My sister was a picky eater growing up, but there was always something for her at dim sum. She avoided crowd-pleasers like barbecue pork buns. What she wanted was beef tripe. My parents had told her ...

Some years ago, I took a visiting restaurant critic from New York to one of the grand dim sum palaces of the San Gabriel Valley, with a multitude of rolling carts, and many tables of 10 or a dozen, ...