Hung To Seafood Restaurant — Restaurant in South San Francisco

We came on a Thursday at noontime so I leave room for benefit of the doubt and COVID circumstances, but this meal was genuinely regrettable. We ordered 6 dimsum plates between two dim sum lovers. It took half an hour to receive the last plate after ordering (check-box menu style) and the first took ten minutes to arrive. Having worked in dumpling restaurants myself, I imagine the first eight to ten minutes might have been the time it took to put some frozen dumplings into a steamer. The following intervals may have been owed to a lesser number of stoves or staff, although there at least seemed to be a healthy number of front staff for the half-full restaurant.

Time taken aside, the meal itself was so disappointing that we couldn’t bring ourselves to finish. And that takes a lot! Any pieces of prawn were tough (perhaps from overcooking or recooking) and every dumpling was folded with skin so thick and starchy that I left pieces off. The har gows were broken and the xiao long baos were all skin (reminded me of pork rind), chewy meat and literally no soup. The prawns in the ha Cheung were shrunken and tough while the sauce, although fully absorbed into the folds held no flavour. We received the prawn crisp balls whole, had further difficulty tearing them open, and were met by an unmistakeable “this is not fresh” foot-like smell.

After pecking at the plates we took the leftovers home out of habitual guilt. We hate waste but I don’t expect anyone to be reaching for them before they end up in the garbage. It was worse than “below average”, it was terrible. We would have been better off ordering frozen from western brands at the...

I've been here for lunch a couple times, and the food is fine for a cheap establishment, but it's nothing special or worth going out of the way for.

Ha Gow - Mushy skin. Shrimp stuffing had a nice firm and smooth texture, but it's under seasoned. It needed more bamboo shoots for sweetness.

Siu Mai - Pork stuffing was tender, but there wasn't enough shiitake mushrooms and shrimp to balance out the flavor. Without the earthy mushrooms and sweet shrimp, the siu mai didn't taste as bold. If you're looking for exemplary siu mai, head to Koi Palace.

Radish Cakes (Loh Bak Goh) - Not enough dried and cured goodies to make them flavorful. The texture was also on the starchy side with not enough daikon flavor.

Steamed Spare Ribs (Pai Gwat) - The meat was tender enough to slide off the bones, and there was enough saltiness from the black beans.

Shrimp Rice Noodle Roll (Ha Cheung) - The rice noodle roll was delicate, and the shrimp had a pleasant firm texture. The shrimp could've been seasoned a little more, but this was one of the better dishes.

Steamed Tripe (Ngau Pak Yip) - The tripe was a little on the soft side for my tastes, but I thought it was my favorite out of everything we ordered. The ginger and white pepper gave the tripe a nice warm kick. More green onions would make it better, but I still liked it more than the other stuff.

XLB - Mushy skin, not soupy, red vinegar instead of black. Do not want.

We ate more things, but I think I've covered the stuff I remember. It's not terrible for a convenient lunch. The best part was that after tax and tip, it's about...

Just OK

It was a wild and stormy day. Always wanted to use that line.

Anyway, it was a very stormy Saturday morning. I mistakenly thought with such horrid weather, there would be less people out and about. Wrong. Place was packed, but we were seated right away. Even before we sat down, ladies with the food trays appeared. Shrimp dumplings (蝦餃), braised chicken feet (鳳爪) and shrimp noodle rolls (蝦腸). Surprisingly meh.

The 蝦餃 wrapper was too sticky and already disintegrating. The 鳳爪 was good enough, but I definitely have had better.

We also had glutinous rice dumplings (鹹水角), fried turnip cake (蘿蔔糕), Chinese broccoli, stuffed eggplants (釀茄子), Portuguese egg tart (蛋塔).

The egg tart was the strangest tasting one we've ever tasted. The crust was very flaky but had a strange taste. Butter? No. Lard? Not really. Don't know what it was, but it tasted different. Not delicious but not awful either. For a restaurant, certainly not a ringing endorsement.

The stuffed eggplants were cold and undercooked. We had stuffed sesame balls too. Not fresh. Too firm. Perhaps leftovers?

We've been looking forward to trying this place since it had such good rating. But, given the good fortune of so many other good dim sum places in the vicinity, it is highly unlikely for us to visit again.

Giving it a three star instead of two because the service was...