Dumplings - The Hungry Nomad

The art of eating a soup dumpling | Vancouver, B.C.

August 11, 2015 2 Comments

Before arriving my friend and partner-in-eating asked me where I wanted to eat while in Vancouver. My response was “everything Asian: Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Thai, whatever, as long as it’s Asian”. That in short sums up what I will be eating for the next few weeks. In a city with such a large community of Chinese, Koreans and Japanese, one thing is sure: the food will be amazing and options, endless to say the least. On our first day together we decided on dumplings. Because nothing can beat a little ball filled with a mixture of heavenly goodness. Being downtown and having no access to the Chinese mecca that is Richmond, we decided on the Dynasty House located on lower Robson street. Most of our Asian food adventures downtown revolve around the two block radius of lower Robson and Denman where many variety of Korean, Japanese and Chinese restaurants reside.

Dynasty Dumpling had a small line up out the door which can never be a bad thing. But within 15 minutes we were quickly seated (despite a little hiccup over having a child and stroller with us). Guests were quick to offer their table so as to accommodate us, on the other hand, the hostess was not very happy about us having a stroller. But in the end, a nice man offered up his table after witnessing the commotion.

I’ll skip a few lines detailing the bad service and get to the good part: the soup dumplings. The menu features Shanghaise dishes including a page filled with a variety of soup dumplings. We ordered the original pork dumplings and the pork and kimchi dumplings along with a variety of other dishes including other dumplings beef and rice cake, and honey glazed lotus roots. The first time I had a soup dumpling happened to be on a Chinatown tour in Philadelphia. It was there that I was taught the secret of how to eat a soup dumpling. Once served If you bite into one right away you will surely burn your tongue. It is best to wait at least a minute to let it cool. Then gently dipping your chopstick in the vinegar you can pick up the dumpling right underneath the chopstick and place in spoon. You will then have two options: 1- poke a hole and let the broth ooze onto the spoon before eating, or 2- biting off the top and sipping the broth before devouring the whole thing. Either way you are sure to feel the same effect: pure and simple ecstasy.

Addicted to Gyoza King since 2003 (Vancouver, Canada)

February 27, 2014 No Comments

It seems that the majority of my time was spent eating in the West End where there is a densely packed number of Korean, Japanese, Malaysian and other Asian restaurants. Gyoza King is no new addition! It has been around for over a decade. The tiny Japanese restaurants specializes in handmade gyozas with different fillings including the pork, prawn and chives, prawns and pork and chives. They also serve pages and pages of other Japanese delicacies typically found in Izakayas.

As a regular, I have the menu memorized and always order two servings of the pork, prawn and chives and pork and chive gyozas. You just can’t go wrong with these pan-fried dumplings. They are as good as it gets and you would do yourself a huge injustice if you went to the restaurant and failed to get the dumplings.

Next, I always order the Agadeshi Tofu. Pieces of skilen firm tofu are cut into cubes, lightly dusted with potato starch and deed fried to a golden crisp. They are then served in a bed of hottentsuu borth made of dashi, mirin and sho-yu (Japanese soy sauce) and topped with finely chopped spring onions, grated daikon and dried bonito flakes which dance in the heat to give this dish the ultimate visual appearance. The agadeshi tofu at Gyoza King is the best I’ve ever had through my trips around the world.

An order of kimchi Udon is only one of many servings of udon offered at Gyoza King. Udon served without the broth is what I would explain to those who have never tasted it as the Japanese version of spaghetti. Instead of meatballs and tomato sauce the Japanese have come up with their own concoction of tasty sauces to blend the udon with making it a hit at the dinner table each and every time. All this food would not be complete had it not been for the bottle of unfiltered sake which made everything taste even more delicious but yet filled us up too quickly. I was sad that I was too full to eat all my other favorites on their menu like the Chicken Karagge (Japanese fried chicken), ebi mayo (fried shrimp with mayonnaise) and tuna tataki.