A Little Bit About a Lot of Things

Leah and I visited Dumpling Palace a while back, so when Dumpling Kingdom, their sister restaurant, opened in Allston, we were excited to check them out (with our gal pal Kim too). Owner Zengqi Lui and Executive Chef Peter Wang also run Dumpling Cafe in Chinatown. Parking is a little better at Dumpling Kingdom, with a lot out back and street parking. The restaurant was pretty spacious (it is the largest of the three restaurants and holds about 85 people) and we had the place to ourselves – a weekday early lunch! They have a few large fish tanks in the back with live lobsters and fish along with an ENORMOUS crab! Service was on point, our waiter gave us some good suggestions and checked in with us throughout the meal.

I love the rice cake noodles here. I order them where ever I go and these are quite tasty – the pork and vegetable combination gives this dish great flavors. All the dumplings we had were delicious, each in their own way. The pan fried dumplings were flavorful and cooked perfectly. The skins on the wontons were just the right thickness (I hate dumplings that are too bready) and the filing was good. The soup dumplings, Xiao Long Bao, were a star, they were just the perfect salty (pork) goodness that warms you up on a chilly day.

Dumpling Kingdom

137 Harvard Ave., Allston, MA

http://dumplingkingdomallston.net