Don't Miss the Shanghai Steamed Dumplings

The Lion's Head Meatballs in Five-Spice Sauce were very good, but the Shanghai Steamed Dumplings were even better. It's an Ad Man's finest moment to have renamed the Shanghai Dumpling House -- it's now the Shanghai Dumpling King. But the atmosphere is not exactly royal. Waiters in white t-shirts and funky tennis shoes, families with very loud babies crying, huge steamers in the middle of most tables filling the room with the fragrant essence of ginger, and people waiting patiently in line by the front door for the best dumplings in the world. It reminds The Great Plotnik a lot of Kowloon, across the bay from Hong Kong -- without the cigarettes. It's worth a short trip to the Avenues (two blocks from the Balboa Theatre) at any time of day to taste those Shanghai Steamed Dumplings.

Plottie is heading for Stiletto City. There's always news down there.