Hosive

when people come into the city, we are always surprised by where they want to visit or go eat. they are equally surprised that we do not frequent those places or want to go eat there. no. i do not want to eat at ruby tuesdays , bennigans or tgifridays in times square. then they ask where we go……so here are the places we like…not the best or the cheapest or whatever category….just where we go and go on a regular basis:

if there was only one chinese place to take my out of town friends, it would be here. primarily for the “soup dumplings” aka shiao lung baos. the wait can be long on weekends and prime dining hours. all this traffic outside the restaurant is for joe’s shanghai.

i hear the quality has gone down but i can’t tell the difference. delicious may not not be super delicious but its still….delicious. and there are different locations in the city. the best one i hear is in the flushing, queens chinatown. but that’s in another part of the country for us so we default to the one in manhattan chinatown.

there is a guide for those who have never had soup dumplings…..most assume that you eat it like a regular dumpling and they bite right into it causing the boiling hot soup juices to explode in the person’s mouth…as seen on the picture all the way on the left. you first start by gently placing the dumpling in a spoon….then taking a nibble to puncture the skin to let some of the soup out onto the spoon….then as the soup cools, you eat and drink the dumpling and the soup in the spoon.

there are variations but that’s the basics.

we normally order a round of noodles either with beef or pork. then we get a couple of racks of the soup dumpling to share….there are two kinds of the soup dumplings…one with crab and one without. i can’t really taste the difference so i always go with the regular(without crab)and save a few bucks.

eating the dumplings can be an art especially when the dumplings are plump and the spoons can’t contain the dumpling. at this point for me, its instinctual…..but if this is foreign territory for you, just look around and see how others are eating it.

its hearty and tummy delightling….just ask my dad plumping up on a fall evening on dumplings and noodles with fried pork chops.

one more thing….that person in the gray and pinstripes is unrelated to us….be prepared to sit with strangers at a big table, cafeteria style. just keep track of your food and you’ll be alright. its a cultural experience! fair exchange for real chinese food!