Palo Alto: Dumpling City replaces Valencia Asian Market

Nuts! After many years of having to schlep to South San Francisco or Union City for the dumplings we now have Dumpling Depot and Dumpling City within 15 minute drive. And right as we are about to leave the area too!

Poke Lover, you've also had fine sources of Chinese filled dumplings available for years right here in Mountain View.

It's the quiet specialty of Queen House on Castro (dumplings are what originally built their customer base, many versions are on the menu, bags of frozen ones are sold ready to cook). Then since 2010, Bamboo Garden at Rengstorff and Central, with its Shanghai and Dongbei specialties, is a destination dumpling source for the peninsula -- they are the restaurant's biggest seller. Cuisine-knowledgeable Michelin Guide inspectors sounded Bamboo Garden's praises for a couple of years and helped put it on the map, some of its dumpling types are rare in the Bay Area. Other restaurants have respectable selections on dimsum menus (Fu Lam Mum, Cooking Papa). And at the Mountain View Farmers' Market on Sundays, OFS Food sells many kinds of good locally made dumplings frozen.

@Eater - yup, have tried all of those. The Bamboo Garden owner knows me as "Mr Xiao Long Bao" :) Their XLBs are the best in the Bay Area bar none, sorry Din Tai Fung.

But there is a unique quality to the "proper" dumpling places. They are all very similar. The glass door fridges and the freezer chests. The plastic tables. The one page laminated menu, dumplings front and center. The auntie making dumplings at one of the tables in the dining room. The amazing orange spicy sauce. The name: "Dumpling X". There are a number of them scattered around the Bay Area, and that's what we always wanted nearby.

Just came back from getting lunch at Dumpling City, and it ticks off all the boxes. The dumplings and the pancakes were fantastic. Life is good, thank you Elena!

Are these actually hand-made? I fear they are machine made and then frozen for distribution.

Hmm, I guess we'd best try these new places to see if it's worth the drive for us too.

Most of those notes cited by Poke Lover (glass-door fridge, plastic, absolutely the auntie making dumplings -- an utter necessity!) can be seen at places like Queen House and Bamboo Garden, but not the Dumpling Something restaurant name. I'd be most interested though in how the dumplings eat, more than what the tables are made of or what the place is called.

@Eater PA (a resident of Evergreen Park):

Re-read the article and look for the hyperlink to the Yelp photos.

If that is not evidence enough, I suggest you personally go to the restaurant and ask to see them make the dumplings.