小籠包 Xiao Long Bao

I came here a few times now for lunch. The place is super fancy for an XLB house, but the food remains decent so the décor is really an added bonus. The first time I came, they handled our large party poorly, bringing duplicates of plates and forgetting others. It was a weekend and they were crowded, but it left a sour taste in my mouth. When I came back again, we were a much smaller group on a weekday and the service was much better.
The XLB here are decent, juicy and flavourful but the skin is a bit thicker than I would like. I also ordered the chicken noodle soup which is perfect if you’re just gathering a cold — it’s so homey and the broth is fabulous. We ordered a plate of bok choy and fish in an insane chili sauce (so spicy!) and both plates were great.
I wouldn’t mind giving it one more try to see how the consistency plays out, but if you’re looking for an XLB place and you’re too far from The Dumpling King, this is a good alternative.

This have a spacious decoration and comfortable seating. Came here on friday night and immediately got a seat. The several times i have been here, their xiao long baos are quite good and juicy, it is a must have every time. However i have tried their spicy beef noodle and their sweet rice roll they are nothing special. I feel like the quality of their other dishes is just on par with some of the food courts out there. However I do like the fact that they have excellent service and accept credit card unlike most chinese places. Overall I would only come here for the xiao long baos and go elsewhere for an actual meal.

The restaurant is very clean and has a great interior. We ordered some cold noodles, the xiao long bao (with crab meat), sticky rice roll with dried pork, onion pancakes, dumplings in spicy sauce, and red bean pancake dessert.
I liked the overall quality of the dishes. Especially, the xiao long bao had the hot rich soup inside that kept me going for more. The bill was a bit expensive, but I’d say it was worth it. I would like to come back and try other dishes.

Xiaolongbao is very clean for a Chinese restaurant! Very impressed. The food is pretty good too, their xiaolongbao is OK but their choice dumplings are great. Spacious, clean, comfortable, even their washrooms are quite clean, I went on a weekday though around 2 pm so there weren’t many people there.

Good Shanghai food, underrated, will come again. Not a lot of people, good tones. The main xiaolongbao dish is on par with the bigger names out there.

Awesome chinease foods！Best tastes of sticky rice dumpling（糯肉烧卖）and juicy pork dumping（小笼包）
Service is not good，price is a little bit high.

Yeey, this place is good. Actually it’s a copy of Din Tai Fung. The food is almost as good as in Din Tai Fung but not exactly the same. From my experience, I noticed that XLB dumplings are very thin and fragile, they broke so fast. Vegetarian dumplings were good and delicious. I like that this place is bigger, not so crowded, and it is much easier to find a table; no need to wait for 30 min or more on Friday night.
I highly recommend their dumplings and veggie dishes, except the ones with garlic — it was way too much garlic. And most desserts are very oily. Last time we tried Soufflé Balls and Red Bean pancake, and we couldn’t even eat half. Soufflé balls were just fried bread that smelled like fish with tiny amount of sesame paste inside, and Red Bean Pancake was too oily and sweet. Not my cup of tea.

Never knew about this restaurant, thanks to Unilocalers, came on a weekday.
The service was quite attentive, someone was always walking back and forth, waiters with their heads up seeing if anybody is waving for their attention, dishes cleared off quickly after they were done.
The renovation of this place is nice and spacious, very comfortable seating.
The menu is in English and Chinese with pictures.
Nice touch is everybody gets their own dish of ginger to mix with vinegar. Don’t need to share with others.
We ordered the 6 piece siu long bao, very juicy and filled with soup. Didn’t realize they had the mini ones, otherwise I don’t mind trying those ones!
We got the fried silver bun with condensed milk (3.50). Really yummy, fresh bun, but the condensed milk was watered down, so when dipping the bun, the condensed milk dripped everywhere.
We got the savoury soya milk bowl. This one was really good (2.95). Had some slices of dough fritters, pork floss. Went down really smoothly, and the bowl is pretty big, enough to share for sure!
Onion pancake, this was the most disappointing dish. Not sure what made it taste mediocre, it wasn’t too crispy, soggy inside maybe because of the amount of onions in between it was kinda soggy.
Lastly we got braised beef (soya marinated) rice with veggies. Comes with a soya egg and a bowl of corn soup.
The soup wasn’t that good, but the rice had a lot of flavour and when mixed together, it was tasty, not too salty.
The prices are very reasonable, and the quality of the food is pretty good.

