Fort Worth’s Getting a Much Needed New Chinese Restaurant With Dim Sum Chef Power — Your First Look at Teddy Wong’s Dumplings

A new Chinese restaurant, which are in short supply in Fort Worth, is headed to Rosedale Avenue. Teddy Wong’s Dumplings & Wine is taking over the former Le’s Wok restaurant space (which was home to a 7-Eleven before that) in Southside.

If you have traversed near the intersection of Rosedale and Lipscomb, you’ve driven past the shell of Le’s Wok, which closed nearly two years ago at 812 Rosedale Avenue. Now, the space is coming back to restaurant life thanks to Chef Stefon Rishel, who owns the nearby restaurants Wishbone & Flynt and Tre Mogli Italian.

Rishel has joined forces with two other partners — Jeffery Yarbrough of Club Clearview and Blind Lemon, and Patrick Ru, the chef behind Bushi Bushi Dim Sum.

“This is Patrick’s food and menu,” Rishel tells PaperCity Fort Worth. “But wait until you taste his stupid-good soup dumplings. The wrapper is so delicate and thin, you’re almost scared to pick them up with chopsticks.”

Ru was born in Hong Kong and he opened a popular restaurant in Brooklyn called Mr. Bun, before making his way to Texas.

Teddy Wong Menu Staples

So what can you expect on the new Teddy Wong’s Dumplings & Wine menu? Soup dumplings, dim sum dishes, Mongolian beef, orange chicken, chili oil fish, whole Peking duck and scallion pancakes will be staples.

When Teddy Wong’s opens in May or June, it will serve lunch and dinner seven days a week. The storefront will be stocked with Asian staples such as house-made chili oil, green tea and teapots, and even ivory and wooden chopsticks for purchase. Rishel notes that the restaurant will only serve beer and wine, but a membership option will allow a lucky few regulars to store their favorite tequila or whiskey. Rishel seems very adamant that those are the only two liquors they’ll store at Teddy Wong’s Dumplings & Wine.

The long communal table will be stocked with takeout meals during what Teddy Wong’s will call Night Market hours. You’ll be able to grab a full meal with instructions for heating at home. Teddy Wong’s also will be available from third-party delivery services.

Teddy Wong’s is going to be every man for himself ― no reservations. On  busy days, you may need to come early or come late to snag one of the 18 or so tables and 10 spots along the bar.

Rishel describes Teddy Wong’s location as “pushing the Southside and Fairmount mentality. We want it to be the cornerstone of the community.”

Unlike the former Le’s Wok restaurant it’s replacing, Teddy Wong’s Dumplings & Wine will have real cutlery and tablecloths on the tables. Rishel says the atmosphere will be much like the “spirit of the Chinese American cowboys who built the railroads in The Stockyards ― Chinese but with a Cowtown vibe.

“It will be a clean aesthetic. The interaction between Chinese tradition and Fort Worth culture.”

This taste of Chinese cuisine will be a welcome addition to Fort