Dish of the Month (DoTM) -- MARCH 2016 -- Dumplings

Lunch @ Doma Kitchen in Manhattan Beach.

Chicken pelmeni:


Vareniki (Lithuanian potato dumplings, per the menu) with caramelized onions and shiitake mushrooms:

7 Likes

I’ve been meaning to try them for a while. Thanks for the reminder, @Pomsmoms. Haven’t had vareniki in quite some time. There was a place in Studio City that used to make them. The caramelized onions and shiitake mushrooms are nice additions.

1 Like

Thanks @Pomsmoms! Chicken Pelmeni looks delish! How was it?

Is there a large overlap btw Russian and Lithuianian food? (please don’t shoot if that’s a very non-PC question… :frowning: ). Agree that the onions + mushrooms dish looks delicious.

It was my first time trying both dishes, and they were pretty good! The pelmeni were total comfort food - light dumplings, not as heavy on the garlic/onion/leek flavor as asian dumplings, floating in broth with onions, tomatoes, dill, and parsley. Every other table got an order, so it seems to be one of their more popular dishes.

1 Like

No idea! (Any FTCers care to educate the rest of us?) And yes, the onions and mushrooms added some depth to the dish. I think there might have been a touch of balsamic in them that gave just a hint of sweet and acid that went well with the potato dumplings.

1 Like

Oh! That looks so awesome!

DTF SCP for lunch on Saturday. I’m not saying I’ve been a lot lately, but the bartenders were making jokes about how many blood orange boba martinis my wife and I drink.

I agree with you @Porthos. The pork and shrimp dumplings are better than the XLB. Had to do a side-by-side comparison. We also had the pork won tons in spicy sauce, another of our favorites…

5 Likes

MELTY. CHEESE. PORK. BUNS.

That is pretty much all it took to head down to to Nikuman-Ya in Gardena

I of course ordered the Melty Cheese Pork Buns and even thought he menu says it’s 1 Piece, sometime I got two LARGE pieces, like fluffy calzones! The Melty Cheese was both inside and outside the bun. The filling was a big pork meatball and quite flavorful. The bun was soft and yielding, not tough or pasty. Overall it wasn’t as good as some of the more refined Dim Sum pork buns (Not as juicy or nuanced in flavor) but it was WORLDS better than most quicky steamed buns available at any number to go places. It was flavorful enough just to eat on the run without any sauce or choking down. Although curiously it does come with a black vinegar and garlic sauce (They call Umami Sauce, it’s okay) and Tapatio (Yep! The Mexican Mariachi Man Hot Sauce!) And the Tapatio actually worked! The bun is slightly sweet so Sriracha might have been too cloying and chile oil too messy to pour on the run. So taking the cute from the countless street elote vendors who use Tapatio as their salsa of choice was a good move.

Not realizing the large order I was getting from the buns, I also ordered mini buns. The Pork and Takana Dumpling. Honestly these would stand up to any of the better dim sum offerings. Little bits of pork, quite a bit of the Takana filling. The addition of pickled mustardy greens was brilliant to these rather rich buns (They seemed even richer than the larger cheese buns. No Tapatio included with these.

Nikuman-Ya is located inside the newish Tokyo Central Market (used to be a Murakai) on Redondo near Western. In addition to these Buns they have Shu Mai, Gyoza and Rice dishes. In fact, they had something like Omurice that I might go down again today and try.

6 Likes

seafood dumplings at noodle house in monterey park. assembled after you order.

3 Likes

Cheese w/ a pork bun sounds like heresy, although I must admit the pic is tempting… :slight_smile:

1 Like

After alleging it was on the way to the Sports Arena from the valley, we had an early dinner with old friends at TKF on Saturday night. I am always a bit nervous bringing new people there as I rave about the place and don’t get there nearly as much as I would like to. The four of us shared an apple quinoa salad and a mediterranean salad, both of which were full of fresh nice flavors as usual. Each of us had three Khninkali - all tried the beef and fried cheese and our guests had mushroom as well. The beef continues to be the standout in my opinion (as was the opinion of the table) with great herb and pepper flavors in a lovely broth. The cheese was also delicious. We were quite full and left salad unfinished at the table. The guests were shocked that the total bill, including 2 sodas, tax and 20%+ tip was $80. Although J. Gold has written very favorable about TKF, I still think this is a hidden gem!

Sorry, I didn’t take any food pictures, but Nemroz had one above.

1 Like

Thanks for posting about Nikuman-Ya, @Dommy . I’ve been wondering about them, but figured I couldn’t eat anything there because nikuman translates to meat bun in English. Your pictures looked so intriguing that I checked them out online. They do have a veggie bun and a vegetarian spring roll, so I’ll definitely try them. Perhaps I need to do a comparison between the veggie buns at Nikuman-Ya and Myung In Dumplings. Sounds like a worthy assignment to me!

@paranoidgarliclover, cheese with buns don’t sound completely heretical to me in the Japanese sense since cheese is often added to okonomiyaki and monjayaki. It sort of fits into the whole yoshoku aesthetic (Japanese-style Western food). However, if they added mayo or ketchup to the buns, that would be one step too far for me. I do agree the dumplings in Dommy’s pictures look enticing.

1 Like

No pics of the filling??? :wink:

What is TKF?
Missing even a second of the Bruce show is hard for me to chance, and made it all but impossible to do anything more than tailgate in a Science Center parking lot. I told friends - less paranoid (or Bruce-enthralled) than me - to try Revolutionario Tacos pre-show. They loved it AND made it in on time, LOL.

sorry, no. maybe if i’d taken a bite instead of scarfing them whole.

1 Like

http://www.tkfrestaurant.com

And being on time is why we had dinner at 5pm :relaxed:. It was another great show!

Went to Myung Dong Kyoja after a confusing back&forth with my wife. I preface this with the fact that my wife is from Malaysia. Her family would disown her knowing that she would not want to eat anything with at least some spice. We were picking up our son at LACMA which put us in range of Koreatown so, “Let’s eat Korean food!” says my wife.

“Okay,” says me.

“I don’t want to eat spicy food.”

“But you do understand that so much of Korean food is based around chile, right?”

“Why don’t we go to Jun Won?”

“Been there done that.”

This went on for a number of blocks driven and we finally agreed on Myung Dong Kyoja.Their menu has a fair number of mild items. Their soups are mild, substantial and comforting. Dumplings can be added or ordered separately and some requisite items like bibimbap and bulgogi are available.

As for dumplings, we ordered two types. Pork and shrimp mandoo and pan-fried prk dumplings.

Good flavor and nice piece of shrimp inside. If you are used to the bright clean flavor of fresh shrimp at places like Sea Harbor or Elite, you may frown a bit, but all in all a very good dumpling, especially with a bit of vinegar and Kimchi.

The pan-fried pork dumplings were meh.

Kinda thin and not a whole lot to say about them. Again - dressed up with some vinegar and Kimchi tends to liven things up.

Koreatown is a huge, relatively unexplored part of LA for me. I’ve mentioned before how I kinda avoid this general part of LA due to it being difficult to get to, extremely heavy on traffic and almost nonexistent parking. But I am being more patient with those issues and the rewards are exposing myself and our family to some wonderful aspects of a culture that happens to also embrace wonderful food.

6 Likes

That pork and shrimp mandoo looks great!

I was about to write that the wrapper on the fried ones looked a little thin until I noticed you mentioned it later. :wink: For me, a fried dumpling just has to have some chew.

Also agree w/ you about K-town being intriguing, overwhelming, alluring, and frustrating (esp if you live west of the 405…).