Wine & Dumpling dinner at New Shanghai, Chatswood

It’s mid week baby yeah! Man but is it just me or is this week just crawling away? Definitely looking forward to the weekend (Friday, Friday!) but anywhos a coupla weeks ago I was checking out New Shanghai’s (Shop B-038, Chatswood Chase, Chatswood) first ever Wine and Dumpling Dinner.


Line em up! I’d previously tried the dumplings at their Ashfield location and was intrigued at the Treasury Wines pairing. I’m not a huge red drinker but I found I preferred the reds over the whites with the majority of the dishes though that uh didn’t stop me from drinking the whites… /raises glass to you, you, and you.


Shredded kelp mixed with spice and vinegar; Chopped cucumber with fresh garlic; Drunken chicken, soaked in Chinese wine. I can’t handle chicken skin that isn’t fried or charcoal-y so off that went to Richard but woah that drunken chicken was tasty!


New Shanghai Xiao Long Bao steamed mini pork bun; Steamed mini crab meat and pork dumpling; Steamed vegetarian dumpling. The XLB was awesome and for those not too familiar with them, the trick is to place the dumpling on a spoon with a dash of soy sauce and vinegar and nibble at the dumpling skin, wait a couple of seconds for insides to cool a bit before drinking some of the broth inside and finally eating the rest. Just don’t shove the whole thing in your mouth unless you want to burn yourself haha


Shepherd’s purse and pork wonton tossed with sesame butter, red chilli oil and spice. I heart wontons! Sure I prefer them deep fried but these unfried babies were incredible, the wonton wrappers were soft with a bit of chew and the innards juicy, tender and um porky. Despite the visible chili seeds in the bowl there was just enough spice to give the wontons an edge but not enough to send me running away screaming into the night. That’s a good thing. I hate unnecessary exercise. All in moderation yo


New Shanghai pan fried pork bun and pan fried pork dumpling. Lisa says they look like the sun, moon and star. I say they look like fried dumplings of joy! How can you not smile? Cheer up for there is fried dumplings in your future! I did prefer the pan fried dumpling over the bun mainly because I was getting full and the bready bun was taking up valuable stomach space.


The Shepherd’s purse, prawn and tofu soup gave us a mini break to breath from the dumpling onslaught.


Braised pork belly and deep fried chicken in special garlic and chilli sauce. The pork belly compels you! Zomgs that pork belly was insane! Fatty and oh so tender, it is the perfect definition of awesome. I dream about that pork belly. I would cross the Bridge to get me some more of that pork belly. The deep fried chicken was almost but not equally as delicious, though the crispy skin pushed me into food coma land.


Slow soaked white fungus with papaya soup. Yeah really not a fan of Asian texture desserts so um doo di doo


Carnage muahahaha! New Shanghai’s Wine & Dumplings dinners will be scheduled in the next coupla months so check out their website for dates, the next dinner is at their Charlestown location.

ChocolateSuze dined as a guest of New Shanghai.