Mei Dim ★ 4.5
Manchester Chinatown basement dim sum room, kitchen open until 22:00 weekdays. Har gow, siu mai, char siu pork and chiu chow dumplings late into the evening.
Try: Dim sum
History
Manchester's Chinatown, the largest in northern England and second-largest in Europe, grew around Faulkner Street from the 1970s. Cantonese rooms shaped the steamer-cart dim sum tradition through the 1980s and 1990s; Mei Dim and other Faulkner Street basements still serve the rolling trolleys today. Manchester families gather in Chinatown for weekend yum cha through the year.
Common allergens: Gluten, Soy, Shellfish
Make it at home
Ingredients
- For the wrappers: 200g wheat starch
- 50g tapioca starch
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 250ml just-boiled water
- 2 tablespoons lard or vegetable shortening
- For the filling: 400g raw peeled prawns roughly chopped
- 100g pork back fat finely diced (or use Chinese smoked bacon)
- 100g bamboo shoots finely diced
- 1 spring onion finely sliced
- 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon sugar, 1 teaspoon Shaoxing wine, 1 teaspoon sesame oil, 1 tablespoon cornflour, white pepper
- Sunflower oil for the steamer base
- Black vinegar and ginger threads to dip
Method
- For the filling: combine the prawns, pork fat, bamboo shoots, spring onion, salt, sugar, Shaoxing, sesame oil, cornflour and white pepper. Mix vigorously for 2 minutes until tacky. Refrigerate 30 minutes.
- For the wrappers: combine wheat starch, tapioca starch and salt in a heatproof bowl. Pour the boiling water in all at once, stirring with chopsticks to form a shaggy dough.
- While still warm, add the lard and knead 5 minutes to a smooth, slightly translucent dough.
- Cover with a damp cloth (it dries out very quickly).
- Roll the dough into a 3cm thick log. Cut 10g pieces. Press each between two sheets of cling film with an oiled flat-bottomed cleaver into a thin 7cm round.
- Place a teaspoon of filling in the centre. Pleat one side of the wrapper 7 to 9 times to seal into a half-moon shape.
- Line a bamboo steamer with oiled parchment punched with holes. Place the dumplings 2cm apart.
- Steam over a hard boil for 5 minutes only; the wrappers turn translucent and the prawns just cook through.
- Lift the steamer to the table and serve immediately with black vinegar and ginger threads.
Tip from the editors. Wheat starch (not wheat flour) gives har gow their translucent skin; any Chinese grocer stocks it. The dough dries fast, keep it covered constantly.
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