On a lark, I went to Cha Liu today. Not too far (it’s hot!) and I’ve passed by before, wondering at a dim sum shop so far from Chinatown.
Upon entering, I was struck by how much better the restaurant looked compared to its drab entrance (hole-in-the-wall door, old paint and old carpet in the stairwell). It looks like a converted bar, but very neat, nice lighting, lots of dark wood. Dishware was an interesting glazed pottery material, and not even your typical beige plastic chopsticks.
For me, a dim sum shop is judged by the “classics”: shrimp dumplings, pork dumplings, and shrimp rice noodles. Looking at the menu, the flourished descriptions seemed interesting, although their colour was dampened by the price tags nearby – $4 a dish! The reason why I had my suppresed my curiosity before.
Shrimp dumplings:
Pork dumplings:
Shrimp rice rolls:
Looks good enough, eh? And thus my culinary experience began, dish after dish. Looks nice enough… a little sticky… a little soggy on the outside… good ingredients on the inside… eh <shrug>. Next… same, next… same. How disappointing. Well, at least the prices kept me from from commiting acts of gluttony, I weigh enough as is. ^_^
The dessert, however, was quite interesting. Strawberry sago:
I’ve had this in coconut milk before, but never in what looked like strawberry syrup! It was surprisingly good. I feared it would be sickly sweet. The condensed milk was more for visual appeal than actually being detectable I think.
So after it’s been paid for, I have to wonder… how does this rank highly to be written about? Unless I got the end of day dregs (possible, it was closing time), I’d much rather take the time to travel somewhere where more of the money goes into my stomach rather than the decor. Not terrible, but at that price, I’d rather go elsewhere. In their vicinity, though, I can see how they have a captive dim sum market.
