Update (July 2022): this place in Mountain View closed down sometime during the pandemic - how sad! But the same owners reopened recently as Zongzi house in San Jose. Yay! Haven't tried it yet, but if you have, let me know how it is in the comments below!
I snapped this adorable photo of Mr. Eng bringing a zongzi to our table, and I instantly knew that I wanted to highlight this family business as the first one on my Bay Area blog.
Eng's Zongzi is a relatively new mom-and-pop shop in the Mountain View neighborhood. It's owned by Mr. and Mrs. Eng and opened up within the last year. From what I've heard, Mrs. Eng has been cooking and selling these zongzi and dumplings out of her home kitchen in Fremont for many years now. And now they have a store-front!
This shop is easily accessible because it's right on El Camino Real. (This location used to be Chef Xiu, a Chinese restaurant with a different owner). You can swing right in, find a parking spot up front, and order a zongzi or frozen dumplings at the counter.
Just a heads up, there can be a line because this place is becoming quite popular. And they can sell out of their dumplings quickly!
So back to zongzi. What is it? Zongzi is a Taiwanese style sticky rice tamale. It's wrapped in these banana leaves and it's piping hot inside. The sticky rice has different filling likes pork, egg, veggies, red bean, etc... It's quite dense so it fills you up!
Here's the menu at the time we visited. Simple, cheap, and delicious!
We ordered the pork, mushroom, and peanut zongzi, and a vegetarian one.
Once you order, you can either take it to go or eat it there. There are only a few tables inside the place to eat and some outdoor tables. We wanted to eat it there, so we plopped down in some seats and eagerly awaited our zongzi.
The anticipation is sometimes the most fun part. We saw him bringing some zongzi out to the couple at the table next to us, which made us even hungrier!
Ahh it finally arrives! We unwrap it, smell it, and then take a satisfying bite. Mmmm!
This one is really good!!
We receive the vegetarian one too and unwrap it. It's good, but I like the pork one better!
After we eat, we order another one, LoL.
Satisfied after, we wanted something to drink. So we headed over to Tea Era on Castro Street for some boba (not too far away!).
Yum! That hit the spot to end a wonderful meal.
So to summarize, check out Eng's Zongzi in Mountain View for some delicious zongzi (especially if you've never eaten that before)!
We'll definitely go back and we want to try their dumplings too. They don't serve dumplings hot there, but you take the frozen ones to go and cook them at home.
Shoutout to my friend Kristin for telling me about this amazing place!
Comments