Say, have you been to the new mini-Chinatown in Paris? No? Well, look no further than the 4e…read morearound Rue Volta/au Maire, right next to the Musee du Arts et Metiers. It's a bona-fide Chinatown complete with Chinese restaurants, markets, cheap cellphone stores and crap souvenir/merchandise dealers. However, unlike the old Chinatowns of most Western Cities based upon a long history of hardship, this one isn't Cantonese - it's a new Chinatown staffed by Wenzhou/Shanghai immigrants, informing a different set of cooking styles, primarily targeting nouveau-riche mainland Chinese visitors. If you are looking for Cantonese dimsum, you won't find it here.
This brings us to Traiteur d'art du Ravioli. It has a pompous name - the art of Ravioli. they haven't mastered the art of Ravioli making, and frankly, what they sell isn't ravioli - it's Chinese dumplings, or jiaoji. How can you be master of an art that you are not making? Furthermore, is it really dumpling the Chinese grandma way? Here comes a swing from the cluebat - when it comes to jiaoji, there is a lingua franca style. Like Turkish Doner or a New York pizza, purists look for a standard way of prep - in this case - Shandong style - thin skinned, ruffled seals on top, napa cabbage and pork stuffing, a hint of shaoxing wine, boiled in water, dressed with vinegar and soy. The Chinese Northerners consider themselves the true heirs of the dumpling making the same way New Yorkers consider our style of pizza to be the standard and the metric to which it is judged. Whenever a random Chinese person walks into a dumpling place, the assumption is that the place is Shandong style.
I did say that this Chinatown is not Cantonese, and they certainly do not make it Shandong style. The dumplings are simply what you expect Wenzhou immigrants to cough up when they are strangers in a strange land trying to turn labor into Euros, and you will see it in the ingredients - for example, their triple ingredients dumplings (N04) is made from chives, shrimp...and eggs. Which is strange, considering that most other places doing the triple uses pork, shrimp and chives (and sometimes shitake mushrooms instead) The pickled cabbage + pork version (N01) points definitely to a more Jiangsu provincial influence, as does their Daikon+Pork version (N05). The flavors were, well, I wouldn't say that they are bad, they are merely okay - the skin on the jiaoji aren't tender enough, the fillings aren't jucy enough, and the flavor is not quite there. I mean, I am not about to say that they taste bad, it's just merely
serviceable. Do order their fried noodles, though - they are pretty good. Keep in mind that a) the place isn't very clean (their restrooms don't give you the sensation of being hygienic) b) Their flavors are only so-so and c) service is typically Chinese - curt and prompt, but not warm whatsoever d) You are in Paris as a visitor. One refuge meal is enough, really.
When it comes to bang for your traveling food bucks, it's cheaper than menu formule at the local brasserie and about the same as McD or a sandwich at Boulongerie Paul, but then, if you are cheap and eating out all the time while in Paris, put on your dunce cap and sit at the corner - you can do much better buying ingredients from Monoprix/Carrefour/Picard/local markets and cooking your own. This place won't cure your homesickness as much as make you wonder why you left China in the first place.
