dojo serves house-made vegetable gyoza, house-made pork gyoza and Takoyaki.  I tried the pork gyoza and the Takoyaki. Continue reading →

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Return to Vegetarian Dim Sum House (Again)

Posted on March 14, 2016 by rundlea

OK, I admit I have become a regular at, and a little obsessed by, Chinatown’s Vegetarian Dim Sum House and have reviewed it a few times [Here, Here].  Veggie Dim Sum serves dim sum  all day, everyday, but doesn’t serve its food from carts, instead they use a menu-based system where you order by ticking items off on a card that you hand to your waiter.  They have a wide selection of dumplings, thus my multiple reviews, and have a full menu of veganized Chinese dishes.  The crispy fried noodle dishes are excellent.

Water Cress Dumpling Soup

Watercress Dumpling Soup

Today I am writing about their awesome Watercress Dumpling Soup.  This soup isn’t on the menu, you have to know to ask for it, and so now you know.  I became aware of the soup because the couple at the table next to mine were eating it and we asked the waiter about it.  The soup is a mild vegetable stock with a light ginseng flavor.  The soup comes with eight dumplings and shredded cabbage.

The dumplings were packed with watercress with a little bit of mushroom mixed in and some pieces of mock pork. The watercress had a slightly bitter, peppery flavor that picked up some of the ginseng notes from the soup.    You’ll want to eat the dumplings fast because the delicate wonton wrappers get water logged if they sit in the soup too long.  Given watercress’ supposed antibiotic properties, vitamin B, C and E content and minerals, plus what I am hoping was real ginseng, this soup should be a good tonic for a cold or flu.

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Tofu and Spinach Wontons in Pho Soup with Bok Choy

Posted on March 7, 2016 by rundlea
Tofu and spinach dumplings from the NY Times recipe

Tofu and spinach dumplings from the NY Times recipe

Tofu and spinach dumplings in Pho broth with bok choy

Tofu and spinach dumplings in Pho broth with bok choy

I tried the recently published NY Times recipe for Tofu and Spinach Wontons in Broth with a few changes to the broth. Follow the NY Times recipe for the wontons, which produces some really good dumplings and then use this recipe for a vegan Pho broth.

Ingredients:

  • 3 Bao Long brand Sup Chay bouillon cubes (see Here).
  • 1/4 of a sweet onion.
  • 2 heads of bok choy heads.
  • 1,500 ml of water.

Directions:

  1. Bring the water to a boil and then dissolve the bouillon cubes in the water.
  2. Sliver the onions and add to the stock.
  3. Cut off the base of the bok choy, separate the individual stems and clean them.
  4. Add the dumplings to the boiling stock and bring the stock back to a boil.
  5. Add the bok choy to the stock and cook for another minute.
  6. Serve the stock in a bowl with 3 or 4 dumplings and some bok choy leaves.
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Dim Sum Go Go, New York, NY

Posted on February 29, 2016 by rundlea
The Dumpling menu at Dim Sum Go Go

The Dumpling menu at Dim Sum Go Go

I found Dim Sum Go Go on the excellent Vegan in NYC Instagram feed.  Its not a full vegan restaurant but it has the largest selection of vegan dumplings I’ve come across in my Dumpling Hunting career.  Rather than ordering small plates from carts pushed around the restaurant, Dim Sum Go Go has a menu-based system where you order by ticking items off on a card that you hand to your waiter.  Ordering from the menu takes some of the fun out of the dim sum experience but you are assured the food is hot out of the kitchen. The food at Dim Sum Go Go is hit or miss, the sauteed pea shoots were overcooked and the salt baked shrimp tasted like frozen in a bag, supermarket shrimp; at $28.90 an order they were a bland rip-off.  The meal was so unsatisfying we got second dinner at Veggie Dim Sum.

The Dumplings:  there is a huge selection of steamed dumplings at Dim Sum Go Go but the mixed platters help you sample them efficiently.  The down side of the platters is that if you like something you only get one of the dumpling and it is hard to tell what each dumpling corresponds to on the menu. Continue reading →

Posted in Crab, Dim Sum, Duck, Vegan, Vegetarian | Leave a comment

Mee Sum Pastry, Seattle, WA

Posted on February 22, 2016 by rundlea

My photos of Mee Sum Pastry turned out poorly, so here is one linked in from Seattle Bloggers

Mee Sum Pastry in Seattle’s Pike Place Market sells Andre the Giant fist sized, meat stuffed buns known as Hom Bow. They claim to sell the largest buns in Washington State and have baked BBQ Pork, Curry Beef, and Chicken Hom Bow, and steamed BBQ Pork and Chicken Hom Bow. They also sell Crab Rangoon and Pot Sticker dumplings.  Mee Sum Pastry is a take-out only storefront with no dedicated seating so there are always little knots of people standing on the sidewalk eating buns out of waxed paper bags.

The Dumplings:  I tried the baked BBQ Pork Hom Bow which had a crispy outer surface, an inner layer of slightly chewy bread dough and shredded barbecue pork and onion filling.  The filling was sweet tasting, high quality char siu pork, not the mystery off-cuts of pork you find in some buns.  These BBQ Pork buns are really good.

The bun engineering at Mee Sum is really quite amazing.  The bun’s bready dough outer layer are thin, so these monster sized buns pack a  lot of filling, maybe 3/4 of cup of BBQ Pork.   When I bit into the bun the outer crispy layer did not feel thick enough to contain the pork filling.  I kept expecting the pork and onions to squirt out the back of the bun, like jelly coming out of a overstuffed doughnut.  But surprisingly the bun dough kept its integrity the whole time and my shoes were saved from BBQ sauce.

The Location: Mee Sum Pastry is just across the street from the covered produce/meat/seafood market area of Seattle’s Pike Place Market.  It is at 1526 Pike Place, near the excellent Piroshky Piroshky (reviewed here).

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Sticky Potstickers, ChoripDong Frozen Dumplings

Posted on February 15, 2016 by rundlea

Photo Dec 31, 7 05 58 PMRating:  stars_1_5

Photo Dec 31, 7 23 56 PMI don’t really understand ChoripDong brand Sticky Potstickers frozen dumplings. The bags are captioned “Raviolis Des Pommes De Terre” which suggested to me a potato filled ravioli aka a pierogi.  The Korean labeling describes them as “potato rice cake mandoo”.  I previously reviewed ChoripDong’s Kimchi dumplings flavored with pork here, and gave them five stars.

The Sticky Postickers are small pleated buns about the size of a silver dollar around. The filling doesn’t resemble mashed potato pierogi filling or rice cakes but is made with minced leaks, cabbage, spring onion, tofu, potato powder, onion and radish.  Overall the flavor was, at best, mildly savory; these buns are best eaten with a good dipping sauce, soak these buns in your favorite dipping sauce.  The wrappers are made with rice flour crystal dumpling skins, which I find do not freeze and then fry up well.  Even when cooked golden brown or all the way to blackened, the wrappers were gummy and mushy.  H-Mart was having a special on these, two bags for the price of one, so I am stuck with another bag and half in my freezer. If you care to try them, these buns are vegan.

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