We know it sounds petty, but leaving your yum cha brunch only to see a queue standing where there was no queue before really gives your full belly an extra golden glow. What they’re waiting for you’ve already got: it’s the ultimate reward for rising a little early to get to this super popular yum cha destination on the top floor of Market City in Chinatown. In fact, they open at 9am on weekends so you can make it breakfast if you’re a keen bean, or have kids that have roused you at some ungodly hour on a Saturday – there’s not a lot of dining experiences as welcoming to the under age set as yum cha, so take full advantage.
The long dining room is filled with big round tables around which sit dining chairs upholstered in colourful prints so that each table looks a little like a colour wheel. Take a seat and keep an eagle eye out for the steamed dumpling trolley, it’s the most elusive one in the stable and the barbecue pork buns are worth waiting for. Pork ribs are cooked down into soft yielding pieces of meat and fat in a thick garlic sauce, the roast duck is juicy and tender; and the prawns in rice noodles are fresh, slippery and divide perfectly around each little crustacean like it’s tucked into its own noodle doona.
Are you holding out for the final act? They get a full three-pointer for their mango pancakes, mango pudding capped with a pool of condensed milk and the coconut jelly, which is intensely tropical and creamy without being weighty.