Yum Cha Cafe- Linda Vista

Today, we went to Fashion Valley mall to get a ring fixed and cleaned.  After seeing the excess and money at that mall, I immediately craved some cheap eats in the nearby Linda Vista area.  Yum Cha Cafe has been reviewed by others but since I cant remember who out of my favorite bloggers did so, I will take the opportunity here and share my thoughts on my food choices today.  Here is a link to their company site: Yum Cha Cafe

I thought I was taking hubby here for the first time, but it turns out I took him here before.  Drats.  Since we were there already, we picked out about 6 items to graze on together.  My food pickiness keeps me from trying the full range of food choices but we had enough for a full lunch and leftovers.  This place gets full very quickly too FYI.  We usually order the dim sum items although they also have roast duck/ chicken/ pig and soup/ noodle/ rice items. 

So the item on the left is the sugar cane shrimp and the next is the rice shrimp roll.  The stick is an actual sugar cane stick piece which is fun to gnaw on for a minute after you eat the shrimp on top.  Decent amount of shrimp in each piece but the outside wasnt as crispy as I would have wanted.  They dont serve the traditional sauce as other dim sum places do with the rice roll but it was decently fresh and soft.  Whole shrimp pieces in the roll.  I definitely got my shrimp fix today for sure...

This was some kind of shrimp mixture with eggplant slabs as well as some rice wrapped "beef stomach".  Hubby wanted the beef stomach but due to language difficulties, we got this.  It appeared to taste like some kind of har-gow in wonton shape.  This one wasnt that great- something was crunchy inside in a bad way.  The eggplant was good.  It came with its own sauce.  The eggplant was cooked a little too long and was most likely the chinese eggplant in variety.  Seemed to have been a black bean style of sauce btw.

The last 2 items were Pork Shu-mai and Wrapped Rice with Chicken.  I love the wrapped rice personally although I have also had it in bigger portions and with boiled egg inside.  Theirs is smaller but cheap and has some savory chicken tucked inside.  They reheat very well FYI.  The shu-mai was too "porky" in our opinion although I never thought there was such a thing.  Im not the biggest fan of shu mai to begin with but hubby is--he was disappointed for sure in this item.

4/6 aint so bad I guess.  The only quip I have about this place is that they dont have a great sauce option on the table or behind the counter.  No free beverages here either but it is a good cheap dim sum fix. 

xx