A week after I came back from San Francisco, I found myself in Flushing for dim sum. Ahhh, dim sum. I grew up going to dim sum nearly every weekend, and took it very much for granted. Dim sum is a social affair (sort of; for my family, who didn’t really go to dim sum socially the way others do, expecting, perhaps even wanting to run into others that you knew there, it was just about the eating, and that’s okay with me, I always find it a bit awkward to bump into people when I’m eating, and it happens so rarely, well), where Chinese people gather to have tea, share small dishes, gossip, read the paper, share the “local news”, and just be generally social with each other. It’s brunch at a diner where you know your friends will be.
And when non-Asian people used to ask me to explain dim sum, I would tell them “It’s the original tapas. Small plates. Except you eat it in the morning hours and usually on the weekends.” That works, right?
Before I get to the food and with whom I went, I am going to tell you why I said at the beginning of this post that I took dim sum for granted. I didn’t realize how complicated it is to eat with other people, especially those you don’t know very well (or at all) – I’ve alluded to this in the past with my post on Satay. It has a lot to do with my upbringing, in my ever-present quest to make sure other people are comfortable and have enough to eat (sometimes at the sake of my own comfort or having enough to eat), my desire not to appear like a total pig, my complete and utterly selfish disposition (my sister said it most succinctly when we were growing up: “I would rather buy you your own gum than share mine with you”; you can laugh or mock, but I very much feel the same way). So when I eat “family style” with people, I am constantly curbing myself, taking less than perhaps I actually want to, and being polite, offering people the last piece when I actually want it for myself, and letting other people take first instead of just taking for myself, even though this inevitably means the food grows cold and usually doesn’t taste as good when it’s cold.
Also, with dim sum, you throw in another factor: do you know what everyone at the table likes? (Do they?) Obviously, growing up, I ate dim sum with my family, and very much ate what was put in front of me (also part of my upbringing). So clearly, my parents knew what we liked to eat or would eat, and so this made the ordering process much easier. See, with dim sum, there’s usually one seat – the hot seat, if you will – that bears the responsibility of being on the aisle, being the one who can see the food and order it the fastest. The unofficial orderer, the one who dictates what will be eaten and what won’t. This can be a good thing but it can also be bad, very, very, VERY bad (I refer here to an incident from 4-5 years ago when I tried to have dim sum with a friend who is – and I say this with a lot of affection – flat out retarded. First she invited 5 other people I didn’t know – it was supposed to be a catching-up-with-each-other dim sum, but she decided we wouldn’t be able to eat properly at dim sum with just 2 people, which is accurate, but I would have been fine going somewhere else – and then she proceeded to just keep ordering random crap she’d never tried off the carts, most of which turned out to be horrid, and I barely got to eat because the other 5 people apparently hadn’t eaten in 3 months, and to add insult to injury, it was the most expensive dim sum experience I’ve ever had, clocking in at something ridiculous. I refuse to go dim sum with her anymore.) if you have a selfish person in the hot seat, or an inexperienced person, or a flat out RETARD.
In any case, I’m just ranting and putting this out there, especially in light of an upcoming dim sum I have with some of my closest friends, friends with whom I’ve never had dim sum. Thankfully, I doubt I’ll be in the hot seat, and again, thankfully, I know all of them well enough that I believe I’ll feel comfortable just eating and eating and eating and eating and eating… without needing to stop for any reason 🙂
Now back to the topic: on this occasion, Blondie, Brownie, Danny and I had been tossing around the idea of going out for dim sum together for a little while. I’d never met any of them, and I think they had met each other briefly just once (well, Blondie & Brownie clearly know each other from before), but in the interest of food, we were keen on getting together to give Blondie a real proper introduction to dim sum, since she felt she’d never had “real” dim sum before. Once we got there, received our number, waited our 20 minutes, then got a table, casual chitchatting led to the discovery that I was the only one with excessive experience with dim sum (probably because of that nearly-every-weekend-dim-sum growing up thing), and that my working knowledge of Cantonese (PLEASE HOLD BACK THE LAUGHTER, those of you who know me in person!) put me at a distinct advantage from the others in terms of ordering and communicating with the Chinese dim sum push-cart ladies. (Who, by the way, glared at me when I tried to speak to them in English; there was a definite “You’re Asian, why the hell can’t you speak Cantonese?” vibe to their glares.)
So. Now you know why I was in the hot seat. (And, as I explained to everyone at the table, when any of my family members reads this and finds I was the one with the best grasp of Chinese, they will laugh loud and hard, and ask if everyone else at the table was not Asian. Hey! I can get around and order food! HMPH!) I also had the somewhat intimidating task of explaining each dish to someone who’d never heard of it, never tried it, and to try to explain it in such a way that it didn’t sound weird, but rather wonderful. Oh, and to order well – to order the right dishes to match well with each other and well with each person’s palate, though I’d never met any of them before. To showcase a large variety of dim sum without overwhelming.
I fainted.
No, just kidding, but maybe I should have. I apologize to Blondie here because I think I did a really poor job of all of those things, but she seems to have had a good time. We’ll see how she feels next time I try to make her eat feet. Hahahaha.
Onward with the food! (PS I’d also never been to this place before, so there was another ick factor: what if the food failed spectacularly and I was left looking like an ass for suggesting the place?! Augh. I stress myself.)
