The Best Chinese Food in the United States

A strip-mall Northwest Chinese spot on Convoy where you order from a QR code and then forget you were ever annoyed about it. The menu leans on lamb, hand-ripped noodles, and aged vinegar with real tartness, and the cumin lamb arrives smelling like it has opinions. It's casual, cheap, and loud with the clatter of people ordering more than they should. Plan on leftovers, because the magic travels well.

The whole Peking duck arrives lacquered and ready for ceremony, and a Chinatown institution like this one has been running that ceremony for a long time. It's a roast-meat Chinese restaurant with a big menu behind the duck, including beef chow fun, egg noodle soups, and walnut shrimp for the table. The bird also turns up in fried rice and spring rolls if you'd rather skip the full production. There's a stall at Reading Terminal Market, but the original room is the move.

A high-ceilinged casual dining room with sizzling woks going on what feels like a hawker center's worth of burners at once, China Live sprawls across multiple floors of Chinatown to fit in a retail section, a cocktail bar, and a fine dining room besides. The main floor does Chinese cooking in several regional styles, from scallion breads rolled like cinnamon buns to mapo tofu that earns the word tingly. Chatty tourists fill the place, which seems to suit everyone just fine.

Two brothers who started cooking congee in their college apartment now run one of the more quietly singular breakfast and lunch spots in Seattle. The bowl is Thai at heart, so expect tom yum shrimp or mala lamb shoulder alongside the straightforward chicken, with seasonal riffs keeping regulars guessing. The New York Times put it on their Seattle list, which tracks. Open mornings through early afternoon only, so plan ahead.

The koi ponds in the dining room are the first hint that this isn't your average dim sum operation. Koi Palace is a sprawling, upscale Cantonese dim sum hall in Daly City that's been an anchor of the Bay Area scene forever, and the carts still move with unusual confidence. A James Beard semifinalist, it draws weekend crowds willing to wait for siu mai that skew smaller and fresher than the genre norm.

The handmade dumplings and rope-thick noodles in sesame paste have kept this Northern Chinese restaurant an anchor of Oakland's Chinatown for what feels like forever. The room is utilitarian in the best sense: Lazy Susans, communal tables, and staff who will seat you next to strangers when the place fills up, which it does. Order something chewy and don't expect to spend much.

Carpeted walls and glass cases displaying the day's ingredients signal that this isn't your average dim sum hall. Dragon Beaux is a contemporary Cantonese spot in the Richmond where the siu mai comes topped with crab roe and the barbecue buns have a crunchy sugar crust that makes you rethink every bun you've had before. Save room for the custard dumplings, which arrive looking demure and then absolutely don't.

The Ferry Building and Bay Bridge fill the windows of this upscale Cantonese restaurant and dim sum spot in Embarcadero Center, which feels more like a special-occasion destination than a Sunday cart-and-stamp-card affair. The space runs large, with sun-drenched rooms, intimate nooks, and an outdoor patio. Lunch brings an extensive dim sum menu; dinner leans into Cantonese classics. The coffee lava buns are the kind of thing you'll think about afterward.

Hand-pulled noodles are the whole point here, stretched to order and served in broth or dry, inside a no-frills shopping center on Buford Highway. This is a noodle shop that pulls Sichuan dishes into the mix alongside the namesake soups, and the roast duck bowl, bone-in and bobbing with bok choy, tends to stop conversation. A Michelin Selected restaurant with a James Beard semifinalist nod, it draws a serious lunch crowd that knows exactly what it's ordering before it sits down.

The cardstock to-go box comes with chopstick handles built into the sides, which is either the cleverest packaging in Phoenix or a sign that the city has simply been doing lunch wrong. This grab-and-go dumpling shop on a downtown corner keeps the menu short: pick your base, pick your filling, pick a sauce. The whole thing runs about thirteen dollars, which buys considerably more than whatever sad situation you had going on at your desk.

The dining room holds enough live-seafood tanks that you half expect a guided tour, but R&G Lounge is a Chinatown banquet-style restaurant where the point is the occasion. Dungeness crab fried in salt and pepper, black cod baked to the texture of soft butter, geoduck sliced thin for sashimi. The seafood swims until you order it, which settles the freshness question before it's even asked.

