Dim Sum @ Jade Village Restaurant, Taman Connaught, Cheras

What better way to spend Sunday morning with your family than sipping tea and indulging in some dim sum.

Apparently, the stretch of road in Taman Connaught is famous for their dim sum, so we headed here on a Sunday morning to hunt down a good place to eat. It is said that dim sum is to Cheras what char koay teow is to Penang. There were several shops serving dim sum, but we finally settled for Jade Village Restaurant, a newer looking restaurant which has recently undergone some refurbishment.

Only 8am, and the place was bustling. However, we were quickly seated at a table and served Chinese tea in a pot. This restaurant does not have a dim sum menu, but rather they do it the traditional style here, whereby the servers walk around each table with trays of dim sum and you basically choose what you want and dig in.

We usually order lots of deep fried stuff, but here we only tried the Deep fried prawn dumplings and Taro dumpling (wu kok). Usually the prawns used in dim sum in restaurants such as this are pretty small, however I was surprised that the prawns used here were of a decent size and fresh. The batter was crispy, however I would have preferred them better if they were hot off the deep fryer.

The Taro Dumpling or deep fried crispy yam cakes (wu kok) on the other hand, were different from the ones we usually encounter. Instead of pork filling, this one came with prawn filling. Not bad, but I prefer the one with pork filling.

Surprisingly, the highlight of our dim sum breakfast were the steamed items. The Hong Kong style chee cheong fun (rice noodle rolls) with king prawns was the best tasting dish of the day, we ended up ordering 2 portions of this. The chee cheong fun was smooth and the accompanying dried shrimp paste was very good.

The char siew pau (steamed bun with Cantonese BBQ pork filling) was very good, I liked the filling as it was extremely flavoursome.

The spare ribs steamed with black bean sauce was also very tasty.

Baby C had steamed fishballs (surprise, surprise), and she finished them all on her own so it must be good.

We tried 2 types of steamed prawn dumplings (har gao), one with whole prawns and another with chopped up prawns wrapped in a translucent rice flour skin. Prawns were plump and juicy!

Steamed whole prawn dumpling

Steamed minced prawn dumpling

We loved the gyoza dumplings we used to get in Wagamama, so we were pleased to see it being served here. The gyoza dumplings (pot sticker) were good, shallow fried thinly rolled dough with pork filling eaten with a soy/vinegar/ginger dipping sauce.

We also tried some of their yong tau foo variants, brinjal and bittergourd stuffed with fish, served with a sweet/chilli sauce. Average tasting.

There are 2 items which are made to order, xiao long bao (steamed dumplings filled with minced pork and broth) and lo bak go (pan fried turnip cake). We ordered a basket of xiao long bao, but as usual, it failed miserably. The skin was way too thick. I have come to the conclusion that once you have tried the xiao long bao in Din Tai Fung, no where else can compare. We did not order the lo bak go, but it does look pretty promising. Maybe next time.

A must-have dessert for me is the customary egg tart. And don't they do gorgeous egg tarts here! The pastry was wonderfully light and flaky and they were still warm from the oven. Even after all that dim sum I've just eaten, I managed to eat 3 of them. So good, that sometimes we stop just to tapau (buy back) some of these egg tarts to eat at home!

Another dessert we tried was the deep fried sesame balls with pandan paste filling.

Verdict: Thumbs up for their steamed dim sum and desserts!

Dim sum available from 7.00am to 3.00pm.

Also available here is steamboat, from 6.00pm to 10.30pm.

Price: Very reasonable. Prices range from RM2.60 to RM6.00. We paid under RM60 for 3 persons (we had a total of 16 items).

Location: Jade Village Restaurant, 2 Jalan Cerdik, Taman Connaught, 56000 Cheras, Kuala Lumpur.

Tel: 03-9101 2497

GPS Coordinates: 3.081423, 101.738784