China Max - This Time it's Dim sum

I know I've done China Max already. In fact, China Max was my first post back on May 26th, almost 4 months ago. We ended up at China Max because of a terrible visit to our favorite Dim Sum restaurant Emerald which I'll post in the near future.

Because that visit did not satisfy our craving, we needed to get some Dim Sum ASAP. I really wasn't in the mood for the hustle and bustle and Darwinist tendencies that are displayed in a "cart-style" Dim Sum restaurant, so this left China Max as our only choice.

I had tried the Dim Sum at China Max on a previous visit, and had not been overly impressed. All the items were very well presented, but I thought that the flavoring of the Dim Sum was very mild and bland. We entered the restaurant hoping that this visit would be more successful than our last Dim Sum experience. At China Max you order your Dim Sum by checking off items on a sheet of paper. You can make your choices by using the colorful menu as your guide (ooooh pictures!!!). We made our selections and waited:

The first item to arrive was the Taro Gok. When we opened up the taro we noticed nice chunks of pork and the nice and light exterior. There was a problem with this, though; it was lukewarm, almost cold. Served in this manner the dish is most unpalatable. The Missus would not stand for this! She called the Waiter over and explained the situation; the Waiter very nicely insisted that this is the way this is served. Of course my Wife would not stand for that! I could see her hand starting to grip her chopstick; in other words if the Waiter kept up this line of BS, he'd be leaving the table with a pair of chopsticks sticking out of his neck. Luckily, for his sake he decided to replace this dish and all was well.

The Salt and Pepper Squid were next:

Slices of squid are battered and fried, then fried again with garlic, chilies, and pepper. Though some of the pieces were burned to a black, this dish was good. The squid was tender and the seasoning was perfect.

The Shark Fin dumpling were next:

These dumplings were stuffed with bean thread, Krab, and other goodies. As with most items here, the taste was fairly mild, but in this case it worked perfectly! You could taste all of the ingredients. My only gripe is that the wrappers were a bit dried out, but the filling was really nice and moist.

Next up, my Wife's favorite. Steamed sticky rice wrapped in Lotus Leaf:

This is one of The Missus's "baseline" dishes, along with the taro. This version had a generous amount of pork, along with an egg yolk and lup cheong. The flavoring had permeated the rice so that it was completely seasoned though very mild in taste. About this time our replacement Taro Gok was brought to the table. This time it was steaming hot, with large chunks of pork. And not a trace of oil! There was a bit of bitterness from the taro, but as a whole it was very light and good.

Next up was what I was waiting for; the Pan Fried Chive Dumplings:

The wrapper of these dumplings were nice and crusty with a little bit off pull. The dumplings were stuffed with alot of chive and shrimp. The chives were perfect, not bitter in the least bit. I chowed these down in a minute!

The Fried Seaweed rolls were next:

Two of the rolls were badly burnt, and thus bitter. At this point we didn't feel like complaining any more so we just left these alone.

The last dish was Cheong Fun with shrimp:

These were stuffed with large shrimp, and the "noodle" was prepared and cooked perfectly. There was just the right amount of "pull" in the noodle. If I were to have one complaint about this dish, it would be that there was not enough "sauce" provided, what little there was tasted nicely sweet and salty. A very good dish otherwise.

If I were to use one word to describe the Dim Sum at China Max, it would be "light". All the dishes are pretty mild in flavor, and not oily in the least bit. Our lunch set us back $32, not bad at all! Other than the burnt Fried Seaweed Roll and the Taro Gok "blip" the dishes were good enough for a return Dim Sum visit in the future.

China Max
4698 Convoy Street #C101
San Diego, CA 92111

Comments

[Jo]

I SO want the opportunity to meet Missus before heading East. Unless of course you think you'll be able to come out our way soon. I can just picture her, chopstick in hand, squeezing, s l o w l y s q u e e z i n g . . . .

[clare eats]

Me too Jo LOL!
I could feel the rage and pain, glad shehasthe guts to stickup for herself though!

[Reid]

Hi Kirk,

It seems like we all had dim sum this weekend huh? Must have been the moon festival. Did you get to have some mooncakes? I got a couple....they were quite good.

The glutinous rice in lotus leaf is one of my favorites too. It was really good at Legend. In fact, that's one of the dishes they do really well.

[Kristy]

Mmm...had dim sum last Friday from Empress Pavilion - take out to go on the run since I don't get that much time during my lunch breaks. I do love the rice in lotus leaf and the noodles with shrimp. (I also like it with pork or beef too). My all time favorites though are the shrimp dumplings (Har Gow) and the steamed meat dumplings with shrimp (Siu Mai). Yum!

[Kirk]

Hi Jo - Better around that chopstick than my neck!

