"For a recent friend hangout, we decided to dine at the Los Angeles-based restaurant group’s first Austin restaurant which opened in October. Because it was us, we ordered perhaps far too much that our two round tables could barely fit, but everything was delicious. In particular, the house-made dumplings — especially the xiao long bao, the mustard green wontons served in this really nice broth, and the wonderful chile oil ones — and the house-pulled noodles — the tingly Chengdu Zaijian noodles were fun. The sides were particularly nice, including the springy braised gluten with mushrooms and soft tofu topped with slices of thousand-year eggs. I was the lucky one who got to take home the leftovers, and the spicy cold jelly noodles worked well for lunch the day after. The casual ordering system is interesting — you have to play your order through the QR code on the table, but the service was surprisingly fast and friendly." - Nadia Chaudhury