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Chinese Appetizers & Snacks
By peace | January 12, 2007
Traditional dim sum includes various types of steamed buns such as char siew bao, dumplings and rice rolls, which contain a range of ingredients, including beef, chicken, pork, prawns and vegetarian options. Many dim sum restaurants also offer plates of steamed green vegetables, roasted meats, congee porridge and other soups. Dessert dim sum is also available and many places offer the customary egg custard tart – “dan tat.” Having a meal in a Chinese teahouse or a dim sum restaurant is known as yum cha (飲茶), literally “drinking tea”, as tea is typically served with dim sum.
Most formal banquets start with appetizers. A trend that has also become popular, even when having just a simple meal in a Chinese restaurant, is to assuage the pangs of hunger until the main dishes arrive by ordering a plate or two of hot dim sum. These are usually enclosed in fine pastry and either steamed or fried.
Dim sum is a Chinese light meal or brunch served with Chinese tea. It is eaten some time from morning to early afternoon with family or friends. Dim sum consists of a wide spectrum of choices, from sweet to salty. It includes combinations of meat, vegetables, seafood, as well as desserts and fruit. The various items are usually served in a small steamer basket or on a small plate, depending on the type of dim sum.
Originating with the chefs of the Sung Dynasty, these little mouthfuls were intended as delicacies and culinary showpieces to impress guests. Dim Sum literally means ‘touch the heart’. It may be derived from yat dim sum yi, meaning a “a little token”. Though the English word “dim sum” refers to the Cantonese variety, the idea of a wide variety of small dishes for lunch also holds for other regions of China.
Equivalent terms, such as dian xin in Mandarin, exist in other varieties of Chinese, as a generic term for any of a variety of snacks or small food items. The terms “northern dian xin” or “Shanghai dian xin” have thus come into use. These dian xin are, however, not necessarily Cantonese dim sum, although the two still share the same written script in traditional and simplified characters. Likewise, the Korean cognate jeomsim may refer to any kind of lunch.
In Australia the word dim sim is used for a particular kind of dumpling.
Gradually they were aspired to by the merchant class and eventually by the working class. Now they are so popular with all manner of people that in Chinese cities (or Chinese quarters of western cities) whole families, from grandparents to babies in arms, gather at restaurants on a Sunday morning especially, for yum cha (tea) or dim sum brunch.
The concept of a dim sum meal grew up around the Chinese tea house where people met to talk, read newspapers, or simple refuel. There are dim sum restaurants that operate as early as 4 am as Chinese workers from workers from night shifts come in for cup after cup of hot tea and an endless variety of small savoury dishes. By eight in the morning, these places close. It is then that the more elegant restaurants starts serving their dim sum to the leisured classes who rise later. At working-class tea houses the dim sum are actually quite hearty, not dainty as a fashionable restaurants.
Dim sum can be cooked by steaming and frying, among other methods. The serving sizes are usually small and normally served as three or four pieces in one dish. It is customary to order family style, sharing dishes among all members of the dining party. Because of the small portions, people can try a wide variety of food.
Dim sum dishes can be ordered from a menu or sometimes the food is wheeled around on a trolley by servers. Traditionally, the cost of the meal is calculated based on the number, size, and sometimes color of the dishes left on the patron’s table. Some modern dim sum restaurants record the dishes on a bill at the table. Not only is this tidier, it also prevents patrons from cheating by concealing or stealing the plates. Servers in some restaurants use distinct stamps so that sales statistics for each server can be recorded.
Waitresses circulate among the crowded tables with trolleys or trays bearing steaming baskets, plates and bowls. In them or on them is an incredible variety of dim sum. Customers look them over and choose whatever appeals, and at the end of the meal the waitress counts the empty dishes and calculates the bill.
Fast food and Premade dim sum
Two women picking microwave-cooked dim sum from the freezer in Circle K, Hong Kong.
Two women picking microwave-cooked dim sum from the freezer in Circle K, Hong Kong.
Certain kinds of instant dim sum have come onto the market in Hong Kong, Mainland China, Taiwan and Singapore. People can enjoy snacks after a 3-minute defrosting and reheating of the instant dim sum in a microwave oven.
Some stalls serve “street dim sum” which usually consists of dumplings or meatballs steamed in a large container, but served on a bamboo skewer. The customer can dip the whole skewer into a sauce bowl and eat while standing or walking.
Dim Sum can be purchased from major grocery stores in most countries with a Chinese population. These dim sum can be easily cooked by steaming or microwaving. Major grocery stores in Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Mainland China, Malaysia, USA and Canada have a variety of dim sum stocked at the shelves. These include dumplings, siu maai, bau, cheong fun, lo bak go and steamed spare ribs. In Singapore as well as other countries, dim sum can also be purchased from convenience stores, coffee shops and other eateries. In Malaysia, halal-certified dim sum with pork being replaced by chicken are sold.
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