Located mere blocks from Din Tai Fung (鼎泰豐) and its perpetual crowd of tourists, Chinchiyuan lacks the name recognition of its neighbor but offers much more bang for your buck, with dumplings ranging from just NT$80 to NT$160 per steamer.
The restaurant is tucked into Yongkang Street (永康街) with a modest storefront where — just like at Din Tai Fung — you can watch a team of cooks prepare bamboo steamers filled with dumplings. The dining area on the second floor is sparsely decorated excepted for a small balcony stuffed with lush, overflowing plants.
Equally lush is the menu, which features about 70 items, many of which are dumpling-related. The highlight is Chinchiyuan’s xiaolongbaozi, or soup dumplings (小籠包子), which are NT$80 for eight. The xiaolongbaozi arrive at your table neatly arranged in their steamer, each plump, savory little morsel innocently awaiting its demise in your mouth. Chinchiyuan’s xiaolongbaozi are heartier than the ones at Din Tai Fung, with the dumpling skin slightly thicker and pork and broth that are more heavily flavored, but unless subtlety is an asset you value in your soup dumplings, Chinchiyuan’s offering more than satisfies.
Our table also ordered a steamer of zhenzhu wanzi (珍珠丸子, NT$80), which are spheres made with pork like the xiaolongbaozi, but covered in a thin layer of non-sticky, long-grained rice instead of a dumpling wrapping. The texture of the grains of rice against the meat is what makes zhenzhu wanzi fun to eat, and the perfect comfort food for a chilly winter day.
Chinchiyuan’s selection of Cantonese-style zhou (粥), or congee, is a good complement in both texture and flavor to the dumplings. I ordered the shrimp congee (蝦仁粥, NT$80) which came with generous pieces of shaobing youtiao (燒餅油條), the savory cruller-like pastry that is traditionally served with hot soy milk. The overfirm texture of the shrimp was annoying, but the texture of the congee itself was just right — neither watery, nor slimy, nor paste-y, as congee can get when it is overcooked. My dining companions ordered a bowl of majiang mian, or sesame sauce noodles (麻醬麵, NT$40), which was not too oily and had a nutty flavor reminiscent of peanut butter.
Other dishes which are worth trying include xianrou sujiao (鮮肉酥餃, NT$20 for one), which is seasoned pork wrapped in a crispy, flaky, buttery pastry crust, and dousha xiaobao (豆沙小包, NT$80), or sweet red bean paste in a thick, QQ dumpling skin, and the xiehuang zhengjiao (蟹黃蒸餃, NT$140), which are flavored with the tasty yellow substance that is found under a crab’s top shell. Because Chinchiyuan’s dishes are so reasonably priced and the dumplings so hearty, it’s easy to order too much and emerge feeling uncomfortably overstuffed instead of sated. It’s best to exercise restraint and order two steamers of dumplings, along with one or two bowls of soup or congee to share, for groups of two or three people.
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