My friend R. and I meet a couple of times a year to eat seafood. Often, we claim one of these get-togethers is a belated birthday celebration (because it sounds better than a pig-out). To start this year well, we decided to have dumplings because it was Friday 13th.
Chicken with fermented tofu sauce. Gently funky.
What the world thinks
I’ve heard a lot about Stack Dim Sum Bar and was excited to go. For once I read Facebook reviews before I went. It seems the restaurant is divisive: most people love it, some really don’t. Greasy noodles and bad service are the usual culprits. I was really curious to about what I would think.
Eating dim sum
Dim sum has the same great advantages as tapas and meze: you get to try several different things and can continue ordering until you’re satisfied. We started with a quartet of tempting treats:
- Flash-fried squid cakes (3) – crispy, crabby, larger than I had expected and therefore really easy to share.
- Shar sui buns (3) – love these big, fluffy rice buns with their sweet meat filling.
- Vietnamese spring rolls (3) – crispy, tasty, with a lovely and elegant dipping sauce.
- Spinach scallop dumpling (3) – see-through shells wrapped around delicate spinach and scallop. Too good to photograph.
Beef wun ton and pork pot stickers, flash-fried crab cakes (with hand shadow) and char sui bun. Oh yeah.
Then we topped up with three additional delights:
- Chicken in fermented soya sauce – soft chicken in a sauce of fermented soya. It wasn’t as in your face as I expected but gently funky with a salty bite to it.
- Cantoneese pot stickers (4) – I love pot stickers: dumplings that have first been steamed and then fried for a little bit of extra flavour and texture. These were not my favourite ever but I ate them with pleasure.
- Beef wun ton – crispy and fun, wun ton are always nice to eat. I bite off the meat packet and eat the crispy dough on its own.
We could have continued eating – never underestimate our capacity – but had run out of wine and decided to be sensible. So I logged the fun gor, the glutinous rice rolls and the red bean trio for next time (as well as a double serving of the spinach scallop dumpling).
What did i think?
I have no issue with the service and the food was delicious. There are things on the menu I’m unlikely to pick – congee isn’t for me and I can live without chicken feet – but all of the dim sum are tempting and I want to go back for more. Soon. The service was fine, the room basic and cheerful, much like the wine list. The other dinners – we were a mixed bunch on this cold January night, a work party, a table middle-aged women, a courting couple and a table of young men I’d guess were Chinese – gulping and slurping gratefully. The food, the reason we were there, was good and good value.
Stack Dim Sum Bar
42 Dalmeny Street
Edinburgh, EH6 8RG
Telephone: 0131 553 7330
I understand why you want to keep it a secret!
My fab dim sum restaurant in Edinburgh, love it, and the staff are very polite. Don’t go there, as we like it kept as a secret 🙂