Dim sum a bright light Tour showcases Chinatown’s offerings of traditional dishes Tasting Notes
By: Eva Wasney Posted: 2:46 PM CDT Tuesday, Oct. 24, 2023

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This article was published 24/10/2023 (765 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Dim sum isn’t about the food.

“It’s about the tea,” Carter Chen explains, while encouraging his tour group to sip on steaming cups of jasmine tea between bites of decadent dumplings and deep-fried spring rolls.

Chen is a gregarious local food influencer and host of the Chinatown Dim Sum Tours offered by the Downtown Winnipeg BIZ. It’s a natural fit for the first-generation Winnipegger, who grew up frequenting the restaurants and cultural centres in the neighbourhood.

“Dim sum was part of my childhood and a lot of family gatherings, a lot of milestones and celebrations,” he says. “Culturally, it means a lot to the Chinese community… I feel like dim sum restaurants are keeping Chinatown alive in Winnipeg.”

The Free Press recently joined the final Dim Sum Tour of the season. Chen has been running the culinary tours — which will resume next spring — since 2022, hosting two sold-out events in the first year and six this year. Demand has grown thanks, in part, to the guide’s large social-media following.

The group of 18 local tourists gather just before 11 a.m. under the ornate pergolas of the Chinese gardens at the corner of James Avenue and King Street. Chen arrives wearing a dim sum T-shirt complete with cartoon dumplings and holding a selfie stick — food influencing is a full-time hobby for the content creator, who works in banking during the day.

The tour is part-history lesson and part-marathon dining session.

On the way to the first stop, Chen describes the neighourhood’s origin story and points out landmarks, such as Harmony Mansion and the Winnipeg Winnipeg Chinese Cultural and Community Centre.

“In 1879, two (Chinese immigrants) in a horse-drawn buggy came up from North Dakota. One of them opened the first laundromat in Chinatown and that evolved into many businesses,” he says.

Chinatown spans several blocks on the northern border of the Exchange District. Once a bustling hub, the area’s vibrancy has declined since its heyday due to an exodus of residents. The neighbourhood’s concentration of dim sum restaurants, bakeries and grocery stores, however, remain a draw.

The group walks over the Chinatown Gate (built in 1986), past the Mandarin Building (a former jailhouse) and up the street to Sam Po Dim Sum Restaurant. Inside, the unpretentious dining room is starting to fill for the lunch rush. There’s a private party setting up in the back room and a steady stream of guests filing in with balloons, decorations and cake.

Bamboo baskets full of steaming dishes start arriving at the table as soon as we’re seated. The menu is crafted by Chen and designed to be a “safe” introduction to the cuisine. Dim sum is a choose-your-own-adventure experience.

“The order is definitely a little bit more conservative for beginners. I would usually order some beef tripe, which is stomach, with chicken feet, spare ribs and curry squid. It’s a little more adventurous than maybe the average Canadian palate,” he says.

While we pull morsels from the rotating turntable in the centre of the table, Chen shares some dim sum facts and customs.

“It started as a tea ceremony. The ancient Chinese emperors would wake up late in the afternoon, maybe after a late night, and they would want tea, but they were also very hungry, so they’d have some fancy snacks and that became dim sum,” he says.

The meal concludes and the group starts waddling over to the second and final stop on the tour. Several members wonder aloud how they’re possibly going to eat more food. At $40 per person, the dim sum tours are a pretty good return on investment.

Dim Sum Garden is larger and more modern than Sam Po, but the scene inside is the same: full tables, servers flying around with carts of piping-hot food and, downstairs, guests arriving for a birthday party. Just as with Chen’s childhood, the restaurants remain important gathering sites.

“Dim sum has a history of bringing people together, typically you want to have a group of four or more,” he says. “It’s a great icebreaker, it’s a way to get to know each other through food.”

While the Downtown BIZ Dim Sum Tours are currently on hold, the featured restaurants are open year-round. Future tour dates will be posted to downtownwinnipegbiz.com. Find Chen (@ritzcrakca) on Instagram.

Tasting Notes is an ongoing series about Winnipeg restaurants, new and old, meant to offer diners a taste of what’s on the menu.

eva.wasney@winnipegfreepress.com

Twitter: @evawasney