My friend Joanne and I wanted to go for some old school traditional Dim Sum which the carts that roam around the room with various dim sum dishes so we decided to go to Dim Sum King on a Saturday afternoon just around the time of Chinese New Year.
Dim Sum King has a massive room with round tables and it is located on the upper level in the Dundas West area of Chinatown. You can kind of tell when the Dim Sum is authentic when the clientele is mostly Chinese. Two white girls kind of stick out in a place like this but we like good food so we joined the packed restaurant for some traditional Dim Sum dishes.
When we first arrived we were seated at a table by the wall just under a vent so it was really cold so we asked to be moved and they seated us at the back of the room on an elevated area. I thought it would be great since it was a bit away from the crowd but then we realized because it was elevated the carts couldn't come to out table so they would stop at the edge of the platform and just either show us 1 thing or point. I am pretty sure we missed some dishes because of this and I am also pretty sure the Asian men that were sitting at the table close to the edge got much better service than we did.
After our meal we waited a long time to get our bill and found out that they lost it so we had to wait and then we finally paid it and left. Hmmm think they forgot about us...
I have to say that although service is quick it's not always the best in a lot of these Dim Sum restaurants. One time I went to a Dim Sum restaurant similar to this one and was with a group of very diverse people but the server would only go to the 1 Asian man in our group. I have a few Asian friends and I think the next time I go for Dim Sum I will get them to come too and see if the service is better. So my recommendation is to bring your Asian friends with you to make sure you get served well.
But anyway most of the food was excellent.
The Har Gow - Shrimp Dumplings were great but you had to ask for hot sauce or mustard sauce to go with it.
I think it was the first time my friend had this Cheung Fun and it was good but not as good as Susur Lee's.
These fried pork and veg dumpling was great too.
I like Turnip cake since it's kind of an unusual thing to find and I never make turnip at home, but this one was not very good at all. It had a rubbery texture and even though they are generally dense and kind of glutinous they aren't rubbery, so this one didn't hit the mark and was kind of bland too. Skip this one and get it somewhere else.
Overall the food was good and the value was good too. All of the dishes came out to roughly $60 and the tea is included.
I would probably recommend going with a group of people to get the best experience so that you can try a lot of different dishes and everyone would have different tastes so you would get great value and probably better service too.
Grab your friends and family and have a weekend Dim Sum outing if you have never done it. Dim Sum King is good but if you want some Dim Sum that is a bit more elevated I would recommend going to Luckee at the Soho Hotel or Lai Wah Heen inside the Doubletree Hilton Hotel.
