2677 Pembina Hwy
R3T 2H5
Dimsumpembina.com
204-269-7799
December, 2020
For the past decade, I’ve propounded the quality of Chinese foods along the Pembina strip, south of McGillivray to the Perimeter. The influx of Chinese students to the UofM brings the best of Chinese to the south of the city. Every time I walk into a new restaurant in this area, I expect to have the best Chinese meal of my life, which is a high order since I grew up in a Chinese household with a chef father.
In the heart of the COVID era, the restaurant barriers the dining room with tables and chairs. The attendant comes to you with a menu and order sheet, which you use to check off or write in the number of the dishes you want. As with any typical Chinese establishment, the menu features over 200 dishes and another 100 or so entries of dim sum.
The restaurant promises pickup in 25 minutes—it turns out to be about a 45-minute wait. It’s no big deal as my phone entertains me on the chairs. At the start of my wait, I sprawl out by myself. In short order, I share the lobby with five Skip the Dishes drivers, all of whom wait because their dishes are delayed.
This is heartbreaking.
Skip the Dishes charges 30%, cut right from the profit of the restaurant; that’s in addition to what they charge you as the end consumer for delivery. In these troubled times, when we think we’re doing small businesses some good by ordering in, all the profit goes into the pockets of the greedy Skip folks while the restaurant is left with nothing. Today, they are literally left with nothing. If the meal is not ready by the time Skip arrives, they punish the restaurant with a surcharge. If the restaurant must give half the order’s value to Skip, there’s nothing left. They literally work for nothing. All five of these drivers standing here means that the restaurant will not make a single cent from any of those orders. That’s why I sit here waiting. I want to help the restaurant; I want them to get the profits. I don’t want the greedy Skip the Dishes pour more $millions into their pockets.
Please do not use Skip the Dishes (or any other third-party delivery system). Just call the restaurant directly and order. If they have a delivery person on staff (like pizza places), use delivery—if not, just pick it up. Do not order online if it’s through a third party. Even if you pick it up yourself, just because you used Skip’s online payment system, they still take 30% off the top.
Sorry about the rant, let’s get into the food. The Chinese consider dim sum more of a lunch event, rather than a dinner affair. I’m very happy to see dim sum remain on the menu and be available throughout the day here. As food adventurous as I am, I normally stay with the tried, true, traditional dim sum dishes. I've seen some fusions blending dim sum with sushi seaweed and most of that doesn't work for me.
Probably the most ubiquitous dim sum offering, Shrimp Dumplings sit on almost every Chinese diners' tables. There are generally two kinds of Shrimp Dumplings: ones made with whole shrimps and ones made with shrimp meat (pulverised and blended into a paste). With almost every meat dish, I would always take whole over pulverised. you never know what ends, cuts, beaks, feet and genitals come with mashed. With shrimps, it doesn't matter--you're eating the entire animal regardless. With the mashed, they can season it more thoroughly and evenly. Often, the Chinese will add pork fat into the mash, which instantly adds dimension and flavour.
The Kingdom's shrimps come with whole, baby shrimps, but that doesn't mean it's bad or bland--quite the opposite. This rendition tastes delicious, each bite oozing with flavour and the whole shrimps giving a bit of a texture.
As far as texture goes, I'm not a fan of the texture of the Pan Fried Pork and Chives Dumpling. There's just too much dough and when it's too thick, you can only taste the dryness of the dough. They didn't scrimp on ingredients; each dumpling contains a generous amount of chives and ground pork. They come nestled in a nice, tasty sauce, but even the sauce is not enough to cut through the aridity of the dough.
Steamed beef meatballs have always been one of my favourite dim sum dishes but I surprisingly found that not many of my non-Chinese friends care for it. I discovered that it is the texture that turns people off. It's so finely pulverised that it's the consistency of wieners. I hate wieners because they're so finely mashed, and you have no idea what's in it (remember the list complete with genitals). In beef meatballs however, I love the entire package, including the texture. The flavour is quite unique as well, usually heavy in Worcestershire sauce, giving it a tangy and acidic edge (not too overwhelming here). They traditionally come sitting on a piece of bean curd, lettuce or a bed of peas. Here, the Kingdom puts them on the melange of green beans, corn, carrots and lima beans that you find in frozen vegetable bags. I hate lima beans, which is the only down I can find with this dish.
I love Shark Fin Dumpling, and no, there is neither shark nor fin in this dish. I grew up eating genuine shark fin soup, and I loved it. Then I learned how fishers got the fins and refused to eat it anymore. Much push-back came from the parents but eventually, I won out and I've tried to cut all shark meat out since then. These dumplings however, are named after how they appear, rather than their ingredients. Somehow, the wrinkled wrappers are supposed to resemble a shark's fin. I don't get it either, but I do get how delicious these taste.
Speaking of balls, the Chicken Balls are huge and fully stuffed with chunks of white meat. A lot of restaurants scrimp on meat and leaven their batter to artificially inflate their ball sizes, while only offering a smidgen of meat on the inside. Happily, no such deceit here. The batter tastes freshly fried and crispy; the accompanying dip tastes quite mild, not excessively sweet or sour. If you like a power sauce, you might be disappointed.
The Cantonese Fried Rice can be ordered mild or spicy. As you can see in the photo, the spicy version comes with cut up morsels of Thai peppers, giving a solid punch to the occasional bite. The overall dish has nice flavour and isn't too greasy but I would like to see some fresh vegetables here, rather than the frozen bag variety. Even just a bit of cut onions, carrots and celery would add the deepening mirepoix essence and more colour. The rice has a bit of crunch in some bites, resulting from the bits scraped off the bottom of the pot. Personally, I love eating those bits but to the fried rice purist, that's verboten. I would also like to see bigger chunks of meat. According to the description, the dish comes with chicken, barbecued pork and shrimp. The photo I took comes straight from the kitchen and all I did was lift the lid. I look hard at it but I can't see any iota of protein, except for one piece of fried egg.
Interestingly, my order comes with a bowl of what looks like gravy? It doesn't look like it goes with any of the other dishes. At first, I thought it might have been the sweet and sour sauce but it definitely tastes like gravy. I'm not sure and I won't question it. It won't be long until I get some fries that will go great with it.
As I started off saying, I have a certain expectations when ordering Chinese off of the Pembina strip. Dim Sum Kingdom doesn't disappoint, with lots of great food; there are a couple of disappointments but as a whole, it's worth the visit.
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