A branch of Tim Ho Wan and a chef from Din Tai Fung set up in Manhattan.
Visitors to Hong Kong who have an appreciation for dumplings, an eye toward low prices and faith that a single Michelin star reliably predicts quality will tend to eat at one of two places. Those who are more attracted to Cantonese dim sum classics will almost certainly end up at a location of the locally based Tim Ho Wan chain. The ones whose idea of a perfect dumpling is a xiao long bao with hot broth sealed inside will head to a branch of Din Tai Fung, which was founded in Taiwan. The very hungry ones will go to both.
The two businesses have been busy exporting their folding and crimping technologies to dumpling-conscious cities around the world. With its 45th location, which opened in the East Village just before Christmas, Tim Ho Wan is the first of the pair to bring its towers of bamboo steamers to New York City.
Tim Ho Wan was started by the chef Mak Kwai Pui, who had been in charge of the expensively exquisite dim sum at the Four Seasons hotel in Hong Kong. With his partner, Leung Fai Keung, his idea was to go back to basics, retaining some of the techniques and refinements of high-end dim sum while bringing prices down to sea level.
In New York, the entire menu fits on a paper place mat. When you read it, it’s not immediately apparent why fans were willing to stand on Fourth Avenue in the cold for hours last December simply to put their names and phone numbers on a list for the privilege of being called a few hours after that, when a table was finally free.
Many items can be found for about the same price (nothing is over $6) in other dim sum parlors. Now that the lines have died down considerably, it’s clear that the versions at Tim Ho Wan are good, but very few are throw-half-the-day-away good, and some have a rote quality that tends to creep into all but the most vigilant chains.
True, the har gow wrappers are thinner than you expect, the shrimp inside firmer. The black bean sauce with steamed spare ribs tastes especially savory; the abalone sauce on the chicken feet a bit richer than the typical oyster sauce.
The pan-fried turnip cakes contain flecks of dried shrimp that send their particular intensity in all directions. Soft as bread pudding inside, they are firmly seared, giving them an undertone of char and a hint of smoke somewhere off in the distance. The beef balls, under ragged veils of tofu skin, are the lightest and airiest I’ ve ever eaten.
But the rice rolls, a point of pride for the chain, are white bogs of starch that blot out the underseasoned fillings of beef, pork or shrimp. I’ ve tried all three in New York, and they’ re never quite there, while the pork liver rice roll I tried at a Tim Ho Wan last month in Sydney, Australia, buzzed with ginger and scallions inside its thin and delicate wrapper.
The barbecued pork buns, which make the Hong Kong airport location of Tim Ho Wan the first and last stop in town for some passengers, have been a work in progress in New York. The flaky pastry, somewhere between a Parker House roll and a Southern buttermilk biscuit, shows off Mr. Mak’s finesse. The crackled surface, made of short crust dough blooped out of a pastry bag, doesn’ t taste like much but somehow makes the buns more exciting to eat.
The trouble has been with the gooey, half-sweet filling. Back in January, there wasn’ t much of it, and it lacked conviction. In March, it was only slightly more sure of itself. This month, I finally had one that was richly flavored, well proportioned to the bun, and very hot.
Steamed egg cake is another signature dish, or, as Tim Ho Wan puts it, one of the “big four heavenly kings.” A square tan slice of it is so plain it looks like the last thing left on the table of a PTA bake sale, but it’s consistently airy and wonderful, with its homey taste of molasses. It’s not a dessert. It seems to go with everything on the menu.
In Australia, the osmanthus jelly, which is a dessert, was a shimmering, translucent amber, saturated with the spring-fever flavors of peaches and flowers. The New York version has been rubbery, as dark as beef bouillon, and strangely bland. Far more appealing are the coins of French toast pressed together around a center of egg custard, a cross of two Hong Kong snacks bred expressly for the New York market.
Din Tai Fung has almost three times as many branches as Tim Ho Wan, but for now its American presence is focused entirely on the West Coast. A few months ago, though, a restaurant in SoHo came along with a chef, Charlie Chen, who had been pried loose from the company’s kitchens. The xiao long bao and other dishes at Pinch Chinese will for many New Yorkers be the first taste of the Din Tai Fung aesthetic.
Mr. Chen’s dumpling cooks wear masks over their mouths as they work behind glass at the end of the dining room, which gives them the air of fast-moving surgeons. The first thing you notice about their soup dumplings is that they are pretty. In other restaurants, they are baggy, saggy water balloons ready to spill their guts on impact. At Pinch, they stand upright like Hershey’s Kisses, and their skins, though very thin, don’ t rupture when squeezed between chopsticks. A single dumpling fits quite comfortably in the mouth.
Once you bite down, the broth that pours out is not as lip-smackingly gelatinous as it could be, but it’s still rich and full of flavor. The best and most unusual is filled with chicken soup, and you wouldn’ t want it any thicker than it is. It’s very good.
As finely made as those are, I somewhat preferred the non-soup dumplings: the steamed half-moons stuffed with gingery flakes of fish; the ones with a dark core of minced mushrooms and truffles; or the pan-fried semicircles filled with juicy sautéed beef, found only at lunch and brunch.
Pinch also makes the best Sichuan won tons, shaped like clothesline ghosts and swimming in chile oil, that I’ ve tasted outside a Sichuan restaurant. Sean Tang, who owns Pinch with a cousin, Tony Li, and Mr. Chen, has said he wants the menu to be “region agnostic.” Occasionally this results in stuff I might cook at home with a recipe from an American magazine, like the humdrum fried rice with steak or the pork ribs in cumin and chile seasoning. A magazine would call them Spicy Sichuan Ribs. They aren’ t.
In general, though, the conceit works. Other Sichuan-style dishes, like the ma po tofu, make up in balance what they may lack in heat. From Taiwan, there’s a highly credible three-cup chicken cooked with all dark meat (it makes a difference) , as well as a hypnotically good stir-fry of cabbage with red chiles and thin slices of browned bacon.
Snow Crab in a Chinese Restaurant has a generic name but a nongeneric flavor, with spicy black bean sauce over glass noodles and crab meat.
