Xi’an Famous Foods Team Debuts a New Dumpling Restaurant

The masterminds behind popular local noodle chain Xi’an Famous Foods just opened a completely new restaurant in their old Chinatown space: Dumpling Spot, a fast-casual restaurant focusing on, as the name suggests, dumplings. The new restaurant is in soft opening at 67 Bayard St. The outpost of Xi’an Famous Foods formerly in that storefront moved to a bigger space at 45 Bayard St. last week.

Dumpling Spot serves a short menu featuring both fried and boiled Northern Chinese-style dumplings, also called jiaozi. Options include Three Treasures dumplings (pork, shrimp, chives), chicken and chives dumplings, pork and cabbage dumplings, and veggie dumplings filled with bok choy and mushrooms, as well as items like guihua flower-infused sweet congee, or winter melon in clementine sauce.

For now, an order of ten Three Treasures dumplings costs about $10, while an order of ten veggie dumplings costs about $9. Everything costs under $13, though portion sizes, prices, and the number of menu items may change in the future.

Notably, most of the menu items at Dumpling Spot are unique from the dishes at Xi’an Famous Foods locations — making it a markedly different restaurant. Xi’an Famous Foods currently only offers two kinds of dumplings, a spicy and sour lamb and a spicy and sour spinach. The company’s other restaurant Biang has a different name, but it largely serves the same dishes that the fast-casual chain offers, just in a full-service setting.

The restaurant chain from CEO Jason Wang and his father David Shi started as a tiny stall in Flushing and has been in expansion mode recently. It now has a dozen locations in New York City, and with a new central kitchen in Queens, the company plans to be ubiquitous in the city and beyond.

Dumpling Spot will hold its grand opening on Saturday, February 25 from 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Anybody who follows Xi’an Famous Foods on social media (Facebook/Instagram/Twitter/Weibo) will receive five free dumplings. It’s not yet clear if this new restaurant will be popping up all over the city, too. Stay tuned.

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