Living in the San Francisco Bay Area, there isn’t a shortage of great Chinese restaurants. From dim sum at Koi Palace, salt and pepper crab at R & G Lounge, stinky tofu at Joy Restaurant, to Shanghai style chow mein at Little Shanghai, we could find plenty of restaurants to fulfill our Chinese food cravings. The one Chinese specialty that Nami and I love but haven’t found a restaurant that wowed us so far in the Bay Area is Xiao Long Bao, aka Shanghai steamed dumplings.
When talking about Xiao Long Bao, the best known specialty restaurant is probably Din Tai Fung, originating from Taiwan. Din Tai Fung was founded 1958 in Taipei originally as a peanut oil retailer. As time changed and packaged salad oil was introduced, the owners had to subsidize their oil business by selling steamed buns on the side. The delicious steamed buns at Din Tai Fung became so popular it got out of the oil business in the 1980’s and became a full time restaurant business. Today, Din Tai Fung serves their delicious Xiao Long Bao in 10 different countries with most of them in the Asia Pacific region.
Whenever I travel to Los Angeles, there is an “eat” list that I usually can’t skip. This list has evolved over the years but Din Tai Fung is always on the list. When our family went to Los Angeles for a wedding earlier this year, it was the perfect time to bring our children and share the wonderful experience with them (since both of them love dumplings). We went there around 10:30 AM on a weekend for lunch because the wait time for an available table is also legendary. There are actually two branches of Din Tai Fung in Arcadia, California and they are located back to back (and yes there is still a line). Since we were there early we only had to wait for 15 minutes before sitting down at our table.
As you enter the restaurant, you could see the men huddled in the kitchen around a table making fresh dumplings. It’s amazing to observe their machine-like hands and fingers moving so quickly to make each dumplings.
As you site down, the table setting is simple, vinegar with julienned ginger, tea, along with chopsticks, spoon, and a plate. The menu is not a long list, with a variety of noodles, rice, soup, and dumplings. However as someone who has tried almost their entire menu, I can attest that almost everything on the menu is super delicious. For our meal, we ordered sour and spicy soup, fried pork chop, shrimp and pork dumping, pork bun, red bean bun, and 2 order of Xiao Long Bao.
The sour and spicy soup came out first it was my very first time ordering it. Unfortunately it was a rare disappointment, the soup was not sour or spicy and I had much higher expectations. For soup, I highly recommend the house chicken soup instead.
The second course was Taiwanese style fried pork chop and it was superb, I had to fight with our son for the last piece. The pork chop is seasoned and golden fried to perfection. Din Tai Fung’s Taiwanese style pork chop is unique because it doesn’t have a thick layer of batter on the outside. The meat is juicy, tender, and flavored all the way through.
The next up are the shrimp and pork dumplings. When you order multiple steamed dishes, Din Tai Fung serves the dishes one at a time so the dumpling doesn’t get cold sitting there idle and the skins become hard. The biggest differentiator in my opinion between Din Tai Fung and everywhere else is their skin. The skin on their dumplings is so thin it’s barely strong enough to hold the fillings.
You can see the fabulous ingredients they use (large shrimp piece) in the filling when you bite inside.
Along with the dumping, we also ordered two types of buns, pork and red bean. The buns were freshly steamed and the texture for the exterior of the bun is extremely refined. The skin was soft like marshmallow and simply melted in your mouth as you bite into it.
The pork bun fillings were done just right and didn’t overpower the gentle flavor of the bun. The red bean paste filling was sweet and delightful.
Finally Xiao Long Bao was served at last. Each Xiao Long Bao is wrapped in paper thin skin that almost tears when you try to pick them up with chopsticks.