I love Everything about this place.
It’s a fairly large restaurant and it’s nice and bright, which you don’t get often for a Chinese restaurant. The food is amazing! It tastes like authentic Chinese food I ate in Shanghai.
If you go, go for the mini xiaolongbao!

Ordered:
5 types of xiao long baos;
Stewed pork belly;
Braised tofu;
Gelatinous tendon;
Fried tentacles;
Steamed chicken;
Sweet & sour pork ribs;
Onion/​chives fried bread;
Dan Dan mien (peanuty-​version)
Ambiance/​washroom: clean — modern.
Prices– reasonable.
Taste– very good.
Tip: Their Dan-​Dan noodles don’t have meat; other Shanghai restos have a better rendition.
When tipping, ALWAYS base your tip on the SUBTOTAL not on the total (tax included). I always use «Other» rather than the pre-​programmed percentages.

Expensive. Low value for money IMO.
Xiao Long Bao and dumplings were tasty enough but you can get much better value for dumplings at «Dumpling Restaurant» at Sheppard and Brimley, «Mother Dumplings» /​«Dumpling House Restaurant» in old Chinatown on Spadina.
Shanghai fat noodles were stir-​fried nicely but the portion size was embarrassing. The noodles portion were about ¹⁄₃^rd what any other congee /​noodle house would serve you.
Beef rolls were dry and lacking flavour.
We came for lunch and paid $ 52 including tip for a Shanghai noodle, xiao long Bao, steamed dumplings, potsticker dumplings, beef rolls and a beef soup. $ 13 per person that worked out to a small bowl of noodles, 4 dumplings, a beef roll, and half a bowl of soup. We left hungry.
You need to pay $ 20+ per person to get your fill. but for northern Chinese style food? Nah bro, that’s too much.
If you want to help Xiao Long Bao pay for their high rent charges and renovations, by all means… But we will not be back.

I’ve been there 5 – 6 times with my family, and have tried most of their dishes. Spacious and nice décor. Most of the dim sum are fresh and delicious. Noodles and rice cake dishes are nice with generous portions too.
Set meals/​rice are okay, some of which, such as braised pork belly meals (卤肉饭), don’t have that particular Taiwanese taste (considering it’s one of signature dishes of Taiwan)
Stirring fried dishes are 1/3−½ more expensive but with relatively smaller portion and quality. So I don’t really recommend it. I used to order Sweet & sour prawn and pork chops with sweet & sour sauce together since the Chinese names look different. (甜酸虾&糖醋排骨）they actually use the same Cantonese style sweet & sour sauces and veg mix, they are jokes for Chinese customers but the western customers might dig it ;)
Don’t order Black pepper beef, just not worth the price ($ 15.99).

I’ll put this one as 3.5.
This restaurant is huge. So spacious, clean and modern. It’s a completely different feel from the Ding Tai Fung at First Markham Place but I liked it a lot.
We stuck to the traditional items such as the Xiao Long Bao, Panfried Pork Dumplings, Green Onion Pancake, Panfried Pork Bun but added an order of Shrimp & Pork SiuMai to spice things up.
Xiao Long Bao ($ 5.99 for 6) is fantastic here! The dumplings were filled with the right amount of soup and came out at the perfect temperature to eat right away without burning my tongue. They were soft, tasty and perfectly-​sized.
Panfried Pork Dumplings ($ 5.99 for 6) were also enjoyable. They were panfried just enough and the filling was wonderfully in proportion to the wrap.
Green Onion Pancake ($ 3.75) was just OK. Maybe it was personal preference since my boyfrend liked it but I thought it was very plain and had too little green onions. Although crispy, I like the ones at Chinese Dumpling House more. These are also slightly more expensive than average.
Panfried Pork Bun ($ 5.99 for 5) was a total miss. There was barely any filing and pretty much 90% dough. It’s such a staple item but they don’t make it well here. I’d skip this one for sure and now that I think about it, this was probably what affected my rating for this place the most.
Shrimp & Pork SiuMai ($ 6.99 for 6) was quite big in size and had a shrimp on top. This one also has a soup filling and the opening at the top makes it nice and easy to drink the soup. These tasted and looked great!
I didn’t have any problems with the service — helpful and attentive.
Solid place overall but there are some major misses on the menu. I would return for more of their XLBs and to try their noodles.

