Grand Century – Wellington

It has been a very long time since I have been to Grand Century for Yum Cha and was overly surprised when my Uncle booked a family Yum Cha at this place as we usually head to Dragon. As to be suspected it was busy for a Sunday lunch but as we booked we were seated at our tables with breeze and also because my family knows the owner. The food came out at a steady speed and we had quite a few dishes.

Har Gow: Prawn Dumplings

These were really good. The skin was nice and thin and the filling had chunks of prawns inside. We were lucky that these came steaming hot and made them so much better.

Sui Mai; Pork Dumplings

These were nice, had a nice finely chopped up pork to them and a good amount of mushrooms. This was even better when you add chilli oil to it.

Pai Gawt: Pork Pieces

Small pork pieces of pork with gristle. This was really nice and had good seasoning. There was a nice amount of garlic and other flavours and usually, there is black bean to this dish and not sure if there was any. I ate the whole thing including the gristle as it was soft and easy to eat.

Prawn and Corrinder

Nice pieces of prawn in this dumpling with a slight hint of coriander. I really do not think you have this dish for the coriander though. Nice amount of skin and not too thick.

Roast Duck

This was really nice and had quite a few meaty pieces on the plate. It was nicely seasoned, not too fatty and had a good amount of pickled vegetables underneath.

Prawn and Chives

The skin on these was thicker and slightly easier to pick up, but I still prefer the thinner skin. Inside was a good amount of Chinese chives and had a good balance between the chives and the prawns.

Prawn Rice Roll

These were surprisingly quite short with large chunks of prawn but not whole prawns, which was disappointing. They tasted nice but the skin at the top was slightly hard and had a different texture from the skin at the bottom of the dish.

Spicy Beef Stomach

I do love my offal and I do like this dish. Beef stomach that is cooked slowly until it is tender. The seasoning in this is great, where it is spicy, lots of garlic and slightly sweet.

Savoury Dumplings

These came smoking hot, which was great. The outer skin was crisp and inside was chewy and sweet. The filling had pork mince and other things inside like a bit of mushroom and chives.

Beef Tripe

I do usually like this dish. However, not this version. The tripe was chewy as to be expected but the flavours were just ok.

Glutinous Rice

This was nice but made differently to what I am used to. Inside were mushrooms, Chinese sausage and other things. They were diced up and slightly mixed into the rice.  It was good but my nephew liked it more.

Fried Chicken

This is the Chinese version of Fried Chicken. It had a nice seasoning of five spice and had a nice crispness to the skin, the chicken flesh was nice inside and nicely cooked.

Pineapple Bun

This is my favourite dish when I go to yum cha. I love the crispy top of the bun and then the custard in the middle. The bread around the custard was nice and thin and great when served hot or warm.

Dan Tart; Custard Tart

These were good but I have had better. Even though the pastry was very flaky there was quite a bit of it. The filling was nice but the pastry was the letdown.

The great thing I love about Yum Cha is how you can have as many people as you want in your group and you can all get what you want. As I said this place was pumping. The great thing about having Yum Cha at a place that is busy, the food will be hot. Also if you manage to get a seat in front of the kitchen, that is the best place so it is hot and you get first choice. Food at Grand Century was really good, but the thing about yum cha in Wellington is that it is inconsistent. This time was good and would be happy to go back again, just make sure you calculate your tally sheet before you go pay.

Address: 84 Tory St, Te Aro, Wellington