The short answer. Dim sum is a whole style of Cantonese eating: dozens of small steamed, fried and baked dishes shared at a table, sold in Australian restaurants as yum cha. A dim sim is a single item, an Australian adaptation of one of those dishes, siu mai, made larger and commonly sold with fish and chips. One is a meal, the other is a snack descended from a small part of it.
Spend any time in China and you will be met with the same greeting, over and over: have you eaten (吃了吗). It is a fair summary of how central food is to the culture. China has one of the largest and most varied cuisines in the world, and its dining etiquette is traced back as far as the Zhou Dynasty, 1045 to 256 BC.
Dim Sim and Dim Sum are not the same thing
They sound almost identical and they mean quite different things.
Dim Sum is the umbrella term for a whole range of small dishes, most of them dumplings. The phrase translates roughly as dot heart: food small and dainty enough to touch the heart rather than fill the stomach. The dishes can be steamed, fried or baked, and are served on small plates or in bamboo steamers. Barbecue pork buns, siu mai and custard buns are classics. In Australian restaurants the meal is usually sold as yum cha.
Dim Sim is a single item: a Chinese inspired snack of meat and vegetable filling partly wrapped in pastry. It descends from siu mai, and the name changed because siu mai proved to be a mouthful for English speakers. Australians eat it with fish and chips, which tells you most of what you need to know about how thoroughly it was adopted.
So: dim sum is a meal, dim sim is a snack, and one is a naturalised Australian version of a small part of the other.
What the dumpling says about where you are from
Johnny Wu, who has more than twenty years of Chinese and French culinary experience and cooked as head chef at Hulu at King Street Wharf, has described a clear split between Western and Asian palates. “Typically our Chinese guests enjoy the more salty, spicy dishes, especially if from Beijing,” he said, pointing to four day tea smoked duck and creamy red crab as consistent favourites.
The dumpling itself can narrow down a home town. Hong Kong tends toward the delicate flavour of a prawn dumpling. Beijing prefers barbecue pork or lamb buns. Shanghai means soup dumplings.
The timing shifts too. Dumplings are a breakfast dish in Guangzhou and Hong Kong terms, served at lunch there, and eaten at dinner in Beijing. Steamed or fried, they are best eaten hot, at whatever hour you get to them.
Where to eat on the promenade
King Street Wharf’s dining lineup changes over time, so rather than send you to a room that may have changed hands, the wharves guide lists what is currently trading along the promenade. For the story of how the precinct was built, see the history of King Street Wharf.
King Street Wharf’s own dining lineup changes over time, so rather than send you to a room that may have changed hands, browse the restaurants currently trading at King Street Wharf.
Deciding where to eat on the waterfront instead? The Darling Harbour restaurants guide walks the King Street Wharf promenade by occasion, from long lunches to late bars.