The restaurant is very clean and quite large. I came here because I wanted my first taste of the famed Xiao Long Bao (soup filled dumplings) and where better to try it then a place named after the very food! I totally get the appeal. Juicy and savory. The xiao long bao here are very good and very satisfying, much more than your average steamed dumpling.
We also had the shanghai style pan fried pork buns which are also really yummy, albeit a bit oily.
Pan fried pork and chive pockets. These are delicious but oily.
Spicy & Sour Soup — The small is perfect for two people who are very hungry. Nothing particularly special.
Everything was seasoned perfectly. Service was a bit brisk and cold but at least food was brought in a timely fashion and the staff was easy enough to wave down.
Overall I really like this place and would come here again, maybe frequently. Definitely want to invite people out to this restaurant.

Service was very good. Place is pretty new open and clean. Dumpling had good flavour The noodle was disappointing. They seemed old and not fully cooked «Tan tan mian» traditionally is a spivey noodle soup with ground meat/​pork some scallions and group peanuts or peanut paste. This one was not spicy and no ground meat so it was a warm peanut soup with poor noodles.
I guess you can tell which part of the meal I didn’t like.
Setting aside quality the prices also seemed a bit higher than average.
A lot of other people seemed happy so for now I will assume it was bad luck.

Very modern and clean look with an open concept design. Tons of seating and tables spaced apart very well. Ordering is really simple; you just check off what you want on the paper menu they provide. The paper menu was all in Chinese but they do have an actual menu as well with English. We ordered a variety of things to try and all were very good. Everything is made fresh to order.
Steamed pork soup dumplings, aka (xiao long bao) $ 5.99 for six dumplings. Very soupy inside and these are probably the best pork soup dumplings around.
Fried pork dumplings $ 5.99 — these come in five dumplings but are much larger. Inside is still soupy but not as much as the xiao long bao. Tasted great but next time I would skip these and just get another order of xiao long bao since I like those better.
Minced beef pie $ 5.99 — these come in three pieces and are pan fried. The beef inside is not soupy but very juicy.
Soup noodle with spicy and peanut sauce $ 6.99 — the noodles were cooked a bit on the softer side and the soup was not spicy at all. It just tasted like peanut sauce to me. Still tasted good but I would rather have the ones at 369 Shanghai.
Steam black sesame paste buns $ 5.99 — these come in six pieces. Inside is sweet black sesame paste and the outside is wrapped in the same casing as the pork soup dumplings. A very good dessert. I could have eaten all six myself :)
Soufflé ball stuffed with black sesame paste $ 7.49 — these come in four pieces. Its basically sweet black sesame paste on the inside with an egg white batter on the outside which is deep fried. The egg white is fluffy, airy and light. It is also topped with powdered sugar. It looked appealing when I saw the picture online but I didn’t really enjoy it as much.
The place was super busy but service never really faltered.

Just outstanding. That’s all I have to say. I don’t mean the food but the whole dining experience is possibly the most comfortable of all the Chinese places I’ve dined in. I’m not talking about how fancy the food is or the décor, presentation… etc.
Xiao long bao delivers in consistency. Their food is nothing fancy but all done with care and tasty. I’ve now been here more times than I can count and every time is with my daughter (2.5 yrs old) who enjoys playing with the dumpling dough the staff generously provides upon seeing her little nose pressed up against the kitchen glass.
They have a handicap/​family washroom with a change table which makes my life a whole lot easier when we’re out for a long family dinners.
I will continue to patronize Xiao long bao for their «right on» kind of comfortable dining approach.