Hi Clare - She does pick her spots well.

Hi Reid - Must be some kind of inner calendar that goes off around this time of the year! We went for Dim Sum twice in two weeks.

Hi Kristy - Dim Sum for you too! Seems everyone is having Dim Sum, and I think everyone has their dishes that they judge the restaurant on.

[elmomonster]

I am starting to think this blog thing is influencing the ebb and flow of people's eating habits, like a peg in the space-time continuum. Even before reading your post, I found out that we are going to go to L.A. this weekend to eat dim sum at some new place (don't know where yet)...of course you'll see a post on my blog on it next week!

Awesome review and pics BTW...as always!

[ed]

Too bad about Emerald - it was fine on my last visit to civilization. But I will have to try China Max particularly if I can remember some of the dishes you had that I've never tried. Thanks again for the pics and post.

ed

[Kirk]

Hi Elmo - Funny thing isn't it, probably the combination of cooler weather and the Moon Festival! Though we could experiment and start doing Haggis and see if those reviews start popping up everywhere! LOL!

Hi Ed - Sounds like another Me n' Ed adventure in the making? We haven't given up on Emerald - too many good meals there in the past, but this last one was pretty bad.....

[Jo]

I was both dim sumless and moon cakeless! =o( "Po Po Pitiful Me"? I forgot to mention that I loved the menu! I would have gotten everything on the fried side! Especially "sugar cane shrimp". Now, what exactly is a sugar cane shrimp?

[Kirk]

Hi Jo - I think sugar cane shrimp is a breaded and deep fried shrimp "cake" wrapped around a stick of sugar cane. Picture menu's are great aren't they????

[Green Turtle]

Do you happen to remember the prices for "small", "medium", and "large"? Is it the same as Emerald or higher? I wish Golden City would hurry up and re-open at their Kearny Villa location. I keep going by there every 2 weeks and looking through the glass door and it seems that their renovations are proceeding very slowly. At this rate, I wonder if they'd even be open before Thanksgiving. Also, I drove by Tommy Burger's future site, they haven't even gotten the framing finished. I wonder how they plan to meet their target opening of Nov/Dec.

[Kirk]

Hi Green Turtle - You know - it's my fault for not paying the attention I should to the price structure. But let me just say we had Curry Siu Mai, Stuffed Bean Curd, Cheong Fun, tripe, sticky rice in lotus leaf, shrimp dumpling, and hot tea at Emerald for $29, that's 6 dishes, here we had 7 and tea for $32, hope that helps. I've been keeping an eye on that Golden City site as well - the other day I saw some workmen going in and out - I hope they open soon! As for Tommy's, I don't think they'll make their target.....I know we all look forward to the heartburn! LOL!

[howie]

I love China Max! They do my favorite version of Salt and Pepper Pork Chop down here. All the dishes you ordered look fantastic.

That's too bad about Emerald. I'm really curious to hear about what happened. I hope it's just a temporary drop in quality.

[Kirk]

Hi Howie - The dishes were pretty good, except for the seaweed rolls. I'll post about emerald in the near future.

[milgwimper]

Kirk,

I love dim sum. Ahhh and you had one of my favourites the Cheong Fun. Ohhh...Yum. I have yet to take DH to a really good Dim Sum place, but maybe this month or next I can convince him! Thanks for making me hungry!

[Kirk]

Hi Mills - I'm sure there are ALOT of great Dim Sum places in your neck of the woods!!!!

[milgwimper]

Kirk,

There are but usually they only serve it for lunch, and its hard for DH and I to time it right. LOL Usually we get distracted by other things. I so love dim sum. The first time I ever had dim sum, I was in highschool, and J and I decided to pool our money and eat. OH that was so good. We didn't know what we were eating but oh it was so good. Too bad the place closed (bad location). *sigh*

[Jo]

There's a place over in Fremont near the Milpitas border that I was taken to by a former co-worker. A chinese gentleman who (like us) took his food VERY seriously. Mike & I went a couple times during our courtship. Maybe we could hit it up this weekend Mills? AFTER Friday night!?!?! ::wink:: OH yea, and the garage sale...

[Kirk]

Hi Mills - Yes Dim Sum is usally a breakfast/lunch thing. There's an art to timing your visit depending on the Restaurant! You want to avoid the masses, but also get all of the "good stuff" coming out of the kitchen!

Hi Jo - Let's see, another 10 hour drive.....hmmm.... ;o)

[Jack]

Gone for a few days and look what I've missed! I took a number of our friends out to China Max for dinner last week. They really enjoyed it (a few of them don't really care for spicy food...what a shame!) I will be sending a link to this entry so they can see your great pics a descriptions.