Long Gong is a Chinese banquet hall set so far west on SW Eighth that the road gives up and the Everglades take over. The tables are big enough to seat a dozen friends, each with a lazy susan roughly the size of a tractor tire. Dishes arrive in bubbling cauldrons kept hot over little grills, which makes a Wednesday lunch feel like someone's birthday. It sits at #23 on The Infatuation's Miami list.

The strip mall on Turkey Lake Road does nothing to prepare you for the room inside, which runs to chandeliers and private dining spaces with the full sweep of a Cantonese seafood clubhouse. Dim sum arrives made to order rather than off a cart, so everything lands hot. The selection runs deep, from siu mai and egg tarts to sticky pork dumplings with a crispy, mochi-soft interior. The Michelin Guide has taken notice, and the move is to come with a crowd and keep ordering.

This is a Cantonese dim sum hall out on Division, with a banquet-room floor plan and carts that never seem to stop circling. Come daytime for congee and shrimp rolls the color of a sunset, or after dark for whole crab fried with ginger and scallion. The parking lot is always packed, and a great uncle seems to be permanently posted outside. Tables turn slowly, which tells you everyone has settled in.

Pork and duck puffs shaped like little black swans are the opening move at this upscale dim sum house inside Ghirardelli Square, where the room earns its own attention with colored lanterns, tiled murals, and candle tea warmers. Classics come with upgrades: lobster where shrimp usually goes, squid ink in the fried rice. The bay-facing patio fills up fast on Sunday mornings with people who planned ahead, and a few who got lucky.

The carts are back, loaded with dumplings, chicken feet, shrimp balls, and sticky rice, and on weekend mornings a line forms outside before the doors open. Star Kitchen is a dim sum parlor tucked into a strip mall on Mississippi, the kind of room that rewards a large, hungry group with a working knowledge of chile oil. Dinner happens too, but the morning rush is the whole point.

A Hong Kong-style cafe in Quincy where the French toast oozes with creamy egg yolk and the ji cheung fun comes loaded with beef brisket or curry fish balls. The menu pulls from classic cha chaan teng tradition and gives it a modern, careful reworking. The chef earned a James Beard semifinalist nod and a Bon Appétit best new restaurant mention, which explains the regulars making the trip from the city.

A bright red neon sign marks this Sichuan restaurant tucked into a Tempe strip mall, where turquoise booths and mural-covered walls set the scene for lazy Susans loaded with mapo tofu, braised eggplant, and the Chongqing-style spicy chicken that Phoenix Magazine named one of Arizona's top dishes. The batter is thin and shatters, the peppercorns do their characteristic lip-numbing work, and the portions are large enough to make you reconsider your afternoon plans.

The twice-cooked pork here is the thing to order first: thin, crispy cutlets in a glaze that toggles between sweet wine and sharp vinegar, a signature dish of China's Dongbei region. This casual Chinese cafe in University City has become a go-to for regional cooking that doesn't smooth its edges for anyone, with bold Chengdu chicken and hot crisp fish rounding out a menu that makes the drive from anywhere in St. Louis feel like a reasonable life choice.

Yunnan province cooking, where the flavor map runs spicy and sour rather than rich and savory, is the whole point at this fast-casual spot. The chef grew up near the borders of Thailand and Vietnam, and her handmade dumplings, chile eggplant, and lime-ginger peanut salad taste like it. A veggie sampler lets you graze across most of the menu in one go, which is lucky, because narrowing it down is hard.

The xiao long bao arrive as tightly pleated, hand-folded pouches that release a rush of pork broth the moment you bite in. This is a casual noodle and dumpling shop where Sichuan heat is the organizing principle, landing not just on the tongue but behind the eyes. The chile oil wontons and dry-rubbed wings deliver real numbness, the satisfying kind you talk about afterward. Ramen and other noodles round things out, though the spice-forward dishes are what most people can't stop thinking about.

