Dumpling King Restaurant

After hearing rave reviews about this restaurant, we decided to brave the cold on a wintery weekend that we were house-sitting in the area, and check it out for ourselves. Unfortunately for us, it was an altogether disappointing and horrid experience. I can safely say I’ve never sampled more disgusting ‘food’ in all my life (and I use that term loosely). I truly hope that this is the only time I will ever need to write a negative review on this blog.

To start off, the waiter was clearly unimpressed with our choices, as he snickered when we gave him our orders. Not a good start to the evening.

When the sweet-and-sour soup arrived, it resembled something found in a pigs trough more than a diner’s bowl. A first, tentative sip confirmed our fears. It was basically a cauldron of boiling vinegar, garnished with a few leaves of limp lettuce and vinegar-infused wontons. One bite made us want to be physically ill. (We should have known better to order the soup, as we noticed a couple before us leave without touching theirs).

Being a “dumpling” specialty house, we also ordered the prawn dumplings (which actually seemed to be tiny shrimps). Much to our disgust, they weren’t cleaned, and the fat, black, digestive tracks were still in them. (Gross!) If that wasn’t enough to turn me off, the pastry was thick and chewy, seemingly just defrosted from the freezer and reheated.

The final disappointment however, was the worst of all. The succulent BBQ pork we were expecting (and what we were looking forward to most of all) was raw, and slathered in grease.

We barely touched any of the ‘food’ served.

Not wanting to cause a scene in front of the other diners, we quietly went to the counter to inform them that the food was inedible. We were met with confusion and hostility. “What?? No, you must pay. That is always the way we cook it. Nothing wrong with it.” We offered to pay for the half the meal (which I thought was quite generous considering we only ate about 1/8th of it!), but that wasn’t enough for them. Realising that we weren’t getting anywhere, we turned to walk out. They followed us to the door and wouldn’t let us leave.

At this point, we had caught the other diners attention and everyone was listening as we repeated that the ‘food’ was inedible, and we weren’t going to pay for a meal that we didn’t touch, especially considering we now had to go find somewhere else to eat! Eventually, I handed the waitress a $20 note (half of the bill, more than what they deserved) and we walked out.

I don’t understand how this place got such good reviews, but looking at eatability.com now, people are finally reporting on how shocking this place is. Perhaps there was a change of management, or staff, or the chef — but that’s no excuse. I wouldn’t feed this ‘food’ to my dog.

And for all those reviewers who still rate Dumpling King Newtown as the best Chinese food in Sydney, I sincerely pity your culinary shortcomings, and urge you to venture into China Town; or to one of the more upmarket options such as Fisherman’s Wharf at the Sydney Fishmarkets; or a larger chain such as the Phoenix Restaurants; or my personal favourite (and local) Chinese takeaway, Dural Terrace, where I’ve been going for 20 years (they also have karaoke on Friday and Saturday nights — what more could you want!).