We all love dumplings. But how many bad ones have you gummed through, a bag of sticky dough glopped around greasy pork or thoroughly unidentifiable vegetable matter? Not that it matters much what’s actually inside them, once the vinegar-salt sauce served with them starts to eat away at your tongue. This isn’t an appetizer. It’s gastrointestinal cement, and you don’t have to stand for it.
Fortunately, the venerable Changsho offers a more palatable start to meals. Steamed shrimp-and-spinach dumplings — available only on weekends — come wrapped in a translucent, ricey pancake. Presented in an aluminum steamer basket, the tricornered dumplings are each filled with one whole, just-cooked shrimp, with a few leaves of emerald-green spinach stretched around them to give the whole package a toothsome snap. You’ll never miss the grease.
Served six to a pan, with that great hot mustard, these guys don’t deaden the tongue. Rather, they fire up the belly, and you just might find yourself asking for another six-pack for dessert.
Available for $7.95 for six, weekends only, at Changsho, 1712 Mass Ave, in Cambridge. Call (617) 547-6565.