flâneur

On yum cha - Jess Ho

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Pour the tea.

I don’t know who needs to hear this but you cannot have Italian yum cha. You also cannot have barbecue (as in low and slow) yum cha, Filipino yum cha or any cuisine other than Cantonese yum cha. Call it what it is: a few shareable dishes in a brunch service a restaurant wouldn’t normally hold with bottomless, watered down, first-pour spirits and a glaring absence of tea. (Don’t roll your eyes at me, I have received media releases on all of these brunches before.) Just to be clear, ‘yum cha’ means to drink tea and ‘dim sum’ means to touch the heart. You’d be surprised how many times I’ve…

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