Yuan Yuan

Dumplings are another one of my favourite foods.  I can never say no to good dumplings.  I used to have a favourite dumpling restaurant, as of until last weekend located in Commerce Gate.  But from that night on, I will never go back.  I found a cigarette filter in my bowl of soup noodles.  So now Yuan Yuan has moved up the ranks of my list of go to dumpling restaurants.

The actual reason that I wanted to try Yuan Yuan was not for it's dumplings but for their Tian Jin pancakes.  It used to be hard to find places that make them, but as it turns out even T&T makes them now.  I guess it's due to the influx of people from China immigrating here.

Our table of 4 order the beef noodle (which is a must according to my husband), tomato & pork soup noodle (which arrived at the table looking different than other restaurants), steamed vegetable buns, fried dumplings, a vegetable dish and of course the Tian Jin pancake.  The beef noodle was quite good, just enough flavour in the beef, and was tender, but the broth was lacking the beef sauce flavour.  So i'm not quite sure where the colour in the broth was from.

Beef Noodle

Tomato & Pork soup noodle was very good and light.  I love tomato based broths so I don't think it could be bad.  In a way the broth was kind of refreshing, even though it was hot.  The one thing I've noticed is that there weren't many chicken or fish dishes.  Do people in China consume mostly pork and occasionally beef?

Tomato & Pork Soup Noodle

The steamed vegetable buns were a lot better than I was expecting.  I think I would order these buns again next time I'm eating there.  There was good flavour, good amount of filling and the bun layer had that slightly chewy consistency which I love in steamed buns.

Steamed Vegetable Buns

The fried dumplings, I believe we ordered the pork and leek filled ones.  Flavour was pretty good.  I was expecting the fried dumpling to be more similar to the pan fried dumplings, but these came out more deep fried.  Deep fried anything is always good!  Just need to be careful eating them.  They're SUPER hot!

Fried Dumplings

The vegetable dish, we didn't expected ALL the veggies to be deep fried and then tossed in a sauce.  I guess this is the exception to my rule where deep fried everything tastes good.  It was way too oily!  I wish I remembered which number this dish was so I would never order this again.

Fried Veggies

Last dish (although i'm certain we ordered steamed dumplings too, but I can't seem to locate the pictures, so I might be wrong?), was the Tian Jin pancake.  It was a challenge to order this dish because on the menu it's not name Tian Jin pancake.  Again, my memory fails me, and I can't remember what it's called.  And of course, there's a huge language barrier between the 4 of us and the wait staff at the restaurant.  None of us speak Mandarin.  So I Googled and found the picture of what the pancake looks like and the waitress figured out what it was.  I really liked this pancake, and would definitely order it again!  Other places give the option of the deep fried dough fritter or deep fried chip like things.  But here, it only comes with the deep fried dough fritter.

Tian Jin Pancake

Overall I would come back to this restaurant again to try their other foods.  A lot of the dishes have names that I don't remember ever seeing before.  So it would be an interesting food experience :)

Yuan Yuan
9425 Leslie St.
Richmond Hill, ON
L4B 3N7
905-237-8877