The best Bay Area dumplings to eat right now

The Dumpling Report began in 2022 spotlighting a residential neighborhood’s mom-and-pop dim sum takeout spot. It was an intentional choice to begin the column with a non-flashy, everyday eatery that locals frequent at an affordable price, and show how the owners of places like these both maintain and create the culture of the Bay Area. 

That said, 2023 took on a broader tone, where I rubbed elbows with Michelin-starred or world-famous chefs, and discovered dumplings in Italian restaurants. While the year before was full of shrimp-filled har gow, 2023 unintentionally turned out to be The Dumpling Report’s year of xiao long bao (or XLB), plus its juicy cousin, sheng jian bao. In the end, they were all delicious, and I’m lucky to be spoiled in this town. Another bonus: The Dumpling Report recently won a San Francisco Press Club Award for Series or Continuing Coverage, in the company of many other SFGATE winners. Read on for a scrumptious, dough-wrapped year-in-review.

After a few months’ hiatus earlier in the year, The Dumping Report returned in July with a power dumpling pairing — dumpling emoji artist Yiying Lu took me to the venerable Chef Chu’s in Los Altos. Chef-owner Lawrence Chu has been serving expertly prepared Cantonese food to both locals and celebrities for 53 years. As if endorsements by Justin Bieber and Serena Williams weren’t enough, Chef Chu’s star power also includes one of his sons, director Jon M. Chu of “Crazy Rich Asians” fame.

While the entire menu is expertly prepared, Chef Chu’s potstickers are iconic. The proportions of meat to dough and crunch to chew are textbook perfect — even when cold. Special mention also goes to the sweet, tangy sugar plum tomatoes in the Four Seasons Cold Plate, which Chef Chu says are merely Trader Joe’s tomatoes. Marinated in red wine, vinegar, sugar and dried plum powder, each bite is a little pop of juicy surprise.

Later in the summer, Chinese American food historian, documentary producer, and AI literature proponent Jennifer 8. Lee took me to her go-to SF dumpling spot — Hayes Valley’s bustling Dumpling Home. Achieving a rare feat — opening during the pandemic to roaring success and being named a Michelin Bib Gourmand restaurant — owner Jimmy Shen also opened sister eatery Dumpling Story on Fillmore Street this June. The secret to his restaurant’s food is that it’s “80% Chinese and 20% American,” leaving him free to tinker with recipes to his liking.

The signature sheng jian bao (SJB) are called “pan-fried juicy pork bao” on the menu, and one must be careful biting through the crispy and chewy, mochi-like dough — lest hot meat juice shoot across the table, which is a common occurrence. One also can’t overlook the large xiao long bao (XLB) of all varieties, including crab, original pork, and “numb and spicy pork” versions, which offer silky dough and viscous meat “soup” upon first bite. Also try unusual offerings like the crunchy stir-fried okra with garlic sauce. 

Hailing from the Bergamo region of Italy, chef-owner Donato Scotti, having worked at Michelin-starred restaurants, declared on Instagram that the Bergamaschi signature agnolotti del plin are “religiously prepared every morning” in the restaurant. The little purses of thin egg pasta are stuffed with Donato’s own combo of veal, ground pork and pork sausage, and served in a rich jus-like sauce made from all three meats’ roasting juices (there’s also another Donato version with tomato-and-onion sauce).

Another Bergamo specialty is the scarpinocc, a bigger, shoe-shaped egg pasta stuffed generously with wilted greens and nutty taleggio cheese, then coated in a traditional brown butter-sage sauce. Look out for the pasta specials, too, which occasionally include fun takes on classic dishes, like an inverted tortellini dish featuring garlicky, chunky amatriciana tomato sauce on the inside of the pasta and a whipped pecorino cheese sauce on the outside.

Michelin-starred chef Ho Chee Boon, known for Cantonese fine-dining establishments like Empress by Boon and the international Hakkasan restaurant chain, soft-opened Blue Whale in September in a huge Pac Heights space with a classy retro nautical theme — and at a more affordable price point than fine dining. Early fans of Empress by Boon can now find the velvety, novel Ibérico ham XLB on the Blue Whale menu in a delicate serving of three bite-sized dumplings. While the crispy pumpkin puffs filled with black pepper sauce roasted duck didn’t quite have the carnivorous oomph I expected, their appearance as baby pumpkins with cheerful orange shells topped with bright green pea shoots made me smile, and would brighten anyone’s day. Aside from innovative dumplings, don’t miss the Malaysian rojak salad — a refreshing, classic Southeast Asian fruit medley that is a rare find in the U.S. Also consider the moist red snapper served on a banana leaf plucked from the patio tree, the flavorful seasonal mushroom noodles, and vibrant cocktail list.

This was a surprise tasting experience at the newly rebranded Chinatown restaurant Fusion Dumpling (formerly Pot and Noodle), by veteran restaurant owners Jiayi “Jenny” Wu and Truman Du. Lured in by the promise of special formulations of Shanghai dumplings like XLB and SJB, the tasting ended up with me sitting next to famed chef Martin Yan for the second season of his KTSF-TV show “Wok Around the Bay.”

Aside from my starry-eyed experience with a pioneering chef I grew up watching on KQED, the dumplings did deliver on their promise. Fusion’s XLB weigh 40 grams before steaming — nearly double the weight of the popular Din Tai Fung’s 21-gram XLBs. The hefty dumplings are held inside an impressively strong dough rolled out nearly paper-thin that is still elastic and chewy. The original pork version has a freshness from the high-quality ingredients, and the crab XLB is a nod to Fusion’s location in San Francisco, where local Dungeness crab is king. Fusion also roasts Peking duck in-house specifically for its meaty, luxurious Peking duck potstickers — something not found in many other restaurants.