If you know the staff well enough, they will go the extra mile for mile. I don’t recall the restaurant, but my Mom knew the hostess there because they were from the same village in China. My mom never had to wait to get in there, and they always brought her something extra.
I know a mixed-race couple in the SF Bay area. They go so often to their local dim sum restaurant that they never have to wait.
favoritism happens.and it would probably be a good thing if more people were aware of when it tilts in their favor at someone else’s expense and they were given a chance to decline with no real bad feelings resulting from that. how’s that for tiptoeing up to the topic of white privilege and then backing away?
Hi, so which of these favorites are still favorites, any new additions to the list, and also, which is the nearest to West LA? Thanks!
Add to the list Longo Seafood in Rosemead and Xiang Yuan Gourmet in Temple City. Closest to the westside are King Hua and Lunasia, both on west Main Street in Alhambra.
Alternatives for the westside: Bao Dim Sum on Beverly Blvd, and Shanghai Rose in Studio City.
Restaurants like Moon House in West LA serve a few dim sum items, but after having tried, them I can’t help but believe that all those offerings are pre-packaged dim sum and not never house made.
@chandavkl Thank you for the suggestions. We ended up in Pasadena instead of Alhambra, so we went to Lunasia. I thought it was pretty great.
@LAFoodiePanda How did I not know about Bao House? People seem to like it it on the Internet. Thanks! I agree about Moonhouse, but the congee, soups and duck is definitely better than at most inexpensive Chinese restaurants on the West side.
I really like their take-out containers. They’re very functional.
Bao opened up back in 2010, with a dim sum chef who had previously worked in the “San Gabrielle Valley”, as the hostess described to me. Stuff was decent, and they had chicken varieties which you can’t get in the SGV. But the next day I had dim sum in Rosemead where the comparable meal was like a quarter or third of the cost, so I didn’t bother to go back until just recently. Most impressive this last visit was that a majority of the clientele was Chinese, where back in 2010, I was it.
Best to go during lunch or happy hour for their lower priced offerings. Still pricey though.
Weekday lunch dim sum at King Hua in Alhambra, December 2019:
Fried squab 
; chicken feet in herb broth ; bitter melon with preserved olive ; pork ribs with black bean (ok).
Sticky rice ball filled with salty egg yolk (Note: Order this as a final item or else it will be served too early in the meal); special - steamed shrimp & pea tips dumpling (ok); baked pork buns meh 
(so-so, bun too tough and thinly rolled out, scant amount of filling).
I’ve been to Lunasia and China Red in the past for dimsum and definitely prefer their dim sum staples, but I found King Hua’s other dishes such as fried squab (Lunch Recommendation menu item); bitter melon with preserved Chinese olive (Lunch Recommendation menu item) and chicken feet in herb broth notable. Since I don’t speak Cantonese, it was difficult to ask for a soup bowl for the chicken feet. It was only after I took my tea cup and pretended to fill it with the chicken feet that the nearby hostess understood my request. Another plus was the acoustics - nothing like the clanging din at Lunasia.
I’ve visited 6 dimsum places In San Gabriel Valley and would rank them as 1. Lunasia (Alhambra); 2. China Red; 3. King Hua. The others were Empress Harbor (closed); Monterey Palace and Elite. I’m hoping to finally try Sea Harbor in Rosemead sometime in 2020 to see if I like it better than my top three picks.
Most servers and managers can converse in English, particularly the managers. If an server doesn’t understand you, they would ask a co-worker who speaks English to assist you.
it’s rare to find anyone speaking cantonese at lunasia: staff or patrons.
Unless you speak to them in Cantonese
Bingo. The staff these days at every dim sum palace are either bilingual (Cantonese and Mandarin), or trilingual (Cantonese, Mandarin and English).
And in some cases, the staff speaks Toishanese (tai shan hua) as well.
geez, just go to any other legit dim sum place and just sit and listen. mandarin is never the predominant dialect like it is at lunasia. even the hostess calls out numbers only in mandarin. never cantonese.
