All You Can Eat Dim Sum at Red Lantern, Solaire Resort & Casino

My friends Jennie and Florence treated our group to a stuff-your-face-silly dim sum lunch at Solaire Resort and Casino.

The private rooms in Red Lantern were beautifully appointed.

There is a minimum consumable fee of P20,000 if you want to dine in private.

I really liked the Chinese calligraphy stickers on the glass walls.

Our group of 10 wanted a round table so we can converse with each other. They said there were no tables for 10 because of their wide and comfy chairs. Hmmm I count 10 people on this table.

They sat us at this long table and I didn’t even get to talk to half of my friends.

Only the early birds got this really cute bag chair.

Just like Finestra they used really nice tableware. The dinnerware was from famous French brand Bernardaud. Click here to see a similar pattern sans the red lantern.

I simply adored and coveted the teapot. It was so heavy! The house tea was light and had a floral scent which we all enjoyed.

Red Lantern menu (click to enlarge)

picture from Solaire’s Facebook page

Ordering was simple. Just tick the items you want and the food will be brought to your table. Execution by the new and inexperienced staff made the process confusing. Food that we already consumed still kept coming while the ones we were waiting for took a long time to arrive.

Dim Sum menu (click to enlarge)

I was in charge for ordering for 6 people on our side of the long table. I basically ordered 90% of the menu and I posted the pictures in the same order as listed on the menu.

My strategy was to order 1 item of each and just re-order the ones we liked best. This way we get to try more food without getting too stuffed. It also minimized food leftovers.

Generally the dim sum was okay. There were some I wouldn’t order again and some we ordered multiple times. I didn’t put any rating on the dishes I wasn’t able to try.

SOUP

sweet corn soup with chicken

hot & sour ‘Szechuan’ soup with seafood

STEAMED

shrimp dumplings with coriander & water chestnuts

I appreciated that their menu had unique items like this squid ink dumplings with scallops. I didn’t really taste the squid ink but I enjoyed the tender scallops.

✔ ✔  squid ink dumplings with scallops

There were some items that I ordered but never arrived and a couple I didn’t order like these beef balls and the vegetable dumplings. I never liked beef balls so I didn’t try this.

beef balls with crunchy green vegetables

The pork siopao was good but really small so make sure you order more.

✔ ✔ ✔ glazed fluffy barbecued pork buns

The glutinous rice was one of those items that we ordered a lot of. We started by sharing two rolls then ended up eating more than one roll each.

✔ ✔ ✔ glutinous rice with chicken & salted egg in lotus leaf

The sticky rice was soft and moist and the filling was very tasty. This didn’t need any soy sauce at all.

Even though I didn’t order this I tried it and was quite pleased. The wrapper was thicker and stickier than the standard dim sum wrapper. Veggie lovers will like this.

✔ ✔  vegetable dumplings with fermented red bean curd

The flavor of the chicken feet was really good, sweet and spicy, but it was really, really malnourished.

✔ ✔  steamed chicken feet with X.O. sauce

RICE ROLLS

The rice roll wasn’t bad but there was barely any shrimp or barbecued pork inside.

✔  shrimp & parsely rice rolls

DEEP FRIED

We all loved the crispy Bean curd skin roll filled with shrimp. I didn’t taste the jackfruit though. We ordered 4-5 plates of this.

✔ ✔ ✔ deep fried shrimp in bean curd rolls with jackfruit

Too bad I ordered this when everyone was already full. Take your typical shrimp & cuttlefish ball and coat it with a generous amount of sliced almonds. I loved the crunch!

✔ ✔ ✔ deep fried prawn & cuttlefish with almond flakes & thyme

This is the Chinese version of gyoza. The filling of ground pork and chives was quite juicy.

✔ ✔ Shanghai pork dumplings with chives “Wo Tie””

mashed yam puff dumpling with minced pork & black pepper milk sauce

These bite sized egg tarts with a very flaky crust was in the deep fried section instead of the dessert section.

✔ ✔  oven baked egg tartlets

I love barbecued pork pastries more than the siopao version because of the flaky crust. Red Lantern’s version was almost as good as those in Hong Kong.  The glazed walnuts were a welcome addition. We also ordered 4 plates of this.

✔ ✔ ✔ golden barbecued pork pastries with walnuts

While some of the food was mediocre the radish cake was positively disappointing in spite of the chicken floss which couldn’t save the super starchy, bland and almost radish free cake.

✖ pan fried radish cake with chicken floss

RICE AND NOODLES

If the dim sum isn’t enough to fill your tummies there are a few fried rice and noodle dishes you can try. These two were not bad at all.

✔ ✔  fried rice with barbecued pork

✔ ✔  crispy noodles with chicken in brown sauce

CONGEE

century egg & pork congee

I ordered six safe and familiar pomelo and mango sago for all of us and just one chilled osmanthus flower & wolfberry with aloe vera to try. We ended up enjoying the refreshing jelly like cubes in a sweet, floral syrup more. Even my friends from the other side of the table ordered this.

✔ ✔ ✔ chilled osmanthus flower & wolfberry with aloe vera

✔ ✔  chilled pomelo & mango sago

This is Richard the very capable manager of Red Lantern. If you order from him the food will come out in a jiffy and in the right quantity. I told him about the several ordering snafus we experienced and he guaranteed it will improve on my next visit.

Richard Hong, restaurant manager

tea choices

check please!

Overall I enjoyed the food MUCH more at Red Lantern than at Finestra.

✖ skip it
✔ not bad
✔ ✔ do order
✔ ✔ ✔ MUST order

Red Lantern

Solaire Resort and Casino
Entertainment City (Near SM Mall of Asia) Parañaque 
telephone: +632-888-8888
click here for the map and directions
website
Facebook