04-26-2006

Dim Sum Beginner’s Guide


Click to download the guide (PDF).

On a trip to Hong Kong a couple of years ago, Amanda and I wished we’d had some kind of Rosetta Stone to take with us to the dim sum restaurants we visited. We knew dishes we liked, but we didn’t know the Chinese names or characters for them. Most of the places we tried didn’t have the typical dim sum carts to order from, so pointing wasn’t an option either.

In getting ready for our recent trip to Beijing, I decided to put together my own dim sum cheat sheet. I used Wikipedia to find a list of dim sum dishes along with the Chinese characters for them. I then searched Flickr for photos tagged “dim sum” that were under a Creative Commons license. I put the two together to create a Dim Sum Beginner’s GuidePDF file. This guide is released under a Creative Commons license, so please feel free to add to or build-on the idea.

The printout did come in handy on our trip to Beijing. Dim sum wasn’t as prevalent there as it was in Hong Kong, but we did come across a few places. The ones we ate at didn’t have English menus or picture menus, so the cheat sheet was a big help.

Admittedly, I’m still a dim sum beginner myself, so this is not a comprehensive guide. There are lots more dishes I could add, but I stuck to the ones I know well—things that we hoped to eat on our trip and would recommend to anyone who hadn’t tried dim sum before. For more options, check out the book “Dim Sum: A Pocket Guide.”

I’d love to see more twists on this idea? How about a beginner’s guide to tapas, sushi, meze, and other snacky foods around the world?

Posted by Matt in communication, creativity, food, photography, travel, wikis | RSS 2.0

2 Responses to “Dim Sum Beginner’s Guide”
  1. HL Says:

    Yes, Hong Kong is probably the DIM SUM capital of the world. You can probably find dozens of good ones along Nathan Road in Kowloon side and one in every street corner. I don’t live there, but do know that there are decent dim sum restaurants inside many of the nicer and bigger hotels (i.e. 5 star hotels).

  2. Lydia Says:

    This is a great guide! I found this fun glossary too:

    http://www.life123.com/food/cooking-asian-food/chinese-recipes/a-handy-dim-sum-glossary.shtml

Leave a Reply