Showing posts with label glutinous rice in lotus leaf. Show all posts
Showing posts with label glutinous rice in lotus leaf. Show all posts

The Queen Seafood Cuisine 皇后臻品 (Toronto)

Posted on Saturday, July 04, 2026 by

While The Queen Seafood Cuisine’s website highlights lavish set menus featuring jumbo lobster and king crab, they also offer less extravagant options. As a guest at a family celebration, I didn’t catch the exact price of our menu, but judging from similar ones online, I’d estimate it around $798. Before committing to a $1,000+ spread, it’s worth visiting to explore the more accessible offerings.

The roasted suckling pig with jellyfish is a dish of contrasts: warm, rich pork paired with cool, crunchy jellyfish. It may have been my portion, but the pork leaned slightly fatty. Still, it was moist with a delicate, crispy skin.

Instead of the usual deep-fried crab claw, Queen’s serves a scallop with shrimp paste. It’s easier to eat with a knife and fork, and while the sauce softens the crisp exterior, it adds a savoury depth without overwhelming the seafood.

The crispy salted egg yolk prawns were impressively large and well cooked. I don’t usually gravitate towards salted egg yolk, finding it heavy, but here it added a pleasant richness. Since the coating sits on the shell, it’s easy to control how much you get. I also appreciated the inclusion of vegetables throughout the meal. The scallops came with gai lan, while the prawns were paired with broccoli, helping balance out the richness.

Swapping out the usual shark fin soup, the bird’s nest soup with minced chicken and egg white was a welcomed change. The broth was thick and silky, but the minced chicken added some much-needed texture.

The braised abalone with mushroom and snow pea tips was well executed. The abalone was properly rehydrated, tender, and infused with the braising liquid, while the snow pea tips were kept simple to provide a fresh contrast.

Amid the celebration, I forgot to take a photo of the crispy roasted pigeon, which comes three to an order. There was plenty to go around. The skin was glossy and crisp, but the meat had a noticeably gamier flavour than expected, making it more of an acquired taste.

The double stir-fried lobster with Maggi sauce was handled with restraint. The seasoning added flavour without becoming sticky or overpowering. Unfortunately, the lobster itself was slightly overcooked, with the meat beginning to pull away from the shell rather than staying plump.

The steamed twin fish was perfectly cooked, so it was flaky but breaks apart. It’s just a shame that the scales weren’t cleaned properly so you had to remove the skin to make it edible.

Being a sister restaurant to Congee Queen, the portions here are generous. Even after most of us had large servings, there were still plenty of leftovers. The pork and seafood fried rice wrapped in lotus leaf was the stronger of the two carb dishes, packed with ingredients, well seasoned, and lightly fragrant from the leaf.

The braised e-fu noodles, however, were underwhelming. They lacked both flavour and substance. Typically, you’d expect mushrooms and chives, but here there were only a few scattered scallions and minimal mushroom. The result was dry, slightly sticky, and bland.

Dessert helped recover the meal. The hot red bean soup was consistently sweet, perhaps a touch too sugary for some, but it held its own after the heavier dishes. The almond cookies were a highlight - flaky, delicate, and fragrant. If you enjoy shortbread, these will be a hit, but even I appreciated them. The mango pudding was pleasant and sweet, though standard.

They’re known for their private dining rooms, which come with an additional $180 fee, but also a higher level of service. We had a dedicated staff member who regularly checked on tea and water, plated dishes for us, and handled leftovers without prompting. For a celebration, the pacing felt relaxed rather than rushed, though the meal stretched to about three and a half hours, so plan accordingly if dining with children or anyone short on patience.

In a nutshell... 
  • Must order: bird's nest soup with minced chicken and egg white, scallop with shrimp paste
  • Just skip: braised e-fu noodles

Overall mark - 7 out of 10


How To Find Them
 Location: Toronto, Canada
 Address: 900 Don Mills Road


 Follow me on twitter to chat, be notified about new posts and more - https://twitter.com/GastroWorldBlog
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Gastro World's Grading System
  • Anything under 5 - I really disliked and will never go back
  • 6 - decent restaurant but I likely won't return
  • 7 - decent restaurant and I will likely return
  • 8 - great restaurant that I'd be happy to recommend
  • 9 - fantastic restaurant that I would love to visit regularly and highly recommend
  • 10 - absolute perfection!

