Red Egg

To wrap up CT’s Birthday weekend full of delicious food, we went with her family for one of our favorite breakfasts/brunches, DIM SUM! Since it was an extra special meal, she decided we should go to a more upscale place. We ended up at Red Egg. Being a more “high-end” place, they take reservations, so we didn’t have to wait, which is always nice. On the other hand, this meant that prices were a lot higher compared to other dim sum restaurants with dishes ranging from $2.75 all the way up to $6.50.

CT says: Umm… I didn’t think it was that much higher? Just that we ended up ordering a ton of food….

Let the gorging BEGIN!

Shrimp Rice Roll. Unfortunately, the wrapping was quite thick and gummy. The shrimp inside were tasty though.

CT says: I didn’t think they were bad. I think the wrapper at Nom Wah was much worse… I’m pretty sure I took seconds of these!

Pork & Chive fried dumplings. These were quite good with a nice bit of crunch on the bottom of the wrapper.

Shrimp Spring Rolls. CT’s Dad’s favorite dish. I bet he could eat a couple orders by himself. These weren’t too greasy and nice and crispy.

CT says: I remember seeing these by him… not sure they ever made it my way though. He does love them, so glad he got to enjoy!

Steamed Pork Buns. Pretty standard. I regretted eating a whole one later since it took up so much precious stomach room.

I believe these were called Red Egg’s Puff. Meh.

CT says: After breaking my chopsticks, tossing the plate of these on my lap and generally causing a huge raucous in the restaurant, I took a bite of the sole remaining puff and thought it was pretty good. Not my favorite, but I’d happily eat them again. Fortunately, the nice wait staff brought over another plate for everyone else to try. Whoops!

Octopus in Sweet Bean Sauce. I made a special request at the table for this since I am a huge octopus fan. I was not expecting these octopi with HUGE heads. I think that turned off everyone except me. I could only eat two of these chewy, sweet, yet savory suckers. This was definitely a dish to be shared.

CT says: I tried them, but definitely not my favorite octopus preparation. Nothing to do with the huge heads, but I didn’t think it was very well cooked. I passed after a bite and never looked back.

Sticky Rice in Lotus Leaf. This was quite a good preparation with nicely sized chunks of various meats inside the rice.

CT says: Perfect and a rather large portion. We definitely didn’t need two portions (although I was happy to take home the extra!)

Fried Mochi. Not one of my favorites, so I let the others gobble these up.

CT says: My favorite and not greasy! Gobble gobble!

Soup Dumplings. It has taken a couple times to sink in, but we now know never to order soup dumplings from a dim sum restaurant. These were especially terrible since a couple of the dumplings had their bottoms fall out when being picked up. I’ll stick to Shanghai Cafe.

CT says: Ooops… another large order, but this time not worth the leftovers. I thought they were not terrible, but mediocre. Not to be re-ordered.

Shrimp Sui Mai. Quite good with nice and fresh shrimp pieces.

CT says: Definitely above average shumai.

Pan fried turnip cake. The outside had a nice crust on it, so I actually enjoyed this more than usual.

CT says: I love when this is made right where it has a nice crust but still soft on the inside. Some places make it too undercooked and gritty or overcooked at gummy. This place did it just right.

This was some sort of pastry filled with red bean paste. I passed on trying it.

CT says: Red bean isn’t my favorite, but this was ok for what it was. We didn’t really know what it would be when we got it, but wanted to try something different.

Tofu skin wrapped pork. This was very good.

CT says: One of my newer standards. Apparently I really like tofu skin. My teenage-self would never have guessed.

We also thought it would be good to order a couple of a la carte dishes. What were we thinking?

Jumbo Salt & Pepper Shrimp ($19). No expected these to be battered, just fried with the shells on. They were ok, but way too heavy for us to wrap up our meal with.

Blurry sauteed mixed vegetables ($13). Meh. We tried to be healthy but the veggies were covered in a gloopy sauce. Not worth the price considering it probably cost the restaurant less than a $1.

Sichuan Style Shrimp ($16). These were sickly sweet shrimp of a mediocre quality. Yvo later pointed out that it was our own fault for ordering Sichuan in a Shanghaiese restaurant. Touche’

CT says: I was quite disappointed in both shrimp dishes. Though the flavors might have been ok, they were just nothing what we expected. The salt and pepper shrimp were a bit greasy (battered? Just why?) and the sichuan shrimp was so sweet! I mean… sweeter than a sweet and sour. It just didn’t make any sense. Since we took home the leftovers, I tried the Sichuan shrimp again the next day and it was actually ok, cut with rice and veggies. But I definitely wouldn’t order it again. Oh well.

To cap off our meal, we got an order of Peking Duck Sliders ($24). An order makes six “sliders,” which was the perfect amount. They prepared them tableside. The duck was quite good and had plenty of crispy skin for all of us to share. Eventhough I was pretty full at that point, I didn’t enjoy the slider as much as I should have.

CT says: All I really wanted from this brunch was a plethora of dim sum and some peking duck… so I was really happy when these were served and were simply delicious! Plenty of crispy skin, a small slather of hoison (extra on the side if you wanted), a julienne of crispy greens and juicy, delicious duck meat. It came right at the end and was the perfect last bite. I really enjoyed the dim sum overall, but this just made the meal.

All in all, Red Egg was a nice choice for a family dim sum experience on a special occasion. I don’t see myself returning anytime soon as there are much better and cheaper restaurants nearby. Happy Birthday CT!