London Eats: Yum Cha Dim Sum
JOY KING LAU- YUM CHA
Been on the hunt for some good yum cha since we’ve come to London. Yum cha was a weekly- biweekly ritual for my hubby and my family. It’s the best way to catch up over a meal, best hang over cure and all the small little dishes are so easy to share. Everyone gets to choose whatever they feel like eating.
We stuck to our favourites and never really explored the other yum cha restaurants. When you find your favourite, you tend to stick to it right? I kinda hate wasting a meal on a restaurant/cafe that’s not that great.
Fortunately for us, Matt’s sister and brother in law eat yumcha and took us to one of the restaurants they eat yumcha. We have tried a few other dumpling/yumcha places but we always come back to this one.
We noticed that they don’t serve it in the carts like we’re used to back in Sydney. I always thought that brought an element to your yumcha / dim sum experience. Now, I’m determined to find one in London that serves the dishes out of the cart!
Joy King Lau – Address
3 Leicester Street
London
WC2H 7BL
website: http://www.joykinglau.com/
Waiting for a table
Fortunately for us, we have never come at a time where we had to wait for a table. We would go in and seated straight away. We normally go on a Sunday afternoon right at 12pm. Today we came at around 12:10pm and still got a table straight away. After we finished our meal, there is always a MASSIVE line waiting out the door. So come early 😃
Time between dishes
Getting the little dishes served in the cart can have its pros and cons. One thing I like about it, is that, there are often many different dishes in a cart and so you can get a couple of dishes at one time. You also get to see the dish before committing to buy it.
What I noticed is that when you order off the menu, the dishes all come out at different times. My hubby and I prefer eating many dishes at one time as the tastes are quite strong so it’s really good to mix it up a little bit.
Today, we waited so long between our first dish wish was the yam croquette and the HK style Cheung Fun. I would say at least 5 minutes. After that, it’ll be 2-3 minutes for the next dish. Then the steamed dishes would come out all at once.
It might not seem too long to wait, but when you’re eating a very strong flavoured dish, it gets quite over powering. But that’s me being really quickly. Generally I won’t mind ,especially if I’m catching up with family and friends.
Service
Yeah, I guess it’s service you would expect at any other asian restaurant that’s fast paced. I generally don’t mind the service at Joy Kin Lau, but today I felt they were rushing us a bit too much. (But I can understand as there was a long line of people waiting outside).
What we ordered today + Price (we’ll add to this list every time we visit)
Yam croquette- £3.40 for 3 pieces
Har Gaw Prawn dumpling – £3.80 for 4 pieces
Siu mai Pork & Prawn dumpling- £3.40
hK style Cheung fun Rice Noodle with satay and hoisin sauce £4
Prawn Cheung fun £4 for 3 pieces
Shanghai style dumpling Xiao long bao £3.60 for 3 pieces
Chicken feet £3.40
This was quite a lot for matt and I to eat and didn’t finish everything. The dishes overall were quite good but we couldn’t help but compare the sizes of the dishes.
The yam croquettes were a lot smaller than what we normally get and the Shanghai style dumplings were a LOT bigger than normal. I could normally fit a whole dumpling in my mouth all at once, but this one took me three bites! But I’m not complaining! 🙂
If you have any suggestions on where we should try yum cha (dim sum) please leave it in the comments below OR if you know anywhere that serves it in a cart, please also let us know xx
