Nonna dumplings — Restaurant in Darwin City

Easily one of the best (if not the best) wheaten food (面食, not just dumplings) restaurant in Australia!

This inconspicuous little shop is an absolute hidden gem which run by authentic Taiwanese people and located in Darwin of all places (no offense Darwin, let me explain). Google wants you to give scores on three fronts, food, service and atmosphere, so let's take a look at them.

Usually for a restaurant, there's always the good, the bad, the ugly. That is there's something they're good at, and something they not so good at, and a little bit that's just down right bad (the so-called bomb, in Chinese “雷”). But there's no such worry at this place. If you have decidophobia (difficulty in choosing as you might have guessed), you can simple close your eyes and blindly point at the menu, and order whatever you end up with. You're guaranteed to have the best meal and surprise yourself at the same time. That's how equally and (more importantly) consistently good everything is. I'm a native Chinese myself, I've had my fill of authentic wheaten food (dumplings, steamed buns, noodles and so on, those are just the three most basic ones best known to the West btw). And I've scoured Chinatown in Melbourne and Sydney. In my experience so far, this shop is the best amongst all of them by a mile. It's got pretty much the same taste as the top restaurants at home. That is extremely rare and a very difficult thing to do giving the natural of Chinese food (and just some FYI and personal ranting, those so-called Chinese takeaways in little white boxes are NOT CHINESE WHATSOEVER!!). I make steamed buns myself occasionally, I know how their fillings are supposed to be prepared and stuffed, and this is the only place that's doing it the right way which is actually a critical process in order to produce the flavour. One would expect to find this kind of shops in much larger cities, because that's where they'd thrive. That's why I was surprised to find such a good shop in a relatively small city like Darwin, not to mention the excessive heat all year around. I wonder why they decided to settle here? Should have asked when I was there.

There is one restaurant in Melbourne that makes some decent wheaten food (decent enough for Westerns who never had the real stuff and desperate locals who have no choice anyway). As long as that shop's open, there's always a long line in front of it. Imagine what would happen if Nonna were to open their shop in Melbourne. There'd be people wrapping around the four corners of the block.

As for service, probably due to the size of the shop, the organisation and relationship between the staff feels so much like a family, and their manner towards the customers are just as warm, and always with a genuin smile on their faces. Whatever you need, just ask. At the same time, accurate and flexible in service. You can't ask for much more than that.

I did say "little shop" in the beginning, and it really is. Less than a dozen tables are enought to fill the place up. Traditionally, this kind of restaurants are called "苍蝇小馆" (literally "restaurants as small as flies"). They're often some of the most favourable places for people to visit, and not just for meals, because of it's coziness and closeness. During my visits on my holidays, I could tell that most of the customers are regulars. They don't even dine-in, they just come in, order something, go away for a bit and come back to pick it up then eat the food at home. Essentially the restaurant has become their kitchen. I think that's the best place a restaurant can be and the highest honour there is. Not some Michelin stared, over-priced, ornamental decorations. Food is for eating, not for looking or used as props for telling stories that the the cooks themselves don't even believe in.

So let's review the three aspects again, i.e. food, service and atmosphere, shall we? The food is top-notch. The service is the best. And atomosphere is good enough for natives to...

A big fan of Din Tai Fung, I was happy to hear about a Xiao Long Bao (soup dumpling) joint open up in Darwin. Less than a week after opening, I finally rocked up for lunch with a friend, just before noon.

First thing I noticed, I don't see the terms of 'Xiao Long Bao' or 'soup dumpling' show up anywhere. Instead they referred to what I believe would have been Xiao Long Bao as 'juicy dumplings' Not sure why, but I guess that's there marketing team/owners.

When we went to order, apparently there were none available, and the friendly waitress encouraged us to order only one serving of juicy dumplings to share (instead of one serve each), showing that they were currently molding these to order. Instead she strongly pushed for us to order steamed pork buns and fried dumplings.

Eventually after some confusion, and burdened by the pangs of hunger, we acquiesced, and agreed to two pork buns, and a plate of fried dumplings to share, along with one serve of juicy dumplings to share (only to save time).

The pork buns were nothing special, my friend enjoyed them, I was apathetic about them.

The fried dumplings, my friend also enjoyed, less so for myself. I didn't eat my share and offered him to finish mine.

Finally the 'juice dumplings' arrived! Some were in fact juicy and full of the soup/broth, others were dry. The chilli vinegar sauce they provided was a little substandard and lacking in oomph.

One positive is they served us cold (chilled?) green tea, which was a nice accompaniment to the meal.

All up, I would only return for the juicy dumplings and no more. For Taiwan or Singapore I'd give this place a 2 star rating, but given this is Darwin, I think a 4 is generous...

Fabulous! We have been travelling for almost a month and after arriving in Darwin I needed a fix of some seriously good fried dumplings ! After a quick Google and reading through others reviews we decided that Nonnas’ was where I had to go- and we weren’t disappointed!

You know it’s going to be good when you walk in the door and the staff are busy making dumplings by hand and prepping other items because they know they’re going to have a rush before closing for the day. We ordered our dumplings and some rice and were blown away by not only their size. But the amount of filling, and good, real filling- noticed crap that’s so minced you can’t tell what it is.

I had never tried kimchi dumplings so we grabbed those and the pork and chive- how awesome to find someone who doesn’t reduce the flavour or chilli heat ! These dumplings were amazing.

If you haven’t been here, put it in your list and grab yourself some seriously awesome dumplings as soon as possible. The staff are welcoming and friendly which always makes your experience that little bit...