Working at a hospitality PR firm two days a week, I read a lot about food. Not surprisingly, I get hungry often because of it. Today, I was craving some chinese dumplings.
While I know of one good dim sum place in Downtown, I know of none near my work in Miracle Mile nor near my house in Venice. Fortunately, my friend reminded me of the Dim Sum Truck.
I hopped on Twitter (@dimsumtruck) to see where they were located, and they happened to be 6 blocks from the office I was at. The usefulness of Twitter to both customers and businesses (who use it correctly) continues to surprise me.
Upon arrival, I was excited to see that they had exactly the kind of food I was craving. I ordered the pork and shrimp shumai (top left), shrimp and green onion har gow (top right), peking duck taco (bottom left), and another special that I don’t remember the name of (bottom right).
I started with the Peking Duck Tacos. Traditional Peking Duck is served in a very taco-like style, so I thought it would be very similar. Unfortunately, the tortilla just didn’t work as well as the wrappers used traditionally. Tortillas have a significantly higher flour to water ratio, therefor is much drier. Great news is, the flavors were pretty good and similar to what I’m used to getting at authentic chinese restaurants. The duck skin wasn’t as crunchy as it could have been.
The special, was only okay, nothing special. I don’t even know if it’s on the original menu, it’s not on the website. I should have been more adventurous and tried the cheeseburger dumplings.
The Har Gow, unfortunately, wasn’t that great. I ate them, but I probably won’t be ordering them again. In case it was just this time, I’d be willing to give these dumplings a second chance if he’ll give them to me for free.
I enjoyed the Shumai. Especially with four sauces, you get to mix and match different flavor profiles. They’ll give you a sweet sauce with your food, and you can also use any or all of three bottles provided: spicy red chili sauce, spicy mustard, and soy sauce. My favorite combo was the mustard and soy sauce on the shumai.
While the quality of food is a notch below my favorite dim sum restaurants, considering the convenience (they come out to Venice twice a week), creativity, speed, price, and friendliness, I’ll come back to this truck whenever I feel like chomping on some dim sum.
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