Tasty dumplings
New Chinese restaurant puts its specialty front and center
There’s something almost magical about watching the culinary pros create their dishes right before your eyes. From teppanyaki grills to high-end chef ’s tables and mixologists crafting signature cocktails, witnessing a bit of edible wizardry gives you an intimate connection to what you’re about to consume.
At Dumpling Tea & Dim Sum, which opened off the Plaza in midMarch in Plaza Galeria, Fen Wang and staff take on the mesmerizing task of filling and pinching dozens of dumplings at a time atop a wooden platform in the main dining room.
Wang, 52, and another designated dumpling-maker pull discs of dough (made earlier in-house) from a bag, then roll them with a dowel into perfect circles and drop in a dollop of pork or vegetable mixture. With the kind of speed and precision that only comes with expertise, they use thumb and index finger to pinch the dumplings into their trademark half-moons.
Once a wooden plate has been filled, the dumplings are chilled until they’re steamed (and served) in bamboo baskets or lightly fried to order.
Wang says her food’s authenticity and freshness are her hallmarks. Before moving to Santa Fe this year, she ran a successful dumpling restaurant in New York City noted for its fresh preparations and lack of MSG, she said.
Her focus on freshness extends to the entire menu, including housemade noodles, pork buns and impossibly delicate wontons. “There’s nothing here that comes frozen,” Wang said.
The menu is deliberately streamlined, allowing the dishes to shine. Dumplings ($7.99 for a half-dozen) are made with a pork or vegetable medley and steamed or fried. Those handmade noodles star in the vegetable noodle soup, vegetable fried noodles and the spicier Sichuan dan dan noodle dish (all $7.99). Steamed pork buns are $9.99 for six, and the pork wontons come eight to a bowl of soup ($9.99), a hot, rich broth packed with cilantro and green onions.
There’s also housemade scallion pancake rolls, egg rolls and two salads: a mildly spicy cucumber version and another with celery and peanut (all $3 to $5.50). In addition to a small case of sodas and bottled water, there’s bubble tea, chai, a refreshing lemon and honey tea, and passion fruit and mango smoothies ($3 to $5.50).
The dumplings, with their frontof-house preparation, take top billing. While many cultures have their own spins on pockets of baked dough filled with sweet or savory goodness — think empanadas, pierogies, samosas, ravioli — Chinese dumplings, or jiaozi, come with a delightful backstory.
There are several theories, but the most popular legend is this: During the Han Dynasty, a practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine named Zhang Zhongjian tried to cure citizens of his ancestral home who were suffering from frostbite on their ears by whipping up a batch of mutton, chile and medicinal herbs and wrapping it dough. He folded the dumplings to resemble ears, boiled them and gave them out to the poor along with the broth.
Today, they’re particularly popular around Chinese New Year, but here, as elsewhere in the world, dumplings are eaten year-round. On a recent afternoon,
Wang sent a neighboring shop owner in Plaza Galeria out with a veritable mini feast to go, free of charge. She talked dishes — and received compliments — from a pair of first-time diners.
“She’s such a giving and generous person,” said Wang’s romantic partner, Marcos Pacheco, 65, a contractor who was born in Santa Fe.
But Wang also said a little generosity is good business practice.
“I’ve been in business a long time,” she said. “I want my customers to be happy.”
Originally from the city of Dalian in northeast China, Wang spent more than a decade in Japan before moving to the United States in 2012. She sold her Manhattan dumpling shop for a slower pace of life in Santa Fe, where she had previously visited a friend, she said.
It wasn’t long before her culinary skills began to impress out West.
“She would make me these dumplings at home and … wow,” Pacheco said. Together, they began looking for a spot for her to open a restaurant.
They found it in Plaza Galeria at the former home of Ji Wang Noodle Shop, bought the business and transformed the interior. A coat of lemongrass-green paint and and a row of hand-lettered wooden signboards bearing menu options give the space a simple feel.
And on a back wall? A fresh mural featuring — what else? — pork buns and dumplings.