beXnlog

Dim Sum House

I've been meaning to go to Vegetarian Dim Sum House, my overall favorite restaurant in New York, for about a month! The last time we went we didn't order nearly enough so i've been craving the things we didn't get to eat. It was sometime between 1995 and 1997 (bad memory) that i was walking around Chinatown and discovered the green awning proclaiming, simply, what they served. At the time, there were 3 vegetarian places in Chinatown (sadly, VP3 closed a few months ago) and out of the bunch, they definitely were and still are the best. I would say it's one of the top 3 veg rests in New York. I like it immensely because they make food, and make it well.

When i was young my parents never really ate out. Sure, my dad loves Popeye's and Pizza Hut and we went to McDonald's like all the other neighborhood kids, but we never ate out at a real restaurant except when the rare family member visited. On these occasions we always had dinner at a Chinese restaurant and/or dim sum for brunch. I never really liked what the adults ordered at dim sum (doughy things, braised chicken feet) except the little egg custard. For my siblings and i, it was cool we were eating out but we usually didn't like it that much.

Dim Sum House, though, is amazingly delicious. Now that i'm old i get to order what i want, and i've tried almost everything on the dim sum menu. Everything they make is very good, the fake meat makes meat-centric dim sum a thing of the past and all the waitstaff know who we are since we're there all the time! There was this one phase where we went once during the weekend for dim sum and again (or twice more) during the week for dinner. (Once, be and i went for dim sum and went back at night on the same day for dinner since we weren't satisfied with the amount we ordered earlier!)

They have a whole regular dinner menu and i must proclaim that they make the best pan-fried noodles in all of New York, no kidding. I grew up eating this Hong Kong style dish and their version with black mushrooms, fake ham and baby bok choy is the BEST. They don't make the sauce like gross gravy, the noodles are crisp on the edges and soft in the center and the topping tastes great. (For those of you who don't know, pan-fried noodles is a platter of the thin wheat noodles crisp-fried in a pan to form a flat shape and covered with a saucy topping. The noodles are crisp and crunchy at first but as the sauce soaks in, they get soft.)

For dim sum, be's most favorite dish is the mashed taro treasure boxes. I love the sticky rice in lotus leaves, jook (rice porridge), rice flour roll with fake ham and cilantro, sesame buns (fried of course!), monk dumplings and banana rolls filled with sweet bean paste. For dinner, we love ordering the said pan-fried noodles, tofu and seaweed soup and orange beef. Sure, they don't have the carts like in bigger dim sum houses, but the food is what really counts. Even my mom, who Loves Meat, agrees that Dim Sum House is very good and makes the best pan-fried noodles. We took her to Dim Sum Go-Go also and everyone thought it didn't compare, even with real shrimp and pork.

We are always down to have dim sum/yum cha, preferably early afternoon on a Saturday or Sunday. Let us know! We'll most likely be there this weekend if anyone wants to join us!

posted by beXn @ 1:35 AM