Is That It? I Want More!

Other Gastro World posts similar to this:



Skyview Fusion Cuisine (Markham)

Posted on Saturday, April 04, 2020 by


In the GTA, there is no shortage of restaurants serving dim sum. But, where do you find the best? For me, I favour places with clean dining rooms, menus with enough choices, reasonable wait times, and of course, where the food tastes delicious.

At Skyview Fusion Cuisine, even though their early bird specials are only available Monday to Friday, based on reviews, the restaurant still gets busy on weekends – perhaps due to its proximity to a Costcos. However, the wait times seem manageable: arriving at 9:30 on a Saturday, we were seated right away and even while leaving at 11am there were still available tables.

Their regular menu prices are small for $3.90, medium for $4.90, and large for $5.90. Even without the weekend early bird special, Skyview’s menu includes a lot of small category options: pan-fried turnip cake, deep-fried sticky pork dumpling, and steamed beef ball with chestnuts, which may be considered medium at other establishments. As a result, the bill total isn’t too bad, even without the discount.

Their steamed beef ball with chestnuts (S) was a bit dense for my taste, but the addition of cilantro, water chestnuts, and sweet corn does help to add further flavours and textures to an otherwise monotone item.


I would have liked the pan-fried turnip cake (S) to be cooked longer, to enhance the crust, but otherwise it was a decent consistency and incorporated enough turnip and lap cheong within the cake. Similarly, the deep-fried sticky pork dumpling (S) could have used a bit more time in the oil to really create a crunchier exterior but was still a solid version of the dish.


Both their steamed shrimp dumpling or har gow (L) and steamed pork dumpling or siu mai (M) are solid renditions and sizeable portions. While most people welcome the golf ball sized dim sum, I personally prefer them smaller so there’s a better ratio of wrapper to filling.


With all the seafood dumplings, it seemed like a bit of over kill to also have the seafood dumpling (L), which truthfully pretty much tasted like the har gow with a tiny bit of chives, scallop, and fish roe on top. It’s a good dish, but I’d pick one or the other.


Their steamed sticky rice with chicken in lotus leaf (L) is a great option. The glutinous rice is not overly thick and there’s enough filling to keep it interesting.


The ‘vegetable and bean sprout and shrimp rice rolls’ (L), may more concisely be labelled as shrimp and snow pea shoot rice roll. It’s fine, the rice wrapper thicker than it needs to be.


One of my favourite dishes, assuming its prepared properly, is the steamed seafood dumpling in soup (L). At Skyview, they are one of the best. The dumpling’s wrapper is thick enough to withstand getting too soggy and there’s tons of ingredients (scallop, shrimp, mushroom) in it. The broth is salty enough for flavour and is kept hot with the candlelit warmer. It was amazing when it was first brought to the table, and still decent enough to finish half-and-hour later.


The sitting around factor of a dish may also be considered an important criterion for a good dim sum experience. After all, it’s an occasion to eat, but also to catch up with family and loved ones. Sometimes you want to sit back and actually just yum cha (drink tea). Converse, drink more tea, and then dive into a dish later.

Overall mark - 9 out of 10
How To Find Them
 Location: Markham, Canada
 Address: 8261 Woodbine Avenue

 Follow me on twitter to chat, be notified about new posts and more - https://twitter.com/GastroWorldBlog
____________________________
Gastro World's Grading System
  • Anything under 5 - I really disliked and will never go back
  • 6 - decent restaurant but I likely won't return
  • 7 - decent restaurant and I will likely return
  • 8 - great restaurant that I'd be happy to recommend
  • 9 - fantastic restaurant that I would love to visit regularly and highly recommend
  • 10 - absolute perfection!

Is That It? I Want More!

