I’ve become so obsessed with food that I now believe flour is more beautiful than flowers.
That’s what I was thinking while working my way through the menu at Dough Zone, a flour-y (!) new restaurant in Bellevue, behind the Crossroads Mall. With the kitchen pumping out baskets of xiao long bao (a.k.a. soup dumplings, or juicy pork buns here), there are inevitable comparisons to Din Tai Fung, with Dough Zone giving it a run for the money, albeit at a little less cost (and usually less wait time) for its customers.
But it’s not just dumplings on the diverse menu of things dough-related. Green onion pancakes? Check. Chinese doughnuts? Fresh-made noodles? Check. Biscuits and “burgers”? Check. There’s even shengjian bao (here called jian buns), making Dough Zone about the only place in the area to find the pan-fried relative of xiao long bao.
So what’s the verdict on quality?
Pretty good, overall. The xiao long bao ($8.50 for 10) are about the cutest I’ve seen—a dollhouse variety that’s small but with a decent amount of broth inside the delicate wrapper. The pork flavor of the meat is good, but while the broth was “clean” tasting, a little more depth of flavor wouldn’t hurt.
Skip, though, the crab meat buns. At $10.50 a basket, it’s the most expensive item on the menu, and not worth the upgrade from the pork version. There’s no discernible crab in the broth, and the crab texture of the meat is somewhat disconcerting.
Shengjian bao, with crisped bottoms
Back to pork, the jian buns are good. My understanding, though, is that the dough should be a little thinner and therefore crisper when pan-fried. The thickness of the dough means that most of the broth gets absorbed, so the anticipated juicy explosion goes missing.
Spicy beef pancake rolls
Pork potstickers
From the list of house specials, the spicy beef pancake rolls are worth a try, with lots of green onions to offset the meaty flavor. Our group didn’t try anything from the boiled or steamed dumpling sections of the menu, instead opting for pork potstickers from the pan-fried dumpling section. These are cooked to a nice crispness, but are perhaps too porky—with clumps of meat crying to be countered with something crunchy and vegetal, such as Chinese chives.
Szechuan sauced cold noodles
Noodles with onion soy sauce
The noodles are fun, made fresh in the back kitchen. They come in small bowls, but as with the rest of the menu, at a rather small price ($4.75 for sauced noodles, or $7.75 for soup noodles). If you’re sharing among four, you’ll each get just a couple of bites. The Szechuan sauced noodles are cold and refreshing, made ma la to be both numbing and spicy. Even more impressive are the noodles with (green) onion soy sauce. The relative simplicity of the sauce allows the warm noodles to shine.
Non-dough delights: “mix flaver beef” with sweet and sour cucumbers in the background (well worth $2.50 just to see the spiraling knifework)
Dough Zone’s current popularity might mean a short wait for seats during the busiest of hours, unless you’re willing to sit at the counter—arguably the best seats in the house, as you get to watch the dumpling-making. The servers are young and friendly, but with mixed language skills, so persist if you need someone to explain any of the description-less menu items. At pricing that allows for lots of menu-sampling, Dough Zone is off a great start. With a little more focus on the fillings (and toppings) than the dough itself, I can only imagine it will get even better.
Seating at the counter, watching the dumpling-making
Today, social media is full of inevitable raves about Din Tai Fung now that there’s new confirmation that the restaurant is opening in Seattle proper, at University Village.
Oh, how I wish I could take all my Seattle friends to Taipei. They’d see that the xiao long bao (soup dumplings) in Din Tai Fung’s Bellevue location pale in comparison to Din Tai Fung’s quality in Taipei. Even better are the xiao long bao at Taipei’s Jin Din Rou, my favorite place for these dumplings.
I don’t want to be a party pooper. Trust me: I crave good xiao long bao in Seattle. I’ve gone back to Bellevue, as recently as a few months ago, with hope the dumplings had improved. They were a bit better, but still the soup inside wasn’t hot enough, and there wasn’t enough of it. (Also, the skins could be more delicate, but that’s a more minor quibble.)
So, ahead of Seattle’s opening, I hereby renew my challenge to Din Tai Fung by re-running my 2010 article about the Bellevue restaurant. Please, Din Tai Fung, leave me breathless instead of brothless. I want my friends to rave once they know how really good xiao long bao can be.
