Xiao Long Bao restaurants?

[Kent Wang]

I grew up in Jing1 San1, a suburb of Shanghai. My uncle, who has travelled the country extensively on business, declares that one of the restaurants in Jing San serves the best xiao long bao. Is this true? Do you know what restaurant I'm talking about? My memory is not so fresh but it seemed like all that restaurant served was xiao long bao, or at least that's all we'd ever order. Even in parties of a dozen or more we'd just get long2 after long2 of xiao long bao.

In your opinion what restaurant serves the best xiao long bao?

[Steven Blaski]

I grew up in Jing1 San1, a suburb of Shanghai. My uncle, who has travelled the country extensively on business, declares that one of the restaurants in Jing San serves the best xiao long bao. Is this true? Do you know what restaurant I'm talking about? My memory is not so fresh but it seemed like all that restaurant served was xiao long bao, or at least that's all we'd ever order. Even in parties of a dozen or more we'd just get long2 after long2 of xiao long bao.

In your opinion what restaurant serves the best xiao long bao?

←

Kent, here's some interesting opinions for you in this article that might be helpful:

The Spring 2005 Shanghai Xiao Long Bao Survey.

[jokhm]

WOW

This is awesome. I'm running around Shanghai with 3 days left! Haven't had a decent one yet and not the chance to go to Ding Tai Feng yet. Let me just finish reading it through....

[jokhm]

Em, I'm not exactly sure on the specific details exactly.. but my favorite XLB-lookalikes come from

1) GuanTangBao.. famous muslim place in Xi'An muslim district. Lamb or beef, I know.. but knocked my socks off. Blew away any XLB I ever ate in Shanghai.

2) While eating some HK dimsum we had some slightly thicker skinned and larger (and EXPENSIVE) Crab XLB brought to the table, with a beautiful yellow broth inside. Fantastic.

But still.. the GTB.. amazing.

[hzrt8w]

There had been a few discussion threads on Xiao Long Bao in this forum. Here are 2 that I could find:

Soup Dumplings (Xiao Long Tang Bao)

Xialong Bao, Broth Secret?

[Kent Wang]

Kent, here's some interesting opinions for you in this article that might be helpful:

The Spring 2005 Shanghai Xiao Long Bao Survey.

←

I'm kicking myself for forgetting about this while I was in Shanghai. We went to the famed Nan Xiang Restaurant in the Temple of the City God. The crowd there was huge on a Friday at 1pm with over fifty people queued up at the take out window.

These xiao long bao were some of the worst I've had. They were way too small, the skin was too thick and lacked any transparency whatsoever and most importantly the meat was way too dry with no soup in them! That's not a xiao long bao, that's just a steamed dumpling.

Fortunately, the little shop near my Grandma's house had some pretty good xiao long bao. I had them nearly every day for breakfast.

[jokhm]

Nothing like a famous restaurant in China... they can keep on pushing out mediocre or horrible food and the line just keeps getting bigger! Kind of disconcerting and makes me think twice when a restaurant is recommended to me as the 'famous' whatever.. Things like Quanjude are famous for a good reason (doesn't justify the price though..) but Nanxiang xiaolongbao is just a reference point for tour companies to gather their neon yellow hatted customers in large quantities and then promptly bus them back out of shanghai. I suppose its the same as the 'food street' at wangfujing in beijing.

So any new consensus? Any new places to name out that will definitely yield some small transparent 200 degree goodies?

[hzrt8w]

In China, many merchants and restaurants pay tour companies, especially those wihch are based in Hong Kong, commissions per head for bringing in bus-load of patrons or potential customers (or somehow have contracts with the tour companies above or under the table). So it would not surprise me the "famous" mediocre restaurants have forever more longer lines.

[Kent Wang]

What would be scary is if all those tourists started thinking this is how xiao long bao should be!

[jo-mel]

Nothing like a famous restaurant in China...  they can keep on pushing out mediocre or horrible food and the line just keeps getting bigger! Kind of disconcerting and makes me think twice when a restaurant is recommended to me as the 'famous' whatever..  Things like Quanjude are famous for a good reason (doesn't justify the price though..) but Nanxiang xiaolongbao  is just a reference point for tour companies to gather their neon yellow hatted customers in large quantities and then promptly bus them back out of shanghai. I suppose its the same as the 'food street' at wangfujing in beijing.

So any new consensus? Any new places to name out that will definitely yield some small transparent 200 degree goodies?

←

A food critic in NYC was commenting on the restaurants in Chinatown some time ago. The places that had received great reviews, because of a good chef, would be the 'in' place to go, and the lines would start. But long after the chef left, the lines remained ---even when the food turned mediocre.

Human nature? You see a line, ------- expect it to mean something great, so you join in? Or you remember a great review in the past?

Edited May 30, 2006 by jo-mel (log)

[jokhm]

Definitely.. makes perfect sense.

Sad though... I wish the great places could stay great. But then egullet would be far smaller, since everyone would already have easy access to the numbers.

Waiting in line for horrible food is what drives up our curiosity to come to egullet and discuss.

[stephenc]

The best shiao3 long2 bao1 are served up by the little hole in the wall shops for about a dollar per long2

I've had some really good ones near shanghai, and I've had some really good ones in Taiwan.

Edited June 3, 2006 by stephenc (log)