Other Gastro World posts similar to this:

Tim Ho Wan 添好運點心專門店 (Hong Kong)

Posted on Sunday, May 13, 2018 by

How different could a har gow be? I wondered to myself after hearing about Tim Ho Wan, a dim sum specialist restaurant in Hong Kong, which has long held on to its one Michelin star. After all, in Toronto, most shrimp dumplings are similar, the wrapper sometimes stickier, but otherwise most are filled with crunchy shrimp that have little taste. They’ve become larger throughout my lifetime, some of them reaching golf ball status, but the bland crunchy shrimp has remained constant.

Therefore, to draw comparisons, we stuck with the basics at Tim Ho Wan; I wanted to see what these “specialists” could do! Getting back to the har gow ($28), they indeed differ - smaller in size, the steamed dumplings are delicate so you can taste the shrimp’s sweetness (these are also tinier) with the seafood not packed together. The wrapper is soft, but not gummy, and has an elasticity to its consistency allowing them to be easily picked up. So, I stand corrected, har gows can be different.


Their steamed pork dumpling with shrimp ($28) or sui mai follows a similar recipe for success: big chunks of pork (as opposed to being pulverized) and shrimp combined loosely so there’s a juicy succulence to the dumpling. Oh, how I want more. 


The wrapper for the vermicelli roll stuffed with BBQ pork ($25) is impossibly thin, yet withstands the large pieces of BBQ pork stuffed in it. Personally, I like the bigger pieces of meat and full springs of cilantro placed throughout - you can taste the ingredients.


Tim Ho Wan’s glutinous rice wrapped in lotus leaf is the old-school format arriving as one gigantic package: a thick layer of chewy sticky rice stuffed with chicken, Chinese sausage, and mushrooms. The longer cooking time helps the lotus leaf essence seep into the rice, but having this dish again makes me realize I prefer the new miniature versions. The rice is softer and overall the dish more flavourful because of the gravy minced meat mixture used. Of course, the traditional way of making the dish requires experience (as you need to ensure everything is cooked throughout) and there is more filling, but you end up with one or two pieces of protein and big hunks of rice. 


Forgetting we already ordered the glutinous rice, the steamed rice with spare rib and chicken feet ($27) was too much; sadly, the rice was wasted. Frankly, unless you’re with a large table, this is a forgettable dish, the spare ribs and chicken foot both fairly average.


A dish that graced every table was their signature baked bun with BBQ pork ($21). Fresh from the oven, they are piping hot and the thin bun containing a large piece of BBQ pork. There’s a sweetness from the sauce and pineapple crust you’d expect, but it’s well balanced with the meat’s savouriness. For those who like it sweeter, allow the bun to cool down and the flavours intensify.  


The pan-fried pork and chives dumplings were also delicious, the meat cut into pieces (rather than minced) with enough vegetables to create a lightness to the dim sum. It’s wonton wrapper was so thin that it’s barely there, merely forming a fantastic crispy crust over everything.  


With only four desserts to choose from, we decided against the signature tonic medlar & petal cake, instead going for the tried and true deep-fried sesame dumpling ($18). At Tim Ho Wan, aside from the red bean paste they also add a piece of banana, which when heated turns into a creamy consistency. 



In the end, what makes Tim Ho Wan so good? From my experience: thin wrappers, ingredients left in chunks, and well-balanced flavours. If you don’t want to wait, head their as soon as it opens on a weekday, you’ll walk right in and find a seat at a number of tables. It’s a quick meal with dim sum flying out of the kitchen, which runs like a tasty, dumpling-making, well-oiled machine.


Overall mark - 9 out of 10
How To Find Them
 Location: North Point, Hong Kong
 Address: 2 Wharf Rd (Seaview Building, GF)

 Follow me on twitter to chat, be notified about new posts and more - https://twitter.com/GastroWorldBlog
____________________________
Gastro World's Grading System
  • Anything under 5 - I really disliked and will never go back
  • 6 - decent restaurant but I likely won't return
  • 7 - decent restaurant and I will likely return
  • 8 - great restaurant that I'd be happy to recommend
  • 9 - fantastic restaurant that I would love to visit regularly and highly recommend
  • 10 - absolute perfection!
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