Eating Out with Family: Tai Pan Dim Sum
May. 17th, 2015 01:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tuftearsAlmost done with the food-related part of my journal flood! Here are a couple of pics of a dim sum outing that I undertook with relatives. We were pondering where to eat, and I mentioned that I'd been wanting a dim sum restaurant that brought you entrees cooked and brought right to your table, rather than from carts where you have to guess what you're getting. I browsed about on Yelp a bit and Tai Pan cropped up.
This was a huge stone piece that basically lined one wall. Actually the picture is just of the center, it stretched out to both sides. I'm guessing it's a depiction of the Celestial Emperor and his court.
We ordered by marking numbers on a sheet of paper next to the names of the dim sum that we wanted. They brought us tea, and in due course, the first entrees arrived.
They didn't bring all the food out at once! They brought a few dishes at a time. Sadly, my most anticipated dish didn't arrive until last, and they also mistook the order, so we only got one order of the 'pan fried chicken buns'. These were delicious though, and to me, the best of the lot-- they were quite gingery rather than doused in barbecue sauce, so they were quite refreshing. They were like char siu baos, except that the bottom had been seared in a pan. The crispness makes a great counterpart to the softness of the steamed bread.
I also liked the taro and meat dumplings, and the actual char siu baos (steamed, not baked). I wasn't fond of the shrimp-containing dim sum, alas. Their potstickers were pretty bland; I needed to use hot sauce to give them flavor. I also put in an order for string beans with minced pork, convinced that my relatives wouldn't eat enough vegetables if I didn't make sure of that. It was a good choice to counterbalance the rest of the meal.
Note, you can ask and they will use scissors to snip dim sum in half. This can be handy if you want to, for example, split 3 pan-fried chicken buns to serve 4 people.
It was a pretty good experience, if kind of pricey. I commented that it might make a good date place, but my relatives pointed out that part of the fun of dim sum is trying many different dishes, which is hard to do if you only have two people. Four to six people is probably best.
We ate dessert at a different place! While browsing around the shopping district, Brian noticed a place serving 'ice cream cookie sandwiches' -- made with literal cookies.
This one has a double chocolate chip cookie, a red velvet cookie, and mint chocolate chip ice cream in the middle! I liked it but honestly, the ingredients would have tasted fine by themselves, and sandwiching them did nothing for the tasting experience. Due to the difficulty of eating without making a mess, I wound up extracting a bite of cookie or a bite of ice cream at a time.
This was a huge stone piece that basically lined one wall. Actually the picture is just of the center, it stretched out to both sides. I'm guessing it's a depiction of the Celestial Emperor and his court.
We ordered by marking numbers on a sheet of paper next to the names of the dim sum that we wanted. They brought us tea, and in due course, the first entrees arrived.
They didn't bring all the food out at once! They brought a few dishes at a time. Sadly, my most anticipated dish didn't arrive until last, and they also mistook the order, so we only got one order of the 'pan fried chicken buns'. These were delicious though, and to me, the best of the lot-- they were quite gingery rather than doused in barbecue sauce, so they were quite refreshing. They were like char siu baos, except that the bottom had been seared in a pan. The crispness makes a great counterpart to the softness of the steamed bread.
I also liked the taro and meat dumplings, and the actual char siu baos (steamed, not baked). I wasn't fond of the shrimp-containing dim sum, alas. Their potstickers were pretty bland; I needed to use hot sauce to give them flavor. I also put in an order for string beans with minced pork, convinced that my relatives wouldn't eat enough vegetables if I didn't make sure of that. It was a good choice to counterbalance the rest of the meal.
Note, you can ask and they will use scissors to snip dim sum in half. This can be handy if you want to, for example, split 3 pan-fried chicken buns to serve 4 people.
It was a pretty good experience, if kind of pricey. I commented that it might make a good date place, but my relatives pointed out that part of the fun of dim sum is trying many different dishes, which is hard to do if you only have two people. Four to six people is probably best.
We ate dessert at a different place! While browsing around the shopping district, Brian noticed a place serving 'ice cream cookie sandwiches' -- made with literal cookies.
This one has a double chocolate chip cookie, a red velvet cookie, and mint chocolate chip ice cream in the middle! I liked it but honestly, the ingredients would have tasted fine by themselves, and sandwiching them did nothing for the tasting experience. Due to the difficulty of eating without making a mess, I wound up extracting a bite of cookie or a bite of ice cream at a time.
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Date: 2015-05-19 08:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-05-19 08:29 pm (UTC)