We had lots of meals in Cityplaza, Taikoo Shing because we stayed really close to the mall. The shopping mall is pretty well equipped with a cinema, a H&M outlet, a Uniqlo outlet and has tons of food. As luck would have it, we came across a Maxim's Palace outlet which serves dim sum all day long.
Maxim's Palace
Shop No.255, 2/F.,
Cityplaza, 18 Taikoo Shing Road,
Taikoo Shing
Monday to Sunday: 8:00am - 4:30pm, 6:00pm - 11:30pm
It may be a chain but Cityplaza's outlet serves excellent dim sum. The standard fare is served in the morning with more interesting dishes appearing in the afternoon so be mean and hog a table for as long as you can.
With tasty char siew filling, the char siew pau was a good balance of salty and sweet with delicate pau skin. No thick pau with minuscule filling here!
They don't serve lau sar pao here but the lai wong pao is a less sinful version with a more solid custard filling. It means you can have more of these eggy and delicious buns with less guilt.
The siew mai was well-seasoned and adequately stuffed with whole prawns and minced pork. Fresh ingredients is their forte here though the dim sum do not look exceptionally pretty. Who minds when it's going into your stomach anyway?
The har gao was almost translucent revealing at least two whole prawns on the inside. Fresh and tasty, I enjoyed at least 2 baskets of these.
The ma lai ko had a darker hue with a strong aroma of brown sugar. The texture could do better though - it was a little sandy for our liking.
Foo chuk rolls, whether steamed or fried were a surprisingly good find.
Both had thin and smooth beancurd skin with large fresh prawns and seasoned carrots and turnip for filling.
The prawn cheong fun was a bit thick the first time we ate here but the char siew version was much softer and thinner the second time we paid a visit.
The jin tui is empty on the inside but has a sweetened thin pastry so you get a crispy and chewy sesame glutinous pastry . Though it was not bad, we prefer filled jin tui.
The crab ball didn't taste very premium - it was a minced crab meat ball with no actual visible crab meat. Give this a pass.
Char siew sou surprised us with melt in your mouth, flaky and buttery pastry. Eye it on the warm pastry cart and be sure to grab it.
The pork slice and salted vegetable porridge was tasty and comforting. Nothing fancy but great for porridge lovers.
Dim sum carts roll around the restaurant with the names stated at the front of the cart. The non-Chinese speaker couldn't read a thing so we resorted to getting the nice (sometimes not so nice) old ladies to open every steaming basket. When you make your selection, they will stamp your order chit.
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They charge differently according to the 'size' of the item and whether it's a special or deluxe item.
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Special and deluxe items usually have more premium ingredients like the fried crab ball we had.
We were quite impressed by Maxim's Palace's dim sum. It was definitely above average with their good quality ingredients and decent service. The wait for a table can be quite long so send someone to take a number while waiting for the entire dinner party to arrive. Another nice thing is no tap thoi!
Maxim's Palace locations here
Review by Lady Iron Chef here.