A row of pan-fried dumplings landed on our table with whole shrimp tails poking out the ends, and right behind them sat five jet-black ones fused to one big crispy skirt.
That plate came out of Spice & Sea, the Qingdao seafood dumpling spot in the plaza beside Aberdeen Square, and it FINALLY soft opened on September 18.
We stumbled on the opening by accident.
Back in May, we reported on the signage going up in the old Kingwuu unit next to Master Rice Roll.
The sign reads Spice & Sea in English and 状元阁 in Chinese, with seafood potstickers and Chongqing noodles printed underneath as the two specialties.
Right now, only half of that sign is available on the menu.
The soft opening menu is mostly dumplings, with noodles coming soon according to the staff, so the Chongqing side is still a preview.
The dumplings are the reason to go anyway.
These are not the pork and chive potstickers you can find at every Richmond food court or Chinese restaurant.
The two headliners lean into the sea: cuttlefish and jumbo shrimp.
Beef and onion and pork and corn fill out the rest of the list, and every flavour comes as a 5 piece or 10 piece plate.
A five piece seafood plate lands just under $10.
We ordered the cuttlefish and the jumbo shrimp, mostly out of curiosity.
The plate came out steaming.
The shrimp dumplings sat in a row up front, tails sticking out like handles.
Behind them, the cuttlefish dumplings came wrapped in dark, almost black skins, all attached to a lacy crispy skirt that covered half the plate.
Every table has soy sauce, vinegar and a jar of chilli oil.
We slabbed chilli oil on ours and dug in.
The jumbo shrimp is the one I’d order again first.
Each bite was piping hot and super satisfying, with the sweetness of the shrimp coming through under the chilli oil.
The cuttlefish dumpling is milder.
It is just as juicy, though, with a pale filling flecked with green inside that black wrapper, and the skirt adds a slight crunch to every bite.
The room is simple, with yellow walls, red trim, wooden tables and a couple of booths, plus the logo printed on the window blinds.
It still feels like a soft opening.
The three TVs over the counter were blank when we went, with no menus up yet, so all the ordering happens through a QR code on your table.
Sides are small for now, like millet porridge and a two vegetable plate, and a few items were still greyed out on the ordering page.
We’ll need to come back once the noodles are ready.
Spice & Sea joins other recently opened Richmond food spots like Xiaoyu Bistro, Meeting In Chang’an and Dolan.
For more new and upcoming food spots in Metro Vancouver, take a peek at our tracker here, and subscribe to our weekly newsletter here.
Address: 4200 No. 3 Road #145, Richmond, BC V6X 2C2
Google decides which local food news you see. Tell it you want Noms
One tap adds Noms Magazine as a preferred source. No signup, no email.