Today we head to Hung Cheung, a Chinese restaurant in Marrickville that has been open since 1991. We are going here for a yum cha lunch to celebrate Lunar New Year. Find out what is best to order there and what is on the menu and how to make the most of your visit there.
It is a Tuesday afternoon and Mr NQN are on our way to meet Monica and Marco for yum cha. My phone buzzes.
"We're here. We're the only people here," Monica messages me.
I'm concerned. The restaurants that we normally eat at are usually busy with people.
"Is there yum cha?" I message back, worried.
"Trolley is here, I see it," she says sending me a picture of an unattended trolley. "3 more people walked in - phew!" she adds.
It is 12noon when we arrive and sure enough, it is a bit quiet. During the next hour or so, a few other groups arrive but never fear because they still bring the trolleys around. "At least this means you'll get the dumplings you want," I say to Mr NQN. Part of the reason he doesn't like yum cha is because he always feels like he is fighting for his favourite dumplings and that he may miss out.
There are two trolleys that they wheel over: a trolley with fried food and one with steamed food. We order a range of items from both along with chilli and sweet and sour sauce. We lift what feels like the heaviest tea pot in the world to pour tea. I don't know the individual price of anything because prices during yum cha are a total mystery that is only revealed at the end when you get the bill. All I can tell you that large dim sims are $8.80, specials are $9.80 and top ones are $10.80 and we had 15 dishes with soft drinks and tea for $166.26.
We are starting strong here. One of the firm favourites at the table are the deep fried taro dumplings. This is the first time having these for Marco and he relishes them. They're well seasoned, freshly cooked with a feathery coating on the outside and smooth mashed taro filling on the inside.
The deep fried sticky mochi style dumplings or "footballs" are usually a favourite. They do have a nice, chewy texture but there isn't a lot of filling and what filling there is could be a bit more seasoned.
I usually find the BBQ pork triangles to be a bit too sweet for me but these are not overly sweet and they're moreish too. Because there are four of us, they end up cutting all of the items with 3 pieces into half so that everyone can try it.
The prawn dumplings or har gow are Mr NQN's favourite. These are filled til almost bursting with prawn and ginger and we end up ordering two of these to keep him happy.
Mr NQN and Marco leave the chicken's feet to Monica and I. There are 4 chicken's feet per serve and they're cooked until super soft in a black bean style sauce.
I can take or leave siu mai but when they're good they're very good. These are actually some of my favourite items at lunch today. The filling is a good mixture or pork and prawns and they're freshly steamed.
One of my favourite yum cha items is the sticky rice in lotus leaf but I don't always order it because Mr NQN won't touch them and that's a lot of sticky rice for one person. But now I've got Monica and Marco to share this with. There's a little bit of filling with lup cheung, pork and mushroom and it just needs a smidge more seasoning. However the rice is nice and soft.
We've eaten most of the first round and they bring around some of the same trolleys along with copies of the menu so that you can choose things that aren't necessarily going around. There are around 48 items on the menu so I definitely recommend asking for a copy of the menu because there's a lot more available than what is in the trolleys. Take the cheung fan or rice noodles which come out freshly steamed as you order them from the waitstaff. We opt for the BBQ pork as it is Chinese New Year after all (pork is a lucky food) and these are slippery and tasty with plenty of bbq pork inside them.
I'm not usually a dried bean curd sort of gal but these are really quite good. They're like steamed spring rolls filled with pork and prawns but wrapped in yuba or dried tofu skin. I dunk them in some of that delicious chicken's feet sauce just for an added flavour element.
Sometimes with spinach and garlic chive dumplings you get that delicious strong garlic chives but these are more spinach than garlic chives. Still, they're not bad with a lot of flavour from the prawns but are best dunked in the chilli sauce.
Our last savoury item is the pan fried turnip cake. It comes out as three large squares of turnip cake that are crispy edged from the pan frying.The flavour in these is quite mild with less lup cheung and dried shrimp than usual.
They come around several times to see if we want dessert but often it's while we are still eating but finally we are ready for dessert. I'm pretty particular with mango pancakes as I make them myself and always put a large amount of mango in them. These aren't bad but when we share a mango pancake between each couple Mr NQN hands me half without any mango in it at all. Either there wasn't much mango in it or he ate it all. Who knows, I'm actually betting on a bit from column A and a bit from column B.
They pour evaporated milk over the mango pudding and we dig into the wobbly mango pudding. It's not overly sweet and just right at the end of a meal!
So tell me Dear Reader, do you enjoy yum cha? Will you be celebrating Lunar New Year?
This meal was independently paid for.
Hung Cheung
338 Marrickville Rd, Marrickville NSW 2204
Open 10am-9:30pm 7 days a week
Phone: (02) 9560 4681
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