Yum Cha @ Chinatown - Mothers' Day Special Exclusive Dim Sum

Yum Cha will be launching 3 special dim sums just for Mothers' Day this year and these exclusive dim sum will be available from 1st to 14th May at both Yum Cha Chinatown and Yum Cha Changi outlets.

I was invited for a food tasting session at Yum Cha to try their Mothers' Day exclusive dim sum as well as many of their regular items and I got my friend Sam to join me for the tasting session.  If you haven't decided where to bring your mum for a good meal for Mothers' day, you can consider bringing her and your family to Yum Cha.  =)

I took the MRT to Chinatown and when we stepped out of the station, we saw the beautiful sky with fluffy clouds.

It was a short walk from the train station to Yum Cha restaurant.  There is still the "Chinese New Year" feel around Chinatown area especially with all the hanging red/ yellow lanterns.

Yum Cha restaurant on the left side.

 We went up to the restaurant using this escalator.  There is a lift to go up to the second level as well.

Reached!

The following 3 items are the special Dim Sum introduced to this year's Mothers' Day menu.

Braised Pork with Preserved Vegetable Buns  ($2/ pc)

This is a classic Chinese dish, probably has a long history.  As they are small and easy to carry, these buns were eaten during war time when people were fleeing from the war in China before settling down in different parts of Asia.

Tender pork belly is braised in their secret recipe sauce for hours to create a sweet and succulent taste that is balanced by a soft steamed bun.  Be warned... pork belly is used here so expect to find lots of fats in the bun! I don't mind actually but I thought they didn't put in enough of the preserved vegetables to distinguish them from the normal "Kong Ba" pau.  

Pan-fried Salted Fish Bun  ($5/ 3 pcs)

 This is quite an unique item that I had not tried before elsewhere.  This is a traditional Chinese dish which is originated from Guangdong province.  It is said that these salted fish buns were the favourite of Emperor Kang Xi of the Qing dynasty.  The filling of the bun is made from salted fish paste and minced meat.  If you are worried about the sodium level, the buns were not too salty surprisingly as there was a good balance of the proportion of salted fish paste and meat.

 The third item in the Mothers' day special menu is Almond Tarts.  ($3.20/ 3pcs)

They do look like Hong Kong bird nests' egg tarts with the almost translucent colour on top, isn't it?  They are served in bite-sized portion and are served warm.  Although I am not usually a big fan of almond paste, but I love these almond tarts. 

Other than the above 3 special Mothers' day items, we were also served their normal ala-carte dishes.

Steamed Fish Maw with Shrimp Paste ($4.80/ 3pcs) 

One of my favourite dishes. Succulent prawns wrapped in fish maw.

Prawn and Mango Sesame Fritters ($4.20/ 3 pcs)
Another must-order dish when you are at Yum Cha restaurant.

Scallop Pea-Shoot Dumpling ($4.60/ 3 pcs)
Something new to me but I find that the skin was a bit too thick.

Pumpkin Yam Golden Cake ($4.20/ 3pcs)
I had tried this before and I remember that they used to be quite good.  However, on the day of food-tasting, somehow the top and bottom part were overly fried and ended up very hard.  The middle part with pumpkin and yam was still soft and delicious.

Salted Egg Prawns

Very nice presentation. The prawns were deep-fried to crisp with the shells and I ate the shells as well. We felt that maybe they could add in more salted egg to give them a stronger flavour. For those who will peel off the prawn shells, you may not be able to really taste the salted egg flavour.

Black Pepper Lotus Beef Slice

Love the colours for this dish! Of course, the food was good too. Beef was tender and I also like the fried lotus roots,  I think it will be better if the lotus roots were cut a bit thicker so that we can feel more crunch with every bite.

7 Flavour Tofu
People at my table all didn't really like the seasonings of the tofu sprinkled on top.  I guess most of us love our tofu with sauce/ gravy.

Fried Vermicelli Seafood

The dish was served with generous portion of ingredients such as prawns, scallops and fish slices.

Liu Sha Bao ($4.50/ 3pcs)
Their liu sha bao were nice too.

Thanks Yum Cha for inviting us to the food tasting session.  We had a great feast!

Yum Cha Chinatown
20 Trengganu Street (Off Temple Street)
#02-01 Singapore 058479

Tel:  63721717
Email:  chinatown@yumcha.com.sg

Opening Hours:
Weekdays:  11am to 11pm
Sat, Sun and Public Holiays:  9am to 11pm

Yum Cha on Mothers' Day @ Chinatown

Sis-in-law organized a family meal on Mothers' Day morning.  She suggested going to "Da Dong Fatty Weng Restaurant" but only when she reached there, she realized that the restaurant was closed for renovation.  Thus, while we were still looking for a carpark lot, sis-in-law and her hubby went to look for another restaurant.  They settled at "Yum Cha".  At around 9.30am, the queue wasn't that long and they managed to get a table even before we found a carpark lot.

 We only ordered dim sum as it was still early in the morning, we didn't want to go on heavy stuff.  Moreover, hubby and myself got to rush over to another Mothers' Day lunch almost immediately after this meal.  Did you spot some black dim sum here?  

Closer look.. They were Squid Ink Dumplings.  Tastewise, they didn't taste really very different from the normal siew mai.  The squid ink simply just added a splash of black to these dumplings, making them looked more unique.

 Mother-in-law enjoyed all these chicken's claws by herself.

 I quite liked this one - Lotus Leaf Glutinous Rice.  The rice was fragrant and soft, and blended well with the meat within.  Do give this a try if you have a chance to dine here.

As the restaurant was very crowded, it was quite difficult to get the push-trolleys' aunties attention.  Some of them were being "hijacked" at certain tables and I didn't manage to get my order of the sesame mango fritters.  Argh...  

Overall, the dim sum were quite ok, but probably due to the crowd, service was rather slow  However, I won't blame them as I could see that they were trying their best to serve us our orders.  At least, they refilled our tea frequently.  After we left the restaurant around 11am, there was a horrendous long queue at the entrance.  We counted ourselves lucky that we didn't need to queue by arriving early in the morning.

Do you like to dine out on Mothers' Day?  For me, if I have a choice, I would gladly choose any other normal day to give my mum a treat.

Yum Cha
20 Trengganu Street, #02-01, Chinatown,
Singapore 058479
Phone: 6372 1717
Website: http://www.yumcha.com.sg/