Wah’s Up! Dim Sum Good Eats!

I remember my mother taking us to a Vietnamese Buffet in Houston. It’s called Kim Son on Belleaire Blvd. When a small Vietnamese woman tells you about an Asian restaurant, you know it has to be good and a good deal. When it’s your mother, know you’re going to pay for her meal too. It was like being in another country. There was very little English spoken and the smell of the food made you want to eat nearly everything on the buffet. For another food lesson before I go into my Cleveland Dim Sum fix, if there are more Asians than any other race in the place, you eat there. Remember what I’ve said about the Midwestern palate? It’s a bit on the bland side and they love potatoes. This place was no where near bland. You can always smell a proper Asian restaurant the moment you walk in.

Li Wah, near Downtown Cleveland, takes me back to that great meal with my mother. If she ever decides to travel again and come to us, this is a must-go kind of place. She will be so proud of me for finding it and she might even let me pay for her meal. The wife and I went to Li Wah for their lunchtime Dim Sum. For years, I’ve heard stories about how great the place is and finally found an opportunity to try it. I was also told how busy it can be for dinner on the weekends when it can be hit or miss with the service. The food is always excellent, but when you get a half-a-million Asians in one place for good Dim Sum, there are bound to be frayed nerves on the part of the wait staff. We went at lunch and were actually the first customers to be seated. It started to fill up quickly, so we were glad we got there the moment they opened.

For those that don’t know, Dim Sum is served as small dishes, almost like appetizers, but better. In Latino cultures they might call them Tapas. At Li Wah, a small Asian woman will roll up to your table with a cart and start lifting lids or opening pots to show her wares. Typically, you pay per plate. The first thing that caught our eyes were the Shumai, little bite-sized dumplings with meat in the middle. They are so good. I then noticed the Chicken Feet. You read that right, steamed Chicken Feet. I’ve had them as a child and I’ve had one too many to be honest. They don’t taste bad, they are just not very meaty and taste like whatever you steam them with, like a chicken broth. Some places call them “Chicken Paws”. I think that is wrong. No one wants to eat paws. Feet maybe, but not paws. We also got an order of Bao. These are white round steamed dumplings with pork in the middle. The Vietnamese call them Bun Bao, filled with pork, an egg, and maybe a piece of Chinese sausage if you aren’t lazy when you make them. Did I use the words, “they are so good” already? Well, they are. We also tried the Black Pepper Spareribs.

As more customers came in, another cart came around with the fried Dim Sum. We Americans love our fried foods and sugar, and the rest of the world knows it. We will fry damn near everything. I’ve had a Fried Snickers at a State Fair once. Don’t judge me, Mr. Judgey McJuggerson. This cart included the fried egg rolls many of us are used to. Most restaurants have cabbage in their eggrolls. I make eggrolls with no cabbage and lots of pork. We also got some Potstickers to round out the meal. It came out to seven items and two full bellies.

In case you aren’t sure what to get when the carts come around, there is a Dim Sum menu at each table, so the nice lady can point at the picture and you can read, in English, what you’re about to get. Unless you grew up with someone in the house with an accent, my bet is you won’t understand a word she says. If you don’t want to get Dim Sum, you can order the entrees. There’s duck and Szechuan this and Mongolian that, and rice for everybody. We didn’t get rice with our Dim Sum as we didn’t need it.

In the end, it costs us less than $50 and we got to try a number of dishes. For the wife, it was the best Chinese food she has had in a very long time. Actually, I may write a blog about Chef Hung’s in San Francisco, which was the absolute best Chinese food either of us have ever eaten. As for Li Wah, it is the best Chinese food in Cleveland. It’s a go-to place if you want good food in the Midwest. As the title says, Dim Sum good eats.