I don't live in Montreal or anything, but I believe this place just opened up.
Pains Farcis Tianjin is a Northern style Chinese restaurant located on the second floor of a building in the alley of Chinatown (directly across from the public temple patio). The restaurant itself looks a bit outdated and dirty, but the restaurant itself is clean (though the decor looks very...Asian). The menu consists of mainly small dishes with a focus on steamed buns and dumplings.
We ordered the pork and leek steamed buns as well as pork and cabbage buns (we love buns...). The steamed buns take quite some time, but obviously it's for good reason. The steamed buns come freshly steamed in the bamboo containers and were nice and fluffy on the outside while maintaining some pretty juicy meat on the inside. The meat on the inside was a bit bland though as it could have used some more spices or come accompanied with something other than vinegar (though I hear it's how its done).
Sadly, we were the only ones there, but this also allowed for some good conversation with the owners.
This place could use a bit more marketing besides the stuff they have going on downstairs (random signs, Chinese music, etc). The owners were pretty friendly, but it is a bit alarming that the place was empty on a Saturday night. Hopefully, they get some more traffic. Good food at decent prices. Free wifi if you're looking for that.
Don't be fooled by the decor. This place looks like a dive, but has the most delicious dumplings I've ever had.
When we first walked it, I was like "wow, What did I walk into?" The decor looked like a throw back from the early 80s, complete with blinking ceiling Christmas lights and sticky chairs.
We ordered the pan fried dumplings and the xiao long bao. The food took an unusually long time to arrive. When the food arrived, it looked very impressive. The bao was so delicious and juicy. The pan fried dumplings came shortly after. And that was so good too! It was worth the wait.
Will definitely go back to try other stuff.
A cool new place with great tasting dumplings and gou bu buns...plus they have refreshing bubble teas.. Its not easy to find, its on the second floor but worth the effort.
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