"Three things in life are certain: death, taxes, and the line at Dumpling Home. So when you’d rather not wait (or brave the Friday night Hayes Valley chaos), go to Dumpling Zone instead. The Forest Hill restaurant has a near-identical menu of steamed, boiled, and pan-fried dumplings (even down to the green, hedgehog-like vegetable dumplings), and is much easier to walk into. Go for the pan-fried pork bao, which are like puffy balloons full of savory soup and tender pork, or the crab and pork xiao long bao highlighting delicate, chewy wrappers. " - julia chen 1, lani conway, patrick wong