When in Guangzhou or Shunde right... If not going for street food stalls, then the natural choice for breakfast would be yum cha i.e. morning tea. So, we had several yum cha sessions during our seven day Guangzhou & Shunde food tour. Of these, I like Xiang Yun Sha in Shunde the most.
Xiang Yun Sha is located a short 10-minute walk from Beijing Lu pedestrian street. Xiang Yun Sha is a 5-Star hotel, and their in-house restaurant serves dim sum, lunch and dinner for hotel guests and general public.
Nice contemporary decor, comfortable, pleasant environment to enjoy our morning yum cha. It looked like a grand banquet hall suitable for functions. It is normally full house during yum cha hours.
Okay.... they don't have pushcarts and actually none of the yum cha places we visited during this trip had pushcarts 😔
Quite sad that even in Guangzhou / Shunde, the iconic pushcarts are carted off to the history books.
We ticked off mostly familiar dishes in the menu slip.
豉油皇炒面 Noodles stir fried with superior soy sauce. A humble but iconic dim sum dish. This was a little greasy, savoury and just alright.
生滚肉片粥, 枸杞猪润粥, 生滚生菜鱼片粥, 生滚牛肉粥 We had four different types of congee - I love the same piping hot, velvet smooth, sweet savoury, thick gruel with different fillings from lean pork slices to liver to fish and beef. All nice and fresh.
冲菜牛肉肠粉 The savoury sweet beefy rice roll or chee cheong fun with beef filling. Soft tender juicy flavoursome comfort staple of the Cantonese.
蜜汁叉烧肠粉 We also had rice roll with char siew filling. Forgot to take a picture 😂
水晶鲜虾饺 Har kow or shrimp dumpling is one of my favourite dim sum when the prawns are fresh, crunchy, sweet and wrap in thin stretchy skin.
Yes, Xiang Yun Sha's rendition was the way I like my har kow 👍
榄角蒸排骨 There's something about steamed pork ribs which I just gravitate towards.
It's that fall-off-the-bone tender meat wrapped with melt-in-the-mouth soft fat attached. It's that sweetness complemented by subtle savouriness and a touch of aromatics from olive (in Xiang Yun Sha's rendition).
蟹子鲜虾烧卖 Most people would order siew mai on reflex at dim sum places (perhaps because it is one of the four heavenly kings of dim sum - siew mai, har kow, char siew bao, and egg tart). But, I usually skip it as I find it too meaty and often not that tasty either.
Turns out Xiang Yun Sha's rendition was quite nice. The key was good quality pork. The tender sweet pork was punctuated with bursts of umami from popping prawn roe.
远年陈皮牛肉球 Beef balls are one of my favourite dim sum items. Seldom seen in Singapore except in higher end places, so any chance to try it overseas, I will get some.
Ah... This was so good! The beef ball was soft tender moist with savoury sweet juices oozing from every bite. The beef was fresh! There's also aromatics and the taste of dried tangerine peel which took this beef ball up another few levels. Skilful use of dried tangerine peel makes everything taste better.
Xiang Yun Sha's beef ball is a must!
XO 酱萝卜糕 Umami savoury sweet flavours were on point but the carrot (radish) cake was done a little soft, breaking apart when held by chopsticks.
凤城鲮鱼球 When in Shunde, my personal mission was to eat as much dace fish as possible. Dace fish is one of the main sources of protein in the Pearl River Delta for over 2,000 years. Eating dace fish is part and parcel of being Cantonese.
The grounded dace fish flesh was tender with a gentle spongy chewiness. The moist meat was sweet with additional sweetness from chopped aromatics in the mix with ground fish.
Love this.
古法马拉糕 I am always fascinated by what the Cantonese call Malay cake. The origin of Malay cake is still being debated. 🎗Shall research it in the future. Meanwhile, just enjoy it lah 😋
Spongy, full of air pockets throughout, not overly sweet. Nice.
Our total bill for this meal came to RMB488 (SG$90).
For our seven day foodie trip, our total shared food bill came to SGD200 per pax for the entire trip. There were six of us, and we also paid for our driver / guide's share as we invited him to join us during meals.
Come to Guangzhou / Shunde have to experience yum cha and you will be spoilt for choice. Can consider Xiang Yun Sha - I found it quite nice here.
Restaurant name: Xiang Yun Sha Garden Hotel 香云纱园林酒店
Address: 25 Qinghui Rd, 大良 Shunde District, Foshan, Guangdong, China, 528300
Written by Tony Boey on 8 Mar 2025
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