***
Nearly seven months ago, on April 24 [2010], I broke the news that Din Tai Fung was coming to the Seattle area. My prediction came true:
“Knowing the food scene here, knowledge of Din Tai Fung’s arrival will be cause for every food lover in Seattle to have a simultaneous orgasm – first when the news hits Twitter, and next when groups gather upon the restaurant’s opening.”
Indeed, since opening just over a week ago, there have been waits of up to four hours for entry.
Upon departure, reviews of the xiao long bao have been mixed. While many are simply ecstatic to slurp down the soup dumplings, most people I know who’ve had them elsewhere have expressed disappointment.
Count me in as disappointed.
It’s not normally right to review a restaurant so soon after opening. And to be fair, the opening has been quite an accomplishment, and much of the food is very good. (You can read my fuller write-up in the upcoming issue of Northwest Palate.) But here my focus is specifically on the xiao long bao—the main reason most people go to Din Tai Fung. Its raison d’etre. And since the staff has had at least three months pre-opening to work on their dumpling technique (in an August 24 email, the public relations firm representing Din Tai Fung wrote, “Currently, there is a team hard at work, practicing the art of rolling dumplings, from dawn until dusk, 5 days a week.”), I don’t think it’s too early to critique the xiao long bao—and to make my challenge.
Actually, back in April, I offered the preliminary challenge: “How to make the xiao long bao as great in Seattle as they are in Taipei. Something seems to get lost in translation when food like this travels far.” As an example, I noted that Beard Papa’s cream puffs in Seattle are not nearly as compelling as the ones you find in Tokyo.
As someone who’s tried his hand at xiao long bao at home, I have great appreciation for the difficulty in making these dumplings. I’ve fiddled with the filling recipe (varying the amounts of ground pork and pork belly), struggled to get the gelatin right using pig skin instead of packaged gelatin, and watched in admiration as my partner put me to shame in pleating the dumplings properly. (Din Tai Fung takes pride that each dumpling has 18 pleats.) I even put a photo of my imperfect dumplings in the April blog post.
And that’s when David Wasielewski, owner of Bellevue’s Din Tai Fung, wrote and asked me to replace that photo with one from Din Tai Fung’s. His photo, at the top of this post, shows the trademark droop. The sag. The teardrop-like shape that shows how the unthinkably thin wrapper (I’ve eaten xiao long bao all over Taipei, as well as in Shanghai, Vancouver, and in places where they’re available in the States, and Din Tai Fung’s are the thinnest I’ve ever had) strains to effectively hold the broth. (I should say that in Taiwan, Din Tai Fung’s xiao long bao rate a 9.0 in my book, while the ones at Jin Din Rou are a 9.5, as I like the broth and meat—the two other components, besides the wrapper, by which I rate xiao long bao—a little better.)
Din Tai Fung’s photo is on the Bellevue menu, but when the dumplings come to the table, they do not resemble that photo. Actually, from watching the workers in the kitchen, I could tell that the wrappers were thicker. (Last time in Taiwan, I spent time in one of the restaurant’s kitchens watching the xiao long bao production.) Plus, I found it a bit disconcerting that instead of gently placing the uncooked dumplings in the steamer baskets, some of the workers were shot-putting them down.
As you can see from this photo, the xiao long bao do not droop as promised. I have not been able to see the meat or soup inside, as I have elsewhere. Oh, they’re juicy inside, but there’s no shot of broth. Instead, it almost feels like the skin is wrapped around a clump of meat.
So, much as the workers were throwing down the dumplings, I’m throwing down the gauntlet. I’m repeating my April challenge to Din Tai Fung: Make xiao long bao that leaves me breathless, not brothless.
Because, sad to say, right now, your xiao long bao are ma ma hu hu.
You get high points for enthusiasm, but deductions for execution.
You need to thin out those wrappers a bit, and get more gelatin in there. Make them like they make them in Taipei.
I’m hoping that Wasielewski will want to meet this challenge. I know he doesn’t have to do that. There will be thousands of customers (including the inevitable Yelpers, some eating xiao long bao for the first time) who will rave about the soup dumplings as they are, proud (rightfully so) that we have landed the second Din Tai Fung in America. (The first is in Arcadia, outside of Los Angeles.) People will say that these are the best xiao long bao in the Seattle area.
