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Chinese · Central Sacramento

Dim Sum House

Quick lunch or takeout near work.

Closed now $ Local FavoriteCasual VibesQuick Bite
5.0/10
Solid Scored by Danny Truong · How we score
№ 01 · The Brief

Broadway's Steady Corner Dim Sum Counter

Dim Sum House earns its regulars by doing a short list of things the same way, year after year. This is a corner counter at Broadway and 27th Street, next to Giant Pizza, with curb parking on 27th. It is built for takeout, not for lingering, and the menu makes that clear: BBQ pork chow mein, har gow, siu mai. The chow mein is the order that keeps coming up, a plate of noodles with char and sweet roast pork that reads as comfort food more than banquet food. Har gow and siu mai cover the dim sum basics without turning the counter into a cart-service hall; there is no rolling trolley here, just a kitchen turning out the classics to go.

That format fits the Broadway corridor, a working stretch of Sacramento where lunch needs to move fast and come in a container. The price sits at the inexpensive end, which matches the counter-service model: order, wait, carry it back to the office or the car. Longevity shows in the record. People who work nearby have been ordering for years, through what looks like turnover in who runs the day-to-day, and the food has stayed consistent enough that nobody seems to notice or mind the change in faces behind the counter. That kind of continuity matters more on a strip like this than any plating flourish would.

Dim Sum House isn't trying to be a destination room or a special-occasion stop. It is a neighborhood institution in the plainest sense: the place a cousin already knows to hit for dim sum, the plate a coworker orders without opening the menu. Cantonese-style chow mein and steamed dim sum, done as a quick, cheap, reliable lunch, is the whole pitch, and Broadway has room for exactly that.

№ 02 · What to Order

The order, from the record

№ 03 · Insider Tip
!

Get the BBQ pork chow mein if undecided, it's the order regulars default to, and expect curb parking on 27th Street since the lot is tight.

Danny Truong · Top of Sacramento
№ 04 · The Verdict

What earns the 5.0

01
Consistent chow mein

The BBQ pork chow mein has stayed the draw through apparent changes in who runs the counter.

02
Built for takeout

The format is quick-order, quick-exit, suited to a work lunch on Broadway rather than a sit-down meal.

03
Neighborhood reliability

Years of steady patronage from nearby workers point to a kitchen that delivers the same plate every time.

How we score

The Insider Score is our own 10-point editorial rating, set by the writer who covers the room. It is never an average of other sites’ stars, and it is never for sale. It weighs three things:

01Track record

How highly a kitchen rates, across how many diners, over how long.

02Consistency

Whether recent diners still agree with the long-term verdict.

03Distinction

What the kitchen does that its category does not.

Dim Sum House earns a 5.0, solid on our scale for Chinese in Sacramento.
Danny Truong
Danny Truong

Danny works the corridors: the pho counters of Little Saigon, the dim sum rooms, the kabob houses of Arden-Arcade, and the strip-mall kitchens that do one thing perfectly. He names the plaza, the cross-street, and the dish worth the drive.

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The new opening, the sleeper the score just flagged, and the one room worth booking this week. Free.