Dim Well Cafe

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is a new addition to the many yum cha restaurants on Gouger St. The shop is located near the gates of Chinatown so it's pretty easy to get to. As this place is so new, they've decided to give a discount of 20% on their yum cha menu to entice new customers. New customers like me.



Upon entering the shop, I was pleased that lots of natural light was used to light up the restaurant. The slightly reflective surfaces on the right wall of the restaurant displayed a list of specials. It was kind of cramped though; the cafe was doing its best to fit as many tables in as possible.



Unlike most of the yum cha places I have frequented, this cafe wouldn't have trolleys of dim sum rolling past. Instead, you'll have to look at the menu and note down which dishes you want so it's good to plan out what you want for your meal.



My table tried shiu mai , pork and prawn dumplings to start. These were decent; nothing special though. We also tried the Fish Meat Shiu Mai and the Shanghai Pork Buns.



The Fish Meat Shiu Mai tasted different; I'd say they were sort of similar to fish cakes. They weren't too bad. I enjoyed the Shanghai Pork Buns. These are soup dumplings, or xiaolongbao .



Next, my table decided to sample the cafe's Salt & Pepper Squid. The batter didn't taste good but the squid tentacles were tender. Probably not something I would order again, however.



The Chinese Donut Rice Pasty was probably my favourite dish. It's a Chinese Donut (or yau ja gwai ) that has been wrapped up in a rice noodle roll (or chee cheong fun ). Soft on the outside but crunchy on the inside.



To sweeten our palates, we decided to get some egg tarts and some mango pudding. The egg tarts were great; the pastry was flaky and the egg paste was melt-in-your-mouth. Unfortunately, the mango pudding fell short of expectations; it was bland and dull to the taste, so much until several people in my table opted to stop eating it after a few bites.



The staff at Dim Well probably need a few more weeks to get more experience; there were several occasions where the wrong food got sent to our table. The waiters were friendly enough however. I'll give the benefit of the doubt to them as this cafe has just started out. It's probably a little pricier than I would like it to be but at least the bill was cushioned by the 20% discount we received. In the future this discount might not be in order anymore and I'm not sure whether I would want to return. I have very mixed feelings about this cafe; some dishes were good but some were not very well received.

#adelaide_city
#brunch
#chinese_restaurants
#dumpling_bars
#lunch
#south_australia
#yum_cha_restaurants
%wnadelaide