Great Wow soft opened a few weeks ago in San Diego, specializing in Northern Chinese-style dumplings.
There really aren’t any places in San Diego where I enjoy getting dumplings, so I didn’t initially have high hopes about this place. But after a pretty positive review from Kirk, I just had to check it out.
The restaurant is still in its soft opening stage, so they were operating with a limited menu. The interior of the restaurant is quite roomy, taking over the space formally occupied by Goldfish World. The set-up is pretty simple and clean, with wooden tables, a few pictures of their menu items on the walls, and a large open window into their dumpling room so you can observe dumplings being made.
Each table is given a set of sauce dispensers to create their own dumpling sauce.
They offer a variety of cold vegetable and meat dishes. Priced at $2 or $3, these were quite reasonable prices.
Cucumber and Bean Curd Noodles
This was a fairly generous plate for $2. The flavors were a little lacking, as I could only really taste the chili oil. Usually these types of cold marinated vegetarian dishes also use sesame oil, soy sauce, etc.
Marinated Tripe
Again, a pretty generous portion, but I also wish there was more to it than tripe with chili oil.
Pork Egg Chive Dumplings
Our dumplings arrived pretty quickly, plump and steaming, served on a plate with a little section carved out to add dipping sauces.
The skins of the dumpling were just right for me. A good thickness to provide some texture but not too thick that it would taste doughy. Each dumping had a generous amount of filling.
Beef Mushroom Dumplings
I didn’t like this filling quite as much. I normally don’t choose beef filling for boiled dumplings, but I felt we needed something different to compare. I found the filling a little salty, and the mushroom flavor lacking.
Overall though, we did enjoy the dumplings. While they aren’t quite at the level as some of my favorites, they are better than most of the dumpling offerings in San Diego. Service was also pretty good and attentive during our visit and our food arrived quickly. As we were leaving, I spotted a table that ordered steamed buns that looked pretty good.
Menu:
Great Wow
3860 Convoy St, San Diego, CA 92111
I went to Great Wow last night and I actually enjoy it a lot. The dumplings & boas are delicious. One of the mushroom dish we got was surprisingly yummy. Although there were not many people eatting at the restaurant last night, I hope they will do well! https://www.instagram.com/p/BKUXwLCgnJl
glad you enjoyed it!
Great that you got to try Great Wow. Personally, I’m not a big fan of beef jiaozi; don’t like the texture, nor the flavor.
I’m not either, but the other pork ones seemed too similar and the “vegetarian” ones with shrimp didn’t quite seem as appetizing.
The two vegetarian dumplings on the menu both list shrimp….
haha, yup! I noticed that as well when I was at the restaurant. There are quite a few menu errors, but hopefully they’ll get it right when they get the final menu done.
I love the pictures! I remember when people were excited about Tasty Noodle opening some time ago (w/ their homemade dumplings, baos, ets). I’m also not a fan of beef dumplings b/c I didn’t grow up eating them. I’m reading the menu now – what is aweto soup? I wonder if the kung pao chicken steamed bao is a novelty item or actually pretty good
if you google it, you can see some photos of aweto. It’s a chinese medicinal/herbal ingredient