3.5÷5, +.5 for service
I’m willing to actually say Ding Tai Fung’s sister branch is better than Ding Tai Fung themselves.
Xiao Long Bao opened a year or so back, and is a completely open-​concept/​modernized Ding Tai Fung. The restaurant is also much bigger, so waiting time during peak hours isn’t as bad as DTF, where if you don’t reserve during peak hours you’re likely waiting north of an hour.
I arrived on a Sunday night at 8pm, and the place was ¾ full, which was about what I expected. The menu is the exact same as Ding Tai Fung, so if you’re used to the menu over there it shouldn’t take long to determine what you want to order. I had the chicken marinated with wine, steamed soup dumplings with dried scallop, shrimp, and chinese okra (new thing on the menu), steamed soup dumplings with pork, steamed silver roll, minced beef pie, and the sesame paste soufflé balls.
I highly recommend you try the new okra soup dumplings, as I believe that one is much better than the regular pork soup dumplings, as you can really feel the dried scallop taste. The chicken marinated with wine is an excellent dish to start as it’s served cold and you get that nice alcohol taste. The steamed silver roll (steamed, not deep fried!) is an excellent alternative to white rice, and I definitely suggest ordering the rolls over bowls of white rice. The minced beef pie was extremely juicy, so if you’re not a soup dumplings fan but want something juicy, go with the beef pie. The soufflé balls, unfortunately, were the worst part of our order, as the sesame paste wasn’t runny at all after it cools down; A La Kitchen unfortunately does a better job here.
Service was excellent, much better than Ding Tai Fung I find. Personally I’d save Ding Tai Fung for the tourists who may not know about its sister branch, cause I definitely found this place to be more enjoyable.

The xiao long Bao here are the best in town. The soup inside the dumping are tasty. The dumping skin itself also very good, not too thin not too thick can hold the soup inside. The mice beef pie which also a surprise, you need to try that out. The braised beef noodle in soup are also very good. The noodle are fresh and bouncy n the beef was very tender.
However the pan fired pork bun was very bad. It had no filling or should say very tiny little stuff in there that can’t really taste what was it.
also the pan fired pork dumping also disappointed. The pork inside the dumping was tasteless.
Overall the restaurant looks clean n organized. Even though some food are out standing and some are not even restaurant quality, will still come back for their «xiao long Bao».

Came to this place with a recommendation from a friend to try a new place.
Place is very new and looks big and clean. Love the atmosphere.
Menu seems identical to 369 Shanghai Dumpling at Kennedy & 7 but the food doesn’t taste the same. I would say the dumplings here are average, definitely not the best I’ve had.
We came on a not so busy time with about 5 tables, but we still had to flag down a waitress because they were busy doing other things…
Probably won’t be going the extra mile to visit here again, there are similar and better places in Markham.

We came to this restaurant a couple of times. They have some comfortable seat and they have enough spacing between tables to tables.
Tonight, I think their food weren’t that consistence. We ordered this noodle soup for the second time. The first time we had, their noodle did it just right but this time it was a bit soft but still taste good.
Today, I think their food were quite salty, and hope next time I try will be better.

Asian Legend had been our go to for years. When my in laws told my husband and me there was a new xiao long bao restaurants they wanted to take us, we were skeptical.
We stuck to ordering all the traditional items we normally would share in Asian Legend. Pork, crabmeat soup dumplings, beef pastry rolls, chive dumplings, string beans, crabmeat in egg white — everything was as tasty as I remembered but much milder in flavor compared to Asian Legend’s. Not that we are writing off Asian Legend but family and I personally enjoyed the milder, cleaner taste.
We completed our meal with their sweet black sesame and red bean xiao long baos like the ones my husband and I had in Tin Tai Fong in Taiwan! Light on the dough/​skin (much better than tong yuan) — loaded with sesame and red bean paste — they were simply the perfect, bite sized treats!
Our new go to for Shanghainese cuisine? Can’t say for certain yet, will definitely return to sample the rest of the menu!

