Qing Hua, 1676 rue Lincoln, Montreal QC
This basement level, authentic Chinese dumpling house on Lincoln came highly recommended by johnmbot and others, so I jointly decided with Chercherfemmes (“CCF”), also an Asian dumpling fan and fellow veteran of the New York Chinatown dumpling scene, to give it a try on the first night of our recent trip.
For those of you who are not familiar with what a soup dumpling is, it is a dumpling that is stuffed with both meat and soup broth. Qing Ha is specializing in handmade soup dumplings from a province in southern China whose name escapes me. These dumplings, which are served by your choice either steamed, boiled or fried, are similar to Shanghai style soup dumplings, but they are smaller and do not ooze quite as much broth as their Shanghai counterparts. To eat them properly, you are advised to tear a corner of the dumpling off and “suck the broth out”, before proceeding to dip the dumpling in your choice of dipping sauce. In effect, these dumplings come in your mouth when you eat them. Unfortunately, the dumplings at Qing Ha are not served with large soup dumpling spoons designed to catch the squirting broth, as is the case with Shanghai-style soup dumplings. In addition, these dumplings seemed to tear imperfectly, with the result being that both CCF and I experienced COB (come on body) from these dumplings – CCF had a few dumplings squirt on his shirt, and I had one that squirted a fairly big and sloppy load on my leg.
We ordered steamed pork and shrimp dumplings and lamb and scallion dumplings first, finished them, then ordered fried beef and onion dumplings and chicken and mushroom dumplings. All were tasty, but the dumplings were not segregated from each other on separate plates. Rather, all were served on one platter together, and we had troubling distinguishing between the different dumplings. The pork and shrimp dumplings was the only one that stood out for what it was, while the others were all somewhat similar in taste. The fried dumplings seemed to contain less broth than their steamed counterparts, but I enjoyed both styles.
For dipping sauces, we had soy sauce, some kind of strong black vinegar (not balsamic) and chili garlic sauce, but no sriracha sauce or hoison sauce, which was a mild disappointment. I blended the soy and chili garlic sauces in my dipping dish and, after extracting the soup from each dumpling, dipped it into the hybrid sauce.
CCF and I both sampled the hot and sour soup as well. For my taste it was on the spicy side, but CCF enjoyed it very much while commenting that it had more of an onion taste than most hot and sour soups he had sampled. They seem to be liberally sprinkling fresh chopped green onions into the soup.
One negative is that the men's room has no hot air duct and is not heated, so if you have to crap you will need to let your ass touch an ice cold porcelain toilet seat. I decided to “man up” and do it. I am not sure if johnmbot would have allowed his ass cheeks to touch frozen, icy porcelain, but I decided you gotta do what you gotta do.
Overall, I enjoyed the experience of eating authentic Chinese soup dumplings at Qing Hua. It is different than the Shangahi style soup dumplings I have had in New York City, but I probably enjoyed it just as much.