Carts trundle through this spacious Cantonese dim sum hall on weekends, and by midday the entrance is already a bottleneck of people clutching numbered tickets. Point at what rolls past: lacquered duck, chewy lo mein, dumplings, fried wontons. The servers are moving fast and the tables are crowded and dimly lit, and the whole operation hums along in cheerful, productive disorder. Phoenix New Times handed it Best Dim Sum in 2025.

Red umbrellas cover the ceiling, a dumpling-making station runs in full view, and various family members compete to greet you at the door before George can get there. This Chinese American restaurant in north Dallas has been around forever, and co-owner April Kao still travels to China each year to pull regional ideas back into the menu. Handmade noodles and egg foo young anchor the regulars, but the dumplings are why Dallas Observer handed them a Best Dumplings nod.

The name is a trap, and a good one. Tucked inside a market on Buford Highway, this Cantonese counter spot hangs roast ducks in the window and lines its walls with numbered food photos so ordering is almost embarrassingly easy. The portions run large, the duck is lacquered and serious, and the honey barbecue pork earns its own return visit. Chamblee's stretch of Buford Highway is Atlanta's great culinary equalizer, and this is one of its reliable anchors.

On weekends, an announcer calls reservation numbers over a booming speaker like high-stakes bingo, and the crowd outside barely fits through the door. Inside, this cavernous Brooklyn dim sum palace runs on steaming carts and trays shuttled through a gold-accented dining room. Eyes do most of the ordering. Weekdays are considerably calmer, which some people quietly prefer.

Dim sum carts still roll through this cavernous Cantonese dining room inside the Gold Coast casino, just off the Strip, which is its own kind of statement. The open kitchen turns out roast duck and walnut prawns alongside the steamed, baked, and fried parade from the trolleys. The lotus-wrapped sticky rice bundles and XO fried rice rolls are the ones to flag down. A full Cantonese menu runs all day for anyone who wants something more substantial.

The carts find you before you find your seat, which is how it works at this Flushing dim sum hall. Oversized round tables, ornate chandeliers, bamboo plants, and enough shumai to reconsider your weekend plans. No menu required; most regulars never open one. Weekends get loud and frenetic in a very satisfying way, so an early arrival is less a suggestion than a survival strategy. The Michelin Guide has it listed among their selected restaurants.

Dale Talde's Hong Kong-style restaurant sits inside a carriage house on a sprawling Hudson Valley estate, where the dining rooms look like someone inherited very good furniture and actually kept it. The menu runs kung pao wings alongside bao stuffed with crispy shrimp and daikon, the kind of cooking that's both nostalgic and quietly restless. Dressy-casual crowd, unhurried pace, and a setting that makes Tarrytown feel like a reasonable destination.

The carved wooden panels and semi-private booths signal that this is not your average strip-mall Chinese restaurant, even if the exterior gives nothing away. A full-service Chinese dining room in Hartsdale drawing multigenerational families on weekend nights, it runs classics like garlic-pepper shrimp and slow-cooked Beijing duck with real kitchen discipline. The chef earned a James Beard semifinalist nod, and the Michelin Guide has taken notice too.

This is a small, family-run Northeast Chinese spot in a Chandler strip mall, where one wall is so thickly framed with press clippings that the decor doubles as a reading list. The dumplings are handmade in assorted shapes and sizes, and the soup dumplings arrive with chewy skins and scalding broth, so patience is a skill here. Order at a casual counter pace, wear whatever, and bring someone who'll split the cumin lamb.

A tea bar up front handles quick orders while the real action unfolds at the long communal tables in back, which tells you everything about how Cha Kee operates. It's a Hong Kong bistro in the thick of Chinatown, with a menu that runs from wonton soup to beef chow fun to a dim sum list that could keep a table debating for twenty minutes. Portions are built for sharing, and the groups who pack those banquettes seem to know it.

The glowing dining room sits one floor below MoMA, all sweeping wood grain, sleek banquettes, and a long bar that runs at full tilt. This is an upscale Pan-Asian restaurant from the Altamarea Group, working through Chinese and Singaporean classics with a precision that matches the neighborhood's price point. Soup dumplings arrive with black truffle; the clay pots come packed with crispy rice. The crowd tends toward people who dressed for the occasion.