The first impression I have on Xiao Long Bao is the décor is really pretty. The restaurant looks more like servicing contemporary, fusion cuisine than traditional Chinese food. Yet the food is most definitely traditional.
We ordered Xiao Long Bao, Sticky Rice Siu Mai, Fish with Wood Ear, Bean Sprouts, Beef Tendon Noodle and Red Bean Sugar Donuts. I really like the Xiao Long Bao because they had a generous amount of soup. The skin was thin but it didn’t break. The Sticky Rick Siu Mai was my second favourite because sweet and savory coexisted in the siu mei. The texture was chewy. Fish with Wood Ear was standard. The fish was average fresh. The Beef Tendon Noodle was forgettable and hardly had any beef tendon in it. The Red Bean Sugar Donuts (Balls?) were not fluffy enough. Their presentation was very appetizing, though.
I kept comparing the food here against Asian Legend’s. The xiao long bao here is better than Asian Legend’s. The fish dish, the beef noodle and the sugar dobuts are not as good as Asian Legend’s. I have not eaten siu meis at Asian Legend yet, so I cannot compare.
The overall impression is the décor is nice. The price is comparable to other higher end Northern Chinese food restaurants. We paid $ 75+ all in for a dinner for 5 people. The services is proficient. Other than xiao long bao, the food is average. Overall, 3.5 stars.

This is a great place to go to for shanghai style dim sum. All the food is made to order (including the steamed dumplings) which means it takes a little bit longer to get your order.
Prices are reasonable (we spent $ 40 for 4 people). The food is not overly oily like I find at other northern chinese places. Menu ranges from dumplings to fried pancakes to noodles and rice to meat and veggies dishes. There’s something for everyone.

This restaurant is a sister restaurant to the famous Ding Tai Fung at First Markham Place. In comparison, I prefer Xiao Long Bao because it is more spacious and the impression is that it is cleaner.
Food wise, I would recommend the classic xiao long bao itself. The food is definitely comparable to Ding Tai Fung. Xia long bao portion is decent and all has soup inside the bun. Next thing I would recommend is Beef Noodle Soup (BNS). BNS noodle is thick and texture is firm. I personally prefer thicker and firm noodles because it has fewer chance of being soggy.
Last dish I would recommend is «Long Chao Shou», which is spicy dry wonton. The specialty of this food is that it has the spicy touch to the wonton that we normally eat. Definitely worth a try.

I Kung Fu Panda these babies so. Dang. Hard.
No, no, I’m not going around punching children.
I’m talking of course about the soft and pillowy, soup-​filled namesake dumplings. Available in regular pork or crab tomalley/​meat filled variety, the xiao long bao are delicately encased in a semi-​sheer wrapping with the delicious hot broth swirling inside. The proper way to enjoy one is to place one on your spoon, take a small bite from the top to allow the mouth-​burning steam to escape, dribble the tiniest bit of ginger & red vinegar inside, then eat it whole to allow the fillings and broth to flood your tongue at once. Alternately, I’ve also heard the best way is to actually sip a bit of vinegar from your spoon as a palate cleanser, then dip the dumpling into the vinegar, place a sliver or two of ginger on top, then place the whole dumpling in your mouth and allow for maximum pork fat broth goodness.
Really though, I think any method of dumpling eating is fine. As long as you don’t pierce the skin and release the soup by accident. That’s dumpling murder, and will bring shame to your family. For shaaaaaame!
The rest of the dishes are OK. I like the beef tendon noodle, spicy-​peanutty soup Dan Dan noodle, crispy and mildly spicy pork ear cartilage too, but the real draw is the xiao long bao.
Man, I love dumplings.
And pandas.
The restaurant is much larger and more modern than their sister restaurant, Ding Tai Fung at First Markham Place, and does allow payment via credit card. The acoustics of the room are terrible though, and even at half capacity it will be as loud as a busy dim sum morning. Get reservations for prime lunch and weekend evenings or risk standing to wait for seats.

I’m always scouting for XLB shops wherever I go – this is a new one that sprouted up since my last visit to T.O. It’s the sister restaurant to the Ding Tai Fung restaurant in First Markham Place (which is not to be confused with the Taiwanese institution Din Tai Fung — the mother of all XLBs).
Verdict — not too shabby. In fact, I like it better than their First Markham Place sibling. They offer both the regular-​sized XLBs and the mini ones. My kids love the latter, but I still prefer the standard size ones as the smaller ones don’t seem to be as juicy or meaty. Also tried their green onion pancakes, wonton soup, red bean bun, stir fried bokchoy and siu mai (yum!).
Service also is a little better here, as with the location and ambiance. Lots of parking, although it still gets packed. Come early as its a popular restaurant!