Which is a lot like saying the Mariners are the best baseball team in Seattle.
Unfortunately, that’s often pretty meaningless.
It’s the same with dim sum in Seattle. Some people say it’s great. I say those people probably haven’t ever had good dim sum. Hey, as I wrote in that April post, “For many, it’s not about the quality of the orgasm, but just having one.”
I remain one of those food snobs (I’ll label myself that so you don’t have to) who, when asked where to find the best dim sum, says to drive two hours north to Richmond to find your pick of quality places. I won’t eat dim sum here until I see marked improvement.
Come to think of it, with four hour waits at Din Tai Fung, I’d suggest that some people invest their time in driving to Richmond and back to see what soupy soup dumplings should be like.
I, in fact, am headed to Vancouver for the holiday weekend, and will be making up for my disappointing xiao long bao here by sampling a few places there, like Long’s and Shanghai River (my two favorites at the moment, approaching a rating of 8.5) and maybe a place called The Place.
But I’d certainly like to save time and gas, and get good dumplings here. Din Tai Fung, here’s hoping that can still happen…
I did enjoy these shrimp and pork shao mai more than I did the xiao long bao.
First bite of the tour: These guo tie dumplings from "Jiao Jiao" at the New World Mall food court. The dumplings remain open at the ends but are still juicy (with crisp "wings"). I enjoyed watching the same vendor make hand-shaved noodles.
While waiting for the dumplings, Joe went to get the pork buns from elsewhere in the same food court.
Here's the menu from Soy Bean Chen Flower Shop, a tofu store that's basically a window on Roosevelt Avenue. I can't help but laugh at the spelling. "Soybeancurd" is right to start, but then comes "Saline Deancurd" and "Cold Beabcurd." I'm not sure what "Horsebean" and "Fried Rise twig" are.
Scooping some of the silken bean curd.
Here's the soft beancurd. I like this version of dou fu fa, as the sweet syrup is comforting.
And here's the "saline" version, topped with chili oil and scallions.
Around the corner from the tofu shop is Tian Jin, which is basically a little Chinese charcuterie shop.
Slow-cooked pork tongue from Tian Jin.
While I was in Tian Jin, a simultaneous purchase at White Bear, next door. Note that so many of these hole-in-the-wall places get an "A" rating from the Health Department.
Wontons with hot sauce from White Bear. Hard to resist.
As a sex educator, I did a double-take when I saw this sign. Upon second reading, I realized it doesn't say "genitally."
Some ping pong action at the Flushing Mall.
I was skeptical, but these xiao long bao (both pork, and pork-and-crab) from Diverse Dim Sum at the Flushing Mall were delicious.
Biang! is the evolution of Xi'an Famous Foods in Flushing. Momofuku-like, you don't see many sit-down restaurants like this in Flushing's Chinatown. These are boiled cubes of pig blood "tofu" with garlic, chili oil, soy sauce, and vinegar. I love pork blood!
At Biang!, spicy cumin lamb biang biang noodles. If I go back, I want to eat more spicy cumin dishes, including the grilled skewers.
Fiddlehead fern salad with Szechuan pepper oil and black vinegar at Biang!
Still at Biang!, quail eggs on sausage and toasted mantou slices.
Getting stuffed on the tour, I couldn't resist a bowl of lamb noodle soup at the Golden Mall. I love the various noodles, with black vinegar and pepper to perk up the soup. (There would actually be more food to follow on the tour, including Qingdao jelly, with no need for dinner that night.)
The day before the Flushing tour, I went to Manhattan's Chinatown. Having been to Xi'an Famous Foods when it was a hole-in-the-wall in Flushing, I was curious to try one of the three new Manhattan locations. This curiously delicious dish is called "spicy and tingly lamb-face salad," which is "cooked lamb cheeks, tongue, eyeballs, and palate meat served chilled with bean sprouts, cilantro, celery, scallion, cucumber; spiced with Szechuan pepper and proprietary spicy sauces."
Also at Xi'an, I absolutely loved the liang pi "cold skin" noodles: "wheat-based cold and chewy ribbon-like noodles, with seitan (wheat gluten) slices, blanched mung-bean sprouts, cucumber and cilantro; dressed with chili oil, soy sauce, and vinegar" (just $5!).
