Battle of the Xiao Long Baos part 2: Lugang Cafe

This is the continuation of my last week's post:

Battle of the Xiao Long Baos: Shi Lin and Peace & Happiness

After 4 hours of studying Japanese, I often craved for Xiao Long bao so upon returning home, from Trinoma, I'll have to cross the mall bridge and pass through a lot of people on my way to satisfy my cravings at SM North the Block.

At last! I have reached this restaurant. Yey! Even though I am a frequent customer here.

The restaurant's name is somewhat disgusting for some but it is really clean. I wonder why they chose Lugang Cafe instead of Lukang Cafe. Lukang 鹿港 is one of the places in northwestern Taiwan.

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Battle of the Xiao Long Baos: Shi Lin and Peace & Happiness

This is a comparison between Shi Lin and PEACE & HAPPINESS Dumpling House

For part 2, Lugang Cafe review will be coming soon. :) :) :) :)

I first came addicted to Xiao Long Bao when I, together with my friends dined in Shi Lin (士林) located at Bonifacio Global City. There is also a branch in The Podium located at Ortigas.

My friends introduced me to this delicacy while listening to Teresa Teng's songs being played in the restaurant.

Since I saw spot.ph's article about the Top 10 Xiao Long bao in Manila after many months from my first Xiao Long bao, I decided to write this post so you can see the delicacy based on a commoner's experience.

I don't know if Shi Lin refers to one of the districts in Taipei, Taiwan or if it means a Stone forest. Since I am currently taking Japanese classes, there are 3 japanese writing systems, those are hiragana, katakana and kanji. Kanji came from chinese characters and whether it is used by the Chinese or Japanese, the meaning are the same even when they were saying it differently to the point that you can write these characters and show it to them even if you don't know the literal translation of these words.

Let's go back to Shi Lin, 士 means earth, ground or soil while 林 means woods. 

Here's my Shi Lin experience for the nth time: (I can't remember the number of times since I'm a frequent customer)

The waiters are courteous and they respond quickly. The place is clean. They are still playing Teresa Teng's songs which I really like. My order came at the nick of time.

There's a second floor but too shy to capture it

Left side where the cooks are making dumplings

Sorry ^^, forgot to include vinegar on this photo. The vinegar looks like a soy sauce because of its color

                                               

                                

                                      Here's the actual amount of soup and it's really tasty

The ground pork with some onions and green veggies

                                               

6 pieces costs Php 148 while 10 pieces costs Php 246

Shi Lin has 5% service charge.

The only problem is the dumplings were easy to fall off unlike in Lugang Cafe's. ( part 2 soon :) )

Overall, Shi Lin is really tasty and worth to try for fine dining at a high end place and not too expensive price.

Prices ranges from Php 150 - 300, here's the menu.

 

Let's talk about, PEACE & HAPPINESS Dumpling House.
It is the cheapest that I've tried. It is located at SM Makati foodcourt.

                     

This is my third time here so I tried the slightly spicy sauce which is normally a dip in eating siomai instead of the real sauce like in Shi Lin.

I have drank the soup and  eaten 1/4 of the meat already

Not bad for Php 115 but I think the dough's too thick for my liking and it's too oily. Nevertheless, it is still delicious and worth craving for.

What is the delicious xiao long bao for you? Comments will be deeply appreciated. :)

Before this post ends, I wanted to share this video about the proper way of eating Xiao Long bao:

Update as of August 16, 2013:

Part 2 of this post is ready to be read!