The Kitchen

Our other big food adventure during spring break, was a trip to The Kitchen for dim sum. The Kitchen up in Alhambra had just been reviewed that week (3/21/07) in the LA Times food section. So we decided as part of a trip up to Santa Monica we'd stop in and taste the dumplings.

Now my daughter loves dumplings, but she prefers plain, simple potstickers. Dim Sum dumplings, with their elegant blendings of meat, seafood, and vegetables, turned out to be a bit too exotic for her taste, although at her request she tried three or four. Knowing this food might not be to her liking I brought along a selection of tofu, cheese, crackers, steamed vegetables, fruit, and milk stored in her lunch bag. So as we tasted our selection of dim sum she could select her own food from her bag. It worked well.

As we pulled into the smallish (for a dim sum parlor) restaurant set just a little bit back from W. Valley Blvd, we were surprised that although the review said they opened at 9:30, and it was 10:40, there was no one there. It was a weekday though, so I assured the worried husband that people would be along. They'd just been reviewed the day before in the Times, after all. As we approached the door, I noticed that their sign said they opened at 10:30, and right behind us other parties started arriving. The inside of the restaurant was light and open, and all the staff very friendly, especially with our daughter.

At The Kitchen, dim sum is ordered off a menu, which with a small child works much better. You place the order and it comes, rather than having to wait around for the food you want to be pushed by in a cart. Of course, if you are not at all familiar with dim sum, nor adventuresome, you might have more difficulty this way as you can't see what you are ordering. We based our order on our familiarity with the food and on the review, trying a number of selections that were mentioned there. Among the choices were seaweed salad, pork ribs on rice noodles, Chiu Chow dumplings, a couple kinds of seafood shu mai dumplings, bbq pork buns, pork dumplings, rice noodles with shrimp. and, for a more sweet option, we tasted the green tea dumpling which a green-tea dyed dumpling stuffed with a sesame paste that almost tastes like chocolate and which is lightly fried so the outside is a bit crisp.

The food was all excellent. I swore it was the best dim sum I've had, but I find myself saying that almost every time I have dim sum. It was the highlight of the day which then included mid-day traffic on the 10 out to Santa Monica and back, diaper rash, but no ointment, and a shortage of diapers. I think maybe we should have just called it day after the fabulous meal and headed back to the OC.

The Kitchen
203 W. Valley Blvd
Alhambra, CA