A Chinese restaurant chain has consumed our diet in Beijing and Shanghai. I know the first thing your probably thinking – wow, the Sharples have did it again, Mood Food and now this place, and the fact that it is a chain also makes it all that more pathetic.
Well, if you are thinking that then you’ll forgive me when I tell you about this place. If you’re from Seattle, then you might have experienced the powerful awe that this place carries with it. Now you’re probably thinking – wait this chain is in Seattle also?! What is this place Starbucks? And now you’re probably thinking – when the heck is this guy gonna get to the point and stop predicting what I’m thinking? Well then I’ll just shoot the name out….Din Tai Fung!
This might already ring a bell to you if you’re from Seattle or Bellevue; the dumpling place that has a 30-60 minute wait to get a table, even on week nights. If it doesn’t ring a bell then I’ll just give you a quick briefing….amazingly awesome, stupendous and to die for. That statement wasn’t just to get me more comments on my blog post, I can honestly say that I could live off Din Tai Fung for the rest of my life. Din Tai Fung in China is just about as common as TGI Fridays is in the US, so there’s not any wait to get in. At this point it might be a little ambiguous as to what Din Tai Fung actually is, so I’ll take you through your basic night at Din Tai Fung.
Your waiter brings you to your table and lays out some menus. You flip to the first page of the menu, and what you see will change your life and alter your future forever. The juicy pork dumpling. You go through the menu trying to find something worth taking space in your stomach other than the juicy pork dumpling, but you can’t. You order your drinks, juicy pork dumplings and something else to cover up the fact that you are only ordering juicy pork dumplings. You have a conversation with your friends, let’s say you are talking about politics. After you begin talking about politics, your tower of dumpling steamers arrives in a jiffy. You make your dumpling sauce with the proper proportions of soy sauce and vinegar on a small plate of fresh shredded ginger. You will clench the soft outer shell of the dumpling vigorously in between your chop sticks, trying very hard not to splatter the delicate drop of wonder onto the table along with your hopes and dreams. If you are an amateur than you will read the dumpling eating manual and place the dumpling onto your spoon and poke a hole in the side of your dumpling and watch the juiciness flow into the spoon, and then you will eat it. If you are an experienced Din Tai Funger, you’ll know the poking and prodding will ruin the popping sensation that happens in your mouth when your teeth puncture the skin of the dumpling. Next you will be amazed. You will start to think of what job you need to have to eat at Din Tai Fung every day. You will begin shoving the dumplings in your mouth as if they were popcorn. After you eat about 12 dumplings and gulp down your drink, you start to fade into the I-really-wish-I-didn’t-eat-
You will have learned a valuable lesson: Din Tai Fung is amazingly awesome, stupendous and to die for.
Wescott and I eating just one more!
The steamers of dumplings!
Mom likes to create a “sauce bath” for her dumplings 
All of us posing with the Din Tai Fung mascot
Latest posts by Otto (see all)
- THE MAGIC OF LOOOOOOOOOOOOBSTER ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLS! PAPOW! - February 24, 2015
- Nepenthe - February 22, 2015
- Sudhiki en Cerdmeal - September 8, 2014
Where in the World?
Travelers
Cliff Sharples (51)
Lisa Sharples (74)
Yve Sharples (46)
Wescott Sharples (34)
Otto Sharples (47)
Tuck Sharples (43)
Jones Sharples (41)
Janet Frohnmayer (1)
PopPop Aufranc (6)
TeeTee Aufranc (2)
6 Comments