The best Xiao Long Bao are the ones with soup inside when served and you absolutely want to enjoy it with the soup. Even with its super thin skin, Din Tai Fung’s Xiao Long Bao are filled with soup. The proper way to enjoy Xiao Long Bao is to put one completely intact in a spoon, drizzle the vinegar, place a few strands of ginger on top and enjoy the whole thing in one bite. Be careful not to burn yourself since the soup inside could be extremely hot. Our children enjoyed the wonderful dumplings with us and Din Tai Fung is now on our family’s “eat” list.
Din Tai Fung
Address: 1108 S. Baldwin Ave., Arcadia, California 91007
Phone: (626) 574-7068
Mon – Fri: 11:00AM – 3:00PM, 5PM – 9:30PM
Sat: 10:30AM – 9:30PM
Sun: 10:30AM – 9:00PM
Good to hear you enjoyed your DTF dinner. I agree their skin is really very good – thin and smooth! Their la mien is also very nice.
Wow these dumpling look amazing, I don’t get down there often, but will have to keep this place in mind for when I do. Hope summer is treating you well.
-Gina-
Oh, I love love lovee xiao long bao! I get so excited when I get a chance to eat some!
How disappointing about the soup, it sure looks delicious.
Had a chance yo eat at Din Tai Fung in Taipei once and it was such a wonderful experience. Although… we had to queue up outside for a little while because the place was packed.
We also tried DTF in Taipei too and loved it as well! Next I should try one in Tokyo!
Oh no!!!!! Nami, you can not remind me of Din Tai Fung at all! Mark & I used to go to Din Tai Fung twice a month when we were working in Singapore. We just loved it there! After we left Singapore, we haven’t come across one restaurant that serves such delightful Chinese foods with immaculate service. We wish there is one in every city we live in, but of course that won’t make them special. Okay, I can’t even bare to look at the delectable pictures you shared here because I just missed a really good authentic Chinese food. We haven’t found one in the Twin cities.
Thank you for this wonderful review! I have been to Din Tai Fung and love their soup dumplings–now I know what else to order the next time I go there!
I love that this place is in Arcardia – it’s not far at all for us!
Nothing in my opinion tops Yank Sing on Spear Street in San Francisco. I live in Los Angeles and I drive three time per year to San Francisco just to eat at Yank Sing !!!
We love Yank Sing too! 🙂
oOo… I love xiao long bao! I’ll definitely have to try the shrimp and pork dumpling next time I visit DTF.
I learned awhile back that the proper way to eat xiao long bao is to eat the soup first and then the rest of the dumpling. You grab it whole and place it on your spoon (with ginger and vinegar if desired). Then, you pierce or bite a tiny piece out of the side of the dumpling and pour the soup into the spoon and drink the soup first. Alternatively, you can suck out the soup. Then, you eat the rest of the dumpling whole. This way minimizes your odds of burning your mouth with hot soup (like when you eat a fresh, piping hot whole dumpling in one bite). Thought I’d share in case it saves someone from a burnt tongue! 😛
Thank you for the tip! Now you mentioned, I did hear that method before! I usually wait till dumplings are a little cooler (not right after being served) and eat the whole thing. 😀 Love the juicy liquid with the dumplings together in the mouth. While my husband obviously cannot wait to take a bite. lol. Thank you so much for sharing the tip Christina! 🙂
YAY LA represent!! I’ve been to the Din Tai Fung in Singapore, but not the LA one. Def top-tier!
Nami, hope you are having a wonderful break!! Have loved your husband’s posts from the beginning – a great big ‘thank you’ for this one as I so enjoy ‘soupy’ dumplings and these sound perfect! Absolutely love Martyna’s comments re her kids appetites [I can remember my own stories only too well!] and her choice of menu! Since we live but about 100 km apart, we’ll have to agree to be in the same place at the same time one of these days 🙂 !
What a great post! I’ll eat a dumpling any day of the week. Terrific place – I’ll definitely put in on my list for next time I’m out that way. Great photos, fun post – thanks.
Nami, your husband did an amazing restaurant review! I would definitely go there next time in LA.
Sounds like an amazing restaurant experience.