Spoonful Of Loh: DinTaiFung

If you like dumplings you might want to write this down: 鼎泰豐 Just kidding, try this instead: Din Tai Fung.

The ten of us braved the chilly night wind and made our way to George Street. Things were looking up as we approached, there were actually people waiting to get in, a more-or-less sure sign this place is doing things right. The two thinly-clad ushers greeted me in Mandarin, and with smiles thrown in. How's that? Can't tell you how warm it made me feel to be acknowledged for who I am, a bloody Chinese.

As we entered the restaurant, a chorus of greetings from the staff guided us to our table. The main dining area is like a hall, huge and with high ceilings, and nosily crowded, as any good Chinese restaurants should be. Not too sure about some aspects of the decor though; the olive-shaped ceiling lamps looks great but the soup spoons lightbox and steamer wall feature does takes a little getting use to.

And the food, oh the food. Where do I even begin. Everything is good, even the humble fried rice didn't let us down. Ordinarily I would have preferred for the food to be served in the order of appetizers, vegetables, meat dishes, dumplings and then finishing off with fried rice/noodles. Not this evening though, whatever that was ready was brought to our table and it was quite fun trying to guess which will turn up next. If I have to nominate, the Drunken Chicken and Xiao Long Bao (literally little basket buns) will have to be the 绝鼎, meaning the best!

But I have to say, it's the other little service things the staffs at Din Tai Fung did that got my attention - if you drape your jacket, or wrap, or any other piece of clothing on the back of your chair, a staff will come up thereafter and drape a burgundy cover over it. This is for protection of your clothing, just in case spills occur during service. How thoughtful!

I am also delighted to learn the good people at Din Tai Fung did not try to "ozzify" their signature dishes but instead seek to engage the Ozzie palate through introducing new dishes. Very astute.

Anyway, you go try it and let me know what you think.

請慢用, meaning bon appetit!