Ahhh, the ubiquitous Phoenix Claws, or really chicken feet. I love this dim sum, naysayers be damned. It’s not my favorite but I do miss it when it’s not there. We’d just been talking about it, and I guess I was oblivious (probably nervous – I get really anxious when I meet new people) to the trepidation with which Blondie spoke of them. My opinion: I really don’t understand why dim sum places seem to be cheaping out on the chicken feet. Isn’t this a cheap part of the chicken? I guarantee if you go to Perdue, they’re throwing this part of the chicken away or selling them for pennies on the pound! What the heck?! Look at each piece carefully – they were chopped in half. Seriously, I’d rather only get three whole ones than get them chopped in half, as they lose a lot of the appeal somehow by being chopped in half. Tastewise, they were fine, but I highly stress these need to be eaten while hot or at least still warm. Otherwise the sauce starts to congeal and turn really icky.
Stuffed green peppers – stuffed with a shrimp paste with pork in it (so FeistyMom says, though I didn’t taste any pork). A leftover favorite as a kid, I hadn’t eaten these in years. The best part is biting into the whole thing, feeling the smooth but bouncy texture of the steamed fish paste and then the gently yielding crunch of pepper. Yummy. These were only alright, nothing outstanding but not offensive either.
Roast pork buns… I didn’t try these. I’m sorry. I don’t get the need to eat these at dim sum – I prefer mine from a bakery. Hahahaha I’m such a hater.
Peppered short ribs. I was really disappointed with this dish. First because I thought it was something else (the spare rib tips that you pop entirely in your mouth), and second because they were horribly chewy and not very tasty. I actually felt embarrassed for this dish.
Shumai… again, fairly standard, nothing mind boggling. I’m not sure BF, the shumai expert between us, would have liked it, since it had shrimp in it.
Sticky rice. This was pretty good although I was surprised to discover bacon in there, along with the usual Chinese sausage. I do so love bacon with my rice, so this was good for my tastebuds, but still unexpected.
I ordered selfishly here and got tripe. I love this dim sum dish, and I rarely get to eat it since no one else I know likes it. But… foodies! They must like it! Sadly, we barely finished off the top of it. (As a kid, growing up, if I wanted this, I had to eat the whole dish. It’s quite a large dim sum, too, comparatively, so I would order it maybe once every few months, then sit there and eat only this dish, plus my favorite dim sum dish. It was my parents’ ruling that if I order it, I finish it.)
Fried chive dumplings… only not. I don’t recall the exact name or filling of these, though they’re quite yummy, and these didn’t disappoint.
Chive dumplings, I love these little things, even though they make you gassy. Delicious.
I also love this dim sum, fried cruellers wrapped in rice noodle. These should be plumper and much tastier, though these weren’t bad, they were definitely a bit lacking.
Salty sweet goodness, fried mochi filled with ground pork & shrimp. I love these. My brother used to call them footballs because he couldn’t pronounce the Chinese words for it. These were pretty darn good actually.
A terrible photo of my very favorite dim sum. Dim sum isn’t complete until I’ve had this – shrimp wrapped in rice noodles. These were standard, nothing terrible about them, and not wonderful. Tasty enough.
Brownie probably got fed up with my ordering (I don’t blame her one bit; I got into a habit of just shaking my head firmly when someone approached with something I didn’t like or want, with one exception, and didn’t ask anyone at the table if they wanted it or wanted to try it. Oops- I let the hot seat power get to my head… my bad!!!), and smartly reached out and snagged one of these – sauteed greens. By the speed with which this dish was killed, great call!!! Once again, tasty, but not special.
Here is an example of my stupid selflessness. This dish – beef wrapped in rice noodle – is one that I detest, with all my might. However, time and time again, when I go dim sum with other people, it finds its way onto the table and people not only eat it, they love it! So I decided to order it for my dining companions, knowing full well I would not touch it. However, I didn’t realize Brownie doesn’t eat beef, and I’m not sure what Danny or Blondie thought of it, though I know it went mostly untouched. My bad. Poor ordering choice.
Overall, the experience was pleasant enough, and I’m pretty sure eventually, I will be back to eat at Ocean Jewels – with friends, or family. But definitely not in the hot seat. Too much pressure to succeed, and I feel like a jerk for failing at nearly every turn. Sigh.
Yvo says: Good enough dim sum to return. Price seemed a bit high, though I don’t recall how much we wound up paying each, but that could also be due in part to my poor ordering skills – we did have food leftover on the table, and you know how much I hate waste. I am too bossy sometimes — I really should have relaxed and let other people order. I’m so sorry!!! At least the food wasn’t awful (aside from that pepper short rib dish, which was quite terrible).
recommended
danny says
Mmmm… dim sum. That beef thing just wasn’t that good.. haha. The shrimp one was so much better and by then we had eaten everything else so I was kind of full. And then there was shaved ice! If we had found it, there would have been dumplings too probably.
Swan says
what happened to all the seafood!? it’s more expensive but their seafood dishes are better than other places
John says
ocean jewel is one of the dim sum places that is on the more expensive side, but it is a good spot though. you should try jade asian. it is a little pricey too.
talida says
Have you had dim sum at East Ocean? You live around there, no?
That’s my recommendation for good and moderately priced dim sum. If you ever need a dim sum buddy, don’t be shy to reach out to me 🙂