After Xi'an, some people recommended a stop for xiao long bao at Shanghai Cafe Deluxe. The red-light district-like interior made photography challenging. The xiao long bao were ma-ma (so-so).
It's all about the buns at Golden Steamer. So many sweet and savory choices; I went with a lotus bun, which I enjoyed.
Some of the selection at New Beef King in Manhattan's Chinatown. My pick: spicy beef tendon chunks.
I love that, as elsewhere, Little Italy is next to Chinatown in Manhattan. How could I not try a slice of New York Pizza? Actually, on my walk from Grand Central Station to Chinatown (pre-burn of calories!), I tried this slice from Famous Roio's Pizza in West Village, the place the original "Ray" recently opened. This brought back good memories, but perhaps just a little too much cheese.
While reminiscing about New York food, here's a shot of my sesame bagel from Brooklyn Bagel & Coffee Company. Now that's a bagel!
...and that's a cream cheese selection!
I passed through Queens again in October, so I asked Joe for a place that would be open when my plane landed at LaGuardia about 7am. He didn't steer me wrong. Curry Leaves in Flushing is essentially a restaurant that turns into a hawker stand from 4am to 10am. This bowl of laksa, with items I could add a la carte, hit the spot!
I wanted to compare the xiao long bao at Diverse Dim Sum with these, from nearby Nan Xiang Dumpling House. I had fond memories of them, but turns out that Diverse Dim Sum's are better.
Later that day, driving back through Queens to catch a flight home from JFK Airport, I simply had to stop at Uncle Zhou to compare the lamb noodle soup to the one I ate on the tour at the Golden Mall. I loved Uncle Zhou in the past, and this version remains my favorite.
New Year celebrations may be behind for most people, but I’m still looking forward to my favorite of the year: Chinese New Year. It’s about a month away, and as with Thanksgiving day and Christmas day, I’ll likely spend it in a Chinese restaurant in Seattle. Or, more likely, Bellevue, as that’s where the better Chinese restaurants are—specifically the Sichuan ones.
But what if I could be anywhere in America for Chinese food? The San Gabriel Valley in the Los Angeles area would tempt me (and wouldn’t disappoint), but at this point, I find myself leaning toward Flushing, New York.
Flushing? Yes. Get out of Manhattan, taking the #7 train to its last station. Better yet, fly into LaGuardia Airport, and you’re just a stone’s throw away. There’s an international melting pot of food in the borough of Queens, and Flushing’s the place if you want a full array of Chinese cuisine.
Now, if you’ve not been, I recommend you meet a man with passion and a plan to show you around: Joe DiStefano. He writes Edible Queens’ World’s Fare blog, and based on what I’ve seen, he’s sampled so much of the street food and more in Flushing and beyond. DiStefano offers a variety of culinary tours of the area. He’ll likely greet you wearing a Mets cap and a #7 train t-shirt, with the fuchsia-colored logo bright on his chest. After “How do you do?” exchanges, a “Have any dietary restrictions?” conversation (hopefully not!), and then a “Hope you’re hungry!” admonition, you’re immediately into the hustle-and-bustle of the Flushing street scene, which feels a bit like Hong Kong.
As someone who’s been to Flushing before, I took a bit of a modified tour with DiStefano. It’s an absolute feeding frenzy, mostly from take-out joints, food courts, and the like, but it’s a great way to sample the variety of Chinese cuisine (Fujian, Xi’an, Sichuan, and on and on…) in a rather compact area of Queens. DiStefano has many interesting stories to share and can throw in stops from little shops (like a Malaysian mom-and-pop place) to large supermarkets (like the Assi Plaza Korean market, loaded with lots of kimchi), demonstrating that Flushing is far from just Chinese-populated.
Check out the slideshow above for photos of dumplings, buns, pork tongue, xiao long bao, and other highlights from the tour. Included you’ll find a few dishes from “Biang!” restaurant. We decided to do this one sit-down place, as I’d gone to Xi’an Famous Foods—whose popularity pushed the opening of the more upscale “Biang!”—just the day before. Photos from my meal at Xi’an and a few other New York City area Asian (and one non-Asian!) restaurants are also included in the slideshow.
