What Is Dim Sum? Dishes, Etiquette & How to Order
Dim sum (點心) is a Cantonese meal of small steamed, fried and baked plates shared around a table and eaten with pots of tea. The meal itself is called yum cha (飲茶), literally "drink tea" — the tea is not an accompaniment, it is the frame the food hangs on. Portions are three or four pieces, so a table orders widely rather than deeply.
The dishes worth knowing
| Chinese | Cantonese / Mandarin | English | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 蝦餃 | haa gaau / xiā jiǎo | Shrimp dumpling | The benchmark dish. A translucent wheat-starch skin around whole prawns |
| 燒賣 | siu maai / shāo mài | Pork and shrimp siu mai | Open-topped, often finished with a dot of roe |
| 叉燒包 | cha siu baau / chā shāo bāo | Barbecue pork bun | Fluffy steamed bun, sweet-savoury pork inside |
| 腸粉 | cheung fan / cháng fěn | Rice noodle roll | Silky sheets wrapped around prawn, beef or pork, sweet soy poured over |
| 鳳爪 | fung jaau / fèng zhǎo | Chicken feet | Braised soft. A texture dish, mostly skin and gelatin |
| 豉汁蒸鳳爪 | si jap jing fung jaau | Chicken feet in black bean sauce | The version you will actually see on most carts |
| 排骨 | paai gwat / pái gǔ | Steamed pork ribs | Bite-size ribs with fermented black bean and garlic |
| 蘿蔔糕 | lo baak gou / luó bo gāo | Turnip cake | Radish and rice flour, pan-fried until the edges crisp |
| 春卷 | cheun gyun / chūn juǎn | Spring roll | Fried, usually vegetable or prawn |
| 流沙包 | lau saa baau / liú shā bāo | Salted egg custard bun | Molten centre. Bite a small hole first or it will run |
| 蛋撻 | daan taat / dàn tǎ | Egg tart | Flaky or shortcrust pastry, custard baked just set |
| 糯米雞 | no mai gai / nuò mǐ jī | Sticky rice in lotus leaf | Chicken, sausage and mushroom steamed inside the parcel |
| 牛肉球 | ngau yuk kau / niú ròu qiú | Steamed beef balls | Bouncy, scented with dried tangerine peel, served on bean curd sheet |
| 灌湯餃 | gun tong gaau / guàn tāng jiǎo | Soup dumpling | Large dumpling served sitting in its own broth |
| 煎堆 | jin deui / jiān duī | Sesame ball | Fried glutinous rice, lotus seed paste inside |
| 馬拉糕 | ma laai gou / mǎ lā gāo | Steamed sponge cake | Eggy, brown-sugar, very light |
| 咸水角 | haam seui gok / xián shuǐ jiǎo | Fried glutinous dumpling | Chewy shell, savoury minced pork filling |
| 芋角 | wu gok / yù jiǎo | Taro puff | Lacy fried outside, mashed taro and pork inside |
| 皮蛋瘦肉粥 | pei daan sau yuk juk | Century egg and pork congee | The standard congee order |
| 油條 | yau tiu / yóu tiáo | Fried dough stick | Eaten with congee, or wrapped in rice noodle as 炸兩 |
How ordering actually works
Two systems exist, and older restaurants run both. The first is the tick sheet: a paper slip listing every item by name, with a column for quantity. You mark what you want with a pen and hand it to a server, who stamps it and brings the food. The second is the trolley: staff push heated carts between tables, lift the lids so you can look, and stamp your card for whatever you take.
Prices are grouped by basket size rather than by dish. The card is stamped in columns marked 小點 (small), 中點 (medium), 大點 (large) and 特點 (special), with premium categories above that. The bill is the count of stamps in each column, so you rarely see a per-dish price at all.
Tea comes first. A server will ask what you are drinking almost before you sit down, and the answer determines the pot on your table for the rest of the meal.
Tea, and the etiquette that goes with it
Pu-erh (普洱) is the default: dark, earthy, and the traditional match for fried and fatty plates. Chrysanthemum (菊花) is floral and caffeine-free, good for children and for anyone who has had enough tea. Tieguanyin (鐵觀音) is a roasted oolong, and jasmine (香片) is the lightest common option. Ordering a mix of pu-erh and chrysanthemum together is standard and has its own name, 菊普.
Two habits are worth adopting. When someone fills your cup, tap the table twice with two bent fingers rather than saying thank you out loud — the gesture keeps conversation intact and everyone will notice if you do it. And when the pot runs dry, tip the lid up on its hinge or rest it half off the pot. That is the signal for a refill, and staff will take it from across the room without you calling out.
What it costs and when to go
Dim sum is a daytime meal. Service usually starts early in the morning and winds down in the early afternoon, and the best kitchens simply stop steaming when the session ends. Weekend late mornings are the peak, when whole families arrive and the wait for a table is longest; a weekday morning gets you the same food in a calmer room.
Cost varies more than the food does. Neighbourhood tea houses are among the cheapest sit-down meals in Hong Kong, hotel dining rooms cost several times that for finer wrappers and a quieter room, and the difference is largely in the setting. Trolley service tends to sit at the older, cheaper end.
How to eat it well
- Everything is shared. Order three or four baskets to start, eat, then order again. Ordering everything at once means cold food.
- Don't stack the steamers. Leave them where they land so staff can count and clear them.
- Serve others before yourself when a new basket arrives, and pour tea for the table before your own cup.
- Sauces are on the table: chilli oil, soy, and sometimes XO sauce. Rice rolls and buns need nothing; ribs and turnip cake take chilli well.
- Eat the dumplings first. Har gow and siu mai are at their best in the first minute out of the steamer.
One thing to prepare for: the tick sheet is often printed in Chinese only, with no English column and no pictures, and the trolley staff in the older halls may answer only in Cantonese. Photographing the sheet and reading it in your own language turns a guessing game into an actual order, and it is the difference between eating five dishes you chose and five dishes that happened to pass your table.