However; when we heard that the owner of Water Library opened a Dim-Sum restaurant; we decided to try it with a few friends. The name of the Chinese restaurant is Hong Bao.
Hong Bao is alllll the wayyyyy out in Srinakarin Road. If you live on Sukhumvit like me; Srinakarin Road is very farrrrrrrr. There is a new community mall called Thanya Shopping Mall and in there, Hong Bao is located in it. Its crazy how far we will travel to try something new.
Our friends were very wise to reserve a table. When we arrived; Hong Bao was packed with families and there was a queue of hungry people.
The restaurant looks like any other Chinese restaurant in town...lots of Red colour, lots of large round tables with white table clothes and lots of bamboo baskets on the tables. What was nice were the large ceiling to floor windows allowing natural light to shine in.
The chef is a famous Chinese chef that Water Library brought in from Macau and they also brought in his highly experienced team from Canton. So we were very eager to try the food.
Since my friends and I normally over do it when it comes to ordering for dim-sum; I will not go into detail of each dish. I will summarize at the end.
The amuse bouch were pickled daikon and cucumbers.
The first dish was Rice flour roll stuffed with crispy shrimp.
The next dish was Sxxx dumplings.
The next dish was Steamed Chinese broccoli.
The next dish was Pork dumplings.
The next dish was Rice flour roll stuffed with red pork.
The next dish was Shrimp dumplings.
The next dish was Sauteed tripe.
The next dish was Spicy eggplant.
The next dish was Deep fried roll stuffed with duck.
The next dish was Chive dumplings.
The next dish was Shrimp open dumplings.
The next dish was Pan fried turnip cakes with ham.
The next dish was Rice flour roll stuffed with sauteed shrimps.
The final dish was Thick chinese rice noodles with seafood & gravy.
The first dessert was Steamed buns stuffed with sweet carrot.
The next dessert was Steamed buns stuffed with sweet taro.
Overall; the food was really good but not great. The dim-sums were prepared well and had good ingredients. Some were really 'good' and some were just 'ok'...nothing special. There were some interesting things that stand out in my mind; for example, the dessert buns. I have never seen such decorative and actually pretty dessert buns. The swirling colour of each bun hinting what you will be tasting is actually lovely. What also stood out from these dessert buns were that the inside content were like liquid chocolate that oozed out when you split the bun into half. But it was not chocolate. Instead; the orange coloured swirl contained liquid sweet carrot and the purple coloured swirl contained liquid sweet taro. Both were very yummy.
The service was good but because the place was packed; the service persons were lost sometimes. We asked for water...several times. We asked for the menu...several times. We even asked for the bill...several times.
Now; the big question is...would we drive all the way to Srinakarin Road again to eat at Hong Bao? I do not think so. There are much better dim-sum restaurants in town.
However; saying all this; I think the area deserves a good place for dim-sum and finally Hong Bao is giving the area what it deserves...a decent place for dim-sum.
Address: Thanya Shopping Park, 735/1, A Building, G floor, Srinakarin Rd, Suanluang, Bangkok
Phone #: 02-108-6055
