An acquaintance who recently fell in love with dumplings during a tour of mainland China urged me to head to New Flavour for a taste of the real deal.

Makeshift signage on their window in the Balmoral shopping strip shouts that dumplings and “manual noodles” are the speciality here.

With at least a dozen flavours of dumplings to choose from, our first two picks were unavailable—a good sign that they make them in small batches and therefore serve them as fresh as possible.

So we chose beef-and-chive and pork-and-cabbage—both steamed, though for an extra charge you can have them fried. A $6 portion consisted of no fewer than 20 dumplings.

And indeed, they were fresh in flavour, the pastry had a bit of “al dente” bite and, dipped in soy sauce, they went down a treat.

The only minus was that the two fillings didn’t taste distinctly different.

About halfway through our platters we were satisfied (but by no means weighed-down full) so we doggy-bagged the leftovers. The next day, refried, they made another fine dinner.

Once we finished studying the menu we learned that New Flavour’s “manual” noodles are in fact hand-made.

They are served in a large variety of ways—mostly simple preparations involving a maximum of two flavours.

Several cold noodle dishes would make a superb light meal on a sticky mid-summer’s day, if the noodles are as good as the dumplings.

From the rest of the menu, which includes a section dedicated to “pork inside” (that’ll be offal) and such crypticisms as “diligent right fried chicken” and “pan explosion pork”, we played it safe and chose stir-fried mushroom and bok choy ($10.80) for an accompaniment. The huge portion was moist with chicken stock and also very salty.

This restaurant allows BYO wine. Décor is not a priority here; the badly arranged tables make it cramped and one wall is dedicated to a bank of refrigerators and stacks of cardboard boxes.

The waitresses became completely discombobulated when several groups arrived at once, and subsequently it was apparently good etiquette for customers to help themselves from the hot-tea dispenser.

But, if you’re an intrepid diner after that 5-out-of-5 dumpling, it feels all the more rewarding to find them in a place with 1-out-of-5 atmosphere.

Average that out: 3 out of 5.

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