The name promises a brewery, and the beers deliver, but there's not a burger in sight: this is a Chinese bistro serving dim sum and family-style plates, with local flowers, crafts, and secondhand books arranged around the room for browsing before or after. Some dishes run spicier than others. It reads like someone's eclectic living room, except the kitchen knows what it's doing. A second location operates nearby in Fenton.

Peter Chang's Dupont Circle restaurant is a sleek, minimalist Chinese dining room that takes its visual cues seriously. The kitchen follows suit with careful, polished takes on classic dishes, from soup dumplings with genuinely superb broth to Beijing duck available in half portions, a small mercy for tables of two who still want the whole experience. Pastry chef Pichet Ong handles dessert, which is reason enough to save room.

A large window into the kitchen lets you watch steam rise off the bamboo stackers all day long, which sets the mood nicely for this casual dim sum shop in an Arcadia strip mall. Everything is ordered from a menu rather than plucked from carts, so bring a plan. The team behind Sea Harbour in Rosemead runs this one, and regulars who know that pedigree tend to fill the tables early on weekends.

Sleek, polished dining room in Winter Park where the Sichuan menu runs long and the family-style format rewards indecision. The kitchen leans into layered heat rather than straight-up fire, coaxing complexity out of chili oil, fermented cabbage, and bold broths. Service keeps things warm rather than formal, which the room's clean lines might otherwise suggest. A Michelin Selected pick for the Orlando area.

A wall of bottles greets you before the menu does at this Sichuan restaurant on the second floor of Pacific Renaissance Plaza, where the room runs plain white booths on one side, black tables down the middle. The classics are all here, portions run large, and the kind of heat that leaves your lips tingling is reliably on offer. Service can drift, but the mapo tofu tends to restore goodwill fast. Bring someone to share with.

Din Ho is a Cantonese barbecue restaurant in a North Austin strip center, where glistening ducks and slabs of pork hang in a window by the front door like a very appetizing welcome committee. The menu runs long into noodle soups, clay pots, and seafood, portions are big, and prices stay easy. It's loud and family-style, with big round tables, and it's listed in the Michelin Guide as a Selected Restaurant.

The strip mall setting hides nothing, which is sort of the point: a Sichuan Chinese restaurant in Tampa that saves its drama for the plate. The menu pulls from classic Sichuan technique and the northeastern Chinese heritage of the team, so the range runs wider than you might expect. Portions are serious, and the dry-fried chicken buried in chilies and peppercorns is not subtle. Come hungry and possibly with a cold drink already in hand.

A case of lacquered meats behind the counter does most of the advertising at this Cantonese barbecue stall inside Mills Market. The team came up through the food truck circuit and landed here with roast duck, char siu, and crispy pork sold by the pound or over steamed rice. Dim sum rounds out the menu, and the fried mochi pork dumpling has a faint sweetness that earns its place. The Michelin Guide lists it among its selected restaurants.

The refrigerators hum louder than the dining room at this bare-bones dumpling shop tucked into the back of a City of Industry strip mall. Water is available if you ask, and the menu makes more sense once you find the poster on the wall. None of that matters much when handmade dumplings arrive with fillings like lamb with fennel or pork with lotus root, and noodles come glossed in scallion oil.

The chewy, seafood-studded rice noodles are a reason to organize a group dinner in San Gabriel, which is exactly how this Southeast Asian seafood restaurant operates best. Chinese, Thai, Cambodian, and Vietnamese cooking styles all converge on one very long menu, and the servers genuinely steer you away from decision paralysis. Salt and pepper crab is the move, but the beef loc lac quietly earns its table space too. Selected by the Michelin Guide.

Strip-mall Sichuan in a Cordova shopping center, which tells you nothing until the mapo tofu arrives and your tongue goes briefly numb. Petals of a Peony is a casual Chinese restaurant that built its reputation on the kind of chili heat that requires planning ahead. The portions run large, so a group and a willingness to order past the point of reason are your best tools here. The Michelin Guide has it on their list, which tracks.

