Tai He Lou — Restaurant in Da'an District

I've eaten here (or take out) something like 30 times, it has never failed to impress. Consistently great food for a fair price. The lack of an english menu might be troublesome for some but they do have pictures or come with a friend. I would recommend the Steamed Vegetarian Buns, the fried jiu? tsai pastry, the shrimp xiao long bao, the cod or other fish (if in a group), the eggplant with basil or stir fried spinach. For dessert, the red bean with sesame 'flatbread'. I usually prefer it to Din Tai Fung and can almost always get a seat without...

I honestly don’t get the hype about this place. Most of the dishes are just too sweet. The stir-fried beef with scallions was overwhelmingly sweet with barely any savory flavor. The sauce for the crispy tofu was also sweet, and even the spicy sliced beef and tripe turned out sweet and spicy—which felt odd since it should be savory and spicy. To top it off, even the filling of the xiao long bao (soup dumplings) tasted sweet… Unless you enjoy overly sweet flavors, this place is really not...

My landlady recommended this place when I mentioned Din Tai Fung, and it did not disappoint. Their vegetable dumplings were amongst the best dumplings I've ever had! The pork ones are a tad better at DTF but overall, this place has a wider array of amazing foods and it's much cheaper. One downside is that they don't have an English menu, but it's not that big of a deal because the staff...