Eight seats, three staff, impossibly light dumplings: Tiny shop leaves a big impression

I said I wouldn’t write about this restaurant. A friend told me about it late last year in exchange for secrecy. Aunty’s gravity-defying dumplings – plump yet light as chiffon – were bound to bring queues.

But then word got out anyway and on some days 1600 dumplings were flying out the door. Now I can write about Aunty’s Dumplings with a clear conscience. Well, mostly clear.

Some may think it’s unfair to direct more attention to a business run by three family members, who make every dumpling by hand and visit fishmongers, butchers and produce stalls up to four times a week for the fillings. What if they get overwhelmed?!

But the flipside is more money to hire staff and perhaps give the owners the odd day off. And eventually bigger premises, with more seats. Small business economics aside, I want more people to appreciate the craft of the Zhao family.

There are dumplings on nearly every street in Melbourne’s CBD, and then there are these. They may not look as intricate as xiao long bao with their whorl of pleats, but these humble Northern Chinese-style pouches are just as dainty. The wrappers nearly melt on your tongue, each one rolled out that day by Joris and her mother, Guixia Li. Nothing is cooked from frozen.

You can see it all – the rolling, the big bunches of water spinach, the dumplings being dropped into scalding water – in a large open kitchen that takes up most of the restaurant. Having spent hundreds of dollars on pottery courses and walked away with misshapen pots of all descriptions, I cannot overstate how impressed I am by this dexterity.

Each tender dumpling skin becomes one with the delicately seasoned fillings, of which there are eight. A grassy note envelops sweet hunks of pearl-coloured prawn bound with minced pork. A mellow mix of mackerel, pork and garlic chives is a study in restraint, the sometimes fishy quality of mackerel kept at bay by precise ratios, Joris later tells me.

The recipe is from her family’s hometown, Jinzhou, in the far north-east of China, where her retired parents lived until about two years ago. Now – after migrating and opening this as a hobby – they dart around their bright little shop, serving guests and warning them not to burn their mouths on hot dumplings.

There are dumplings on nearly every street in Melbourne’s CBD, and then there are these.

Watching a plateful of dumplings disappear brings me the same satisfaction as playing Snake on a Nokia 3210 once did. But the neat little folds of Aunty’s, the ripples in their fine wrappers, are too good to simply demolish.

Plus you’d miss all the extra touches that give these bundles character. Vegetable dumplings – often a disappointing assortment of watery vegetables – are packed with wood ear and shiitake mushrooms, carrot, celery, vermicelli and more. A beef guotie, the “why not both” dumpling with one crunchy side, hums with what I thought was five spice (Joris wouldn’t confirm or deny).

In the north-eastern classic of pork with Northern Chinese pickled cabbage, the pork is so smooth it’s more like a paste, with an enjoyable fattiness that the cabbage occasionally jolts off its axis.

Sides bring crunchy or QQ (bouncy) textures to the table. Matchsticks of crisp carrot, beetroot and cucumber are dressed with chilli oil and black vinegar, a hard reset for your palate. Slices of ultra-firm tofu capped by a layer of pork and century egg jelly have a Top Deck look (yes, the Cadbury’s chocolate) and so much bouncy bite they nearly ricochet around your mouth, a texture you’ll either love (me) or hate (you’ve been warned).

You may need to wait for a table and you might not score a kitchen-side spot to watch the Zhao family in their orange aprons. But even wall-facing seats have charm. In front of you, small ceramic figurines with giant dumplings for heads rest in meditation poses, some kneeling, others cross-legged. They dream of dumplings. When they’re this good, we all do.

Good Food reviews are booked anonymously and paid independently. A restaurant can’t pay for a review or inclusion in the Good Food Guide.