Before Din Tai Fung hit the shores of M’sia, before the mini craze of siu lorng paus 小籠包 ( SLP) I would just nod and say a few polite words of something similar to ‘really ah…so nice ahh..ohh..they weigh each dumpling to make sure every one weighs the same ah..oh..like that ahh…so many people queue up one ah..’ when people started to talk about having a meal at DTF.
When DTF newly opened at the Gardens , Midvalley Megamall, I heard that there were long queues and large crowds..and finally, the Malaysian mass can check out Din Tai Fung SLP without having to go through immigrations.
We arrived at DTF around 8-ish pm on a weekday, not too big a crowd, we didn’t have to wait to get a table which was good as everyone was hungry. There were 5 of us and as the portions can be pretty big for small eaters ( yours truly excluded in this category), we decided to order 3 bowls of noodles and 2 sets of SLP.
The appetizers were pretty appetizing – strips of crunchy salted veges, fungi, seaweed etc. This gets the stomach juice flowing.
We ordered the combo-dumpling set : pork and crabmeat+pork. The SLP’s looked very dainty and simple seated on a white cloth in the steamer. Going through the motions : Lifting up the SLP from it’s nest with the chopsticks, the weight of the broth against the thin skin of the dumpling, dipping the SLP into vinegar and positioning in onto the ceramic soup spoon and adding a few strips of ginger..and the bite..hhmm..feel the taste of the sweet broth on your tongue and you sip the broth greedily ..ahh..so ends the fate of the dainty and simple SLP..and it was pretty good SLP.
Each set consist of 6 SLP ( unless you opt for the bigger set which comes in 12 units), and there were 5 of us, so how do we do the math of who gets how many ? we did it the democratic way – the person who makes the most noise get the extras…that’s fair huh ? ( and it was not me..)
We ordered prawn wanton noodles – the noodles arrived with the 5 wantons in a row..so pretty one..the prawns were fresh , the broth was sweet and the noodles were smooth and springy. No faults here.
The crowd were getting hungrier by the moment, so even before I manage to get my camera ready, they had started to attack the noodle soup with fried pork chop .So, sorry la..no photos, and it was one big block of pork – actually, the comment was ..too much meat..the broth taste the same as the broth prawn wanton noodles.
The same fate befall the braised beef noodle soup – so, I only managed to get a picture of the ‘apportioned/ shared ‘ small bowl allocated to me, again- plenty of beef, big chunks of it. The broth is a dark clear soup and taste of spice, I am wondering why DTF do not serve vegetables with these noodles ( e.g spinach or others) the noodles just had some sprinkle of spring onions. It’s almost like meat meat meat and you won’t have any distractions from the vegetables
Interested to find out more about the history of Bingyi Yang from Shanxi who started all this and the official websites ? The English version is here , and the Chinese version is here
Din Tai Fung Restaurant
Lot LG-207, Lower Ground Floor,
The Gardens, Midvalley City,
59200 Kuala Lumpur
Tel : 03 2283 2292
