The other day, Harold and I got talking about how great dim sum is, and when I sighed about how we just couldn’t squeeze Chinatown into our last New York trip, we turned to the internet to find North Carolina dim sum. And the Snavelys were totally up for an impromptu food adventure. Most of my foodie friends are eating at Do or Dine in Bed-Stuy, and it was great to be able to call up Chapel Hill friends and see if they felt like driving a few towns over to try a dim sum place I read about on the internet.
Dim Sum House, in Morrisville, has an underwhelming location in a stripmall near the airport, but while it’s typically North Carolina on the outside, the inside is definitely Chinese.
Waitresses bring carts of plates and steam baskets so diners can choose whatever appeals to them. There’s also an extensive picture menu that we barely even noticed because so many tasty things were passing by. Staff was pretty great about introducing the dishes, too, which is not always the case at dim sum.
It’s more Cantonese dim sum, which is delicious, although not quite the Shandong flavors I sometimes miss. I kept looking for xiao long bao, which led me to 3 or 4 other dumplings that were delicious but not exactly xiao long bao. (Dumplings are the best kind of failure!) Really nice sesame balls too, and lots of good things.
We just kept ordering food from the carts, figuring dim sum is a rare treat, and also wanting to try all the tastes. When the bill came, I was stunned that four people ate their fill, plus we left a massive tip (all four of us are current or former waitstaff), and it was still really inexpensive.
The only downside was that it was quite busy in the early Sunday afternoon, and so we weren’t able to linger because there was a shortage of tables. Maybe next time we’ll have more time for tea and chatting with friends.
