In search of ...

Vegetarian dim sum recipes

I've adopted a pescatarian diet for mostly health reasons. So, yes, I'm missing out on great meaty dishes! So, I'm trying to recreate some favorites using vegetarian ingredients. I'll be crawling around the web and experimenting in my kitchen to come up with some good recipes.

Here are some recipes that I've found to experiment with:

Veggie-Vegan Char Siu Bao (roast pork buns)

• Vegan char siu bao using seitan from recipezaar
• Vegan char siu bao using tofu from Veggiebun's blog (probably desirable to replace the tomato sauce with hoisin sauce)
• Char siu bao using the "Hong Kong style braised vegetarian char siew" recipe (from Living Vegan's blog)
  

Other bao alternatives:

• Bao with tea eggs (chinese marinated egg)- basic steam bun recipe + tea egg recipe

And for baked buns, here's one to try from Visual Recipes (substituting pork with one of the above veggie-vegan fillings)

In search of ...

"Hole in the walls"

Hole in the walls are grungy places that barely pass DOH inspections but provide the most delicious and most wallet-friendly meals.

The old Mei Lai Wah was inarguably the best hole in the wall. It had the best char siu baos (pork buns) and cheong funs (beef/shrimp noodles). The word got around somehow. Non-chinese/cantonese speaking die-hards and adventurers (myself included, sort of) would frequent. On many occasions, customers would buy char siu baos by the dozens to go. However, it didn't take a genius to realize that the tattered condition of this treasure trove would lend itself to DOH shut-down, amongst other reasons according to foodie blogs.

Soon afterwards, a new Mei Li Wah emerged. To my disappointment, I've step foot once only to leave without a nai cha (milk tea) because it was overcrowded and to realize that the old 1950s coffee house ambiance had been replaced by a more [still looking for the right adjective] atmosphere surrounded by brilliant colors.

The next best place is perhaps the nearby Chatham Square Restaurant‎ at 9 Chatham Square (which is the old-school place with a red awning, not to be confused with the restaurant next door at 6 Chatham Square which has the same name). Agreed or disagreed?