A Sichuan restaurant tucked along a quiet block near Bryant Park, where Midtown office workers have been eating around the secret for years. The kitchen runs on chili oil and Sichuan peppercorns, the kind that leave your lips buzzing pleasantly long after the bill arrives. Scallion pancakes, pork dumplings, braised fish with bean curd, and the spicy hot and sour noodles all make a case for themselves. The Michelin Guide has it listed.

Dragon murals climb the brick walls of this Hong Kong-style restaurant and bar tucked off the main road in Shaw, which means half the fun is finding it. The room goes dark and candlelit, the cocktails lean playful and strong, and the menu runs from cheung fun to chili wontons to glossy soy-and-ginger pork ribs. Fortune cookies arrive at the end, though the wisdom inside reportedly skews more Gucci Mane than Confucius.

Counter seats face a glass-enclosed kitchen where you can watch the noodles being pulled to order, which makes waiting feel less like waiting. This Lanzhou-style noodle shop in a strip mall off Colonial Drive keeps the focus narrow: long, hand-pulled strands in clear beef broth with tender shank, a bowl that earns its reputation one slurp at a time. Pan-fried dumplings round out the menu for anyone who shows up hungry enough to order the whole table.

Hunan cooking gets less Bay Area attention than its Cantonese and Sichuan cousins, which makes this snug Millbrae restaurant worth knowing about. The heat here comes with smoke and funk, built from cured meats, fermented black beans, and pickled chilis rather than pure fire. Grab one of the carved booths in the back if you can, where you're close enough to the kitchen to feel invested. The Michelin Guide has had its eye on this place for a reason.

Hand-pulled biang biang noodles are the point at this counter-service Xi'an noodle shop in Midtown, an offshoot of the original out in Duluth. You order, you grab a paper plate, you find a seat. The cooking leans on cumin and chili in a way that feels more like a region asserting itself than a kitchen showing off. The boiled dumplings, pork or lamb, come by the baker's dozen with a house dipping sauce that does most of the talking.

The glass-enclosed kitchen at the front is the first thing you notice, and if you can grab a table facing it, you'll watch the whole operation. This Sichuan spot in Chinatown is named for its signature dish, a fiery pickled fish with sour greens that comes in sizes running up to a platter for six. The wontons in chili oil are a foregone conclusion. A long list of cold sides fills out the table without much effort.

Live tanks of crab, lobster, and flounder line the back wall, which sets the tone for what this Cantonese dim sum house is doing differently from its strip-mall neighbors. Weekend mornings draw Chinese families through a wide rotation of steamed, baked, and fried dim sum, the dumplings carefully pleated and the barbecue pork buns doing their thing. Evenings shift toward the seafood tanks. The Michelin Guide has it selected.

A spacious, no-frills Chinese restaurant that pulls a crowd big enough to suggest most of Tampa is in on the secret. The menu swings wide, from orange chicken and salt-and-pepper calamari to clay pot-braised fish with a deeper, earthier pull. Lunch brings a separate dim sum menu with dumplings, turnip cakes, pineapple buns, and Hong Kong-style egg tarts, which is the move if you arrive before the dinner rush swells the room.

Counter service, seat yourself, bus your own table: Zoe Ma Ma runs like a family kitchen that happened to open a door to Pearl Street. The chef behind the counter makes everything from scratch, and the Sichuan cooking leans homey rather than showy. Dan dan noodles are a constant, but the rotating daily specials are worth checking before you order. Prices are low enough that you'll probably order one more thing just because you can.

A few blocks from Ocean Beach, this old-school Northern Chinese restaurant in the Outer Sunset has been feeding the neighborhood forever. The cumin-spiced lamb is the reason regulars make the drive, though the beef pancakes, flaky and properly oily, make a strong argument for staying longer. Big bowls of thick noodles fill out the tables, and the date-stuffed mochi arrives warm and sugar-dusted. Fog outside, comfort inside.

Red Plate is a Cantonese fine-dining room tucked away at the Cosmopolitan, small enough and quiet enough that you forget you're a few floors above a casino. Tea-based cocktails share the menu with evening dim sum and roast meats, and a whole suckling pig or duck can be ordered ahead if you're organized or celebrating. The chef was a James Beard semifinalist for Best Chef: Southwest.

The pastry case up front, stacked with crepe and box cakes in flavors like durian and chestnut, hints that this Aurora-border spot plays by its own rules. It's a small, easy-to-miss Hong Kong-style restaurant where the chef's special section does the heavy lifting, and several of the greatest hits aren't on the menu at all. Ask about the salt-and-pepper tofu, and call ahead if you want crab or lobster.

The cumin lamb buns alone might justify a drive to Englewood, but this lively Sichuan restaurant on South Broadway is stacking reasons to come. Dry pepper eggplant, pickled pepper beef, and wok-fried lotus root all land on the table with serious color and contrast. There's a full bar running fruity retro cocktails, which somehow fits. Westword named the mapo tofu among Denver's best in 2025, and the room tends to agree.

The menu has a section called "America's Popular," which tells you everything you need to know about where the kitchen's heart actually lies. This counter-service Sichuan spot runs a long list of chile-heavy, mouth-numbing dishes built around Sichuan peppercorns, and the portions are sized for sharing. Come with people, order widely, and leave the safe column alone.

The glossy-skinned Peking duck arrives whole, gets carved tableside, and sets the tone for everything else at this Chinese restaurant tucked into Tivoli Village. Dim sum, wok-fired beef, chile-oil fish, and silky noodles follow in a dining room that leans unapologetically palatial. The kind of place where the weekend crowd shows up with a plan and still ends up ordering more than expected.

The poached chicken arrives slippery and silky, its fat shocked into a jelly under the skin, but the fragrant rice cooked in chicken broth is what keeps Singaporeans texting each other excitedly. This is a no-frills chicken rice shop on Ninth Avenue doing a very specific thing very carefully, rooted in a family recipe that traces back to a legendary Singapore original. The New York Times named it among the 100 best restaurants in the city.

The salt-and-pepper chicken wings at this old-school Cantonese restaurant in Chinatown have a following that borders on devotional. Wok-tossed with garlic and jalapeño, the crunch when you bite in is audible across the room, which is either a party trick or a warning, depending on your table neighbors. The rest of the menu holds its own too, but the wings are why regulars come, and why they stay a little longer than planned.

The fish is in there somewhere, buried under a brick-red avalanche of dried chiles you have to ladle aside to find it. This Chinatown Sichuan restaurant is famous for that má-là one-two punch, the numbing tingle of peppercorns chasing the heat of the peppers, and the hour-long wait out front suggests the neighborhood has opinions about it. When Dungeness crab is in season, it arrives stir-fried with salted egg yolk.

Sam Wo has been around forever, which in San Francisco's Chinatown means it has survived earthquakes, closures, new ownership, and the slow creep of chow mein tourists. It's an old-school Cantonese noodle house where the move is the steamed rice rolls stuffed with char siu, served with a swipe of hot mustard that will clear your sinuses immediately. The tea program has gotten an upgrade, with oolongs and pu-erhs now on offer, though the rice porridge with fried doughnut remains unchanged and deeply comforting.

The mahjong lounge in back tells you everything about the vibe at this Penn Quarter American Chinese sit-down. The menu runs from crab rangoon spiked with Old Bay to mapo tofu that takes the spice seriously, and the Chongqing chicken arrives buried in chilies as a statement of intent. Fresh noodles and leek fondue give the lo mein a comfort-food pull that's hard to argue with. Fun, loud, and not pretending to be anything else.

The Taishan roast chicken arrives head-on, carved tableside by a server wearing two layers of gloves who tears it apart with her bare hands. This Cantonese restaurant in Chinatown is one of the few places left that stays open deep into the night, which means the 2 a.m. crowd runs from solo diners working through a clay pot of eel rice to the chefs from Four Kings. Named among San Francisco Chronicle's top Chinese restaurants in the Bay Area, it earns the spot at any hour.

The steamed-up windows are the first sign you're in the right place. Hon's is a no-frills Cantonese noodle house in Chinatown, been around forever, and the wonton soup is the reason: thin noodles, plump pork-and-shrimp dumplings in a clear broth with a deep, funky dried-shrimp backbone. The scallion pancakes are hard to skip. Lunch crowds move fast, solo diners fit right in, and the whole thing costs almost nothing.

The sugar-crusted barbecue buns have a following serious enough to cause shortages. Ming's Tasty is a no-frills dim sum shop in Oakland's Chinatown, the kind where takeout orders go out the door in stacks and the breakfast and lunch crowds spill onto the sidewalk. The fried shrimp balls are famously frilly and bouncy, the siu mai lands every time, and the line, when there is one, moves faster than you'd expect.

A dim sum restaurant attached to a Sunnyvale Ramada Inn sounds like a punchline, but the kitchen-feed TV looping footage of cooks pulling noodles and stir-frying greens sets the tone quickly. This is a spacious, serious dim sum house with a sunroom and patio, serving har gow, barbecue pork buns, and chicken feet glossed in sweet sauce. The house chile oil quietly runs the whole operation. Black charcoal buns filled with salted egg custard are the crowd favorite.

The facade is papered with photos of the original owner posing with Jackie Chan, Emeril Lagasse, and Jacques Pépin, which tells you most of what you need to know. This old-school Hong Kong seafood spot in Chinatown has been around forever and draws a late-night crowd that arrives hungry and slightly chaotic. The wok runs hot, the garlic-fried prawns arrive crunchy to the heads, and the salt-and-pepper calamari is what you order when the evening needs a proper ending.

The rice noodles here are stubby and chewy rather than the thin, rippling sheets you'd find elsewhere in Chinatown, and that texture is the whole point. Chang Lai is a tiny Cantonese noodle shop on Bayard where the regulars from the old street cart days have simply followed the owners indoors. Curry fish balls and noodles with all the sauces will run you around five dollars, which leaves you no excuse not to go twice.

One of the last dim sum parlors in Chinatown still rolling carts through the dining room, House of Joy fills fast on weekends, and the wait outside can stretch past an hour if you don't arrive early. Worth the patience: plates of rice noodles, pineapple buns, and chicken feet run a few dollars each, and the room itself, loud and bustling and completely unbothered by trends, does most of the convincing.

Polished concrete floors and olive-green banquettes replaced the worn carpet when City View moved to its new spot overlooking Portsmouth Square, and the room now reads more gallery than dim sum hall. The classics still show up on the carts, though, and the baked pork buns arrive airy with a crackly top. A sleeker option than the old-school palaces nearby, and the San Francisco Chronicle named it among the best dim sum spots in the Bay Area.

Soup dumpling shop where the windows let you watch the pleating happen before the steamer basket lands on your table. The xiao long bao are supple and broth-heavy, and the pork and crab version goes a shade yellow from the crab fat, which tells you everything you need to know. Noodle bowls and dry-fried pork chops round things out. Modern, sleek, always busy, and named among the Bay Area's best Chinese restaurants by the San Francisco Chronicle.

Handmade dumplings folded in a bright counter-service spot inside the Westside Paper complex, a refurbished industrial sprawl on the west side of the city. The menu is compact on purpose: soup dumplings, potstickers, buns, a few noodle dishes. The New York Times put it on its list of Atlanta's 25 best restaurants. Order the lamb and cilantro dumplings if they have them, and they'll tell you if they don't.

A golden dragon installation anchors the back of this sprawling Alameda dim sum hall, where Lazy Susans spin constantly and the noise level confirms everyone is having a good time. Siu mai and har gow are done right, and the golden shrimp rice rolls, crunchy fried shrimp wrapped in chewy rice noodle sheets, are the kind of thing you keep ordering before the last plate is gone. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's top dim sum spots.

The steamed taro buns here are shaped like little pigs, which tells you something about the mood. This is a neighborhood dim sum house in the outer Richmond where the har gow are fat with filling and the siu mai are delicate enough to make you forget the trek out Balboa. The menu stretches well past brunch into roast squab and clay pot brisket, and the prices run noticeably gentler than downtown.

Gold flower fixtures hang from the ceiling of this grand San Leandro banquet hall, where the projectors are always ready for the next big event and the dim sum carts have been replaced by tablets. It's a multigenerational scene, grandparents and kids at the same table, tea steaming alongside turnip cakes. The strawberry taro balls, crunchy outside and custard-oozing within, tend to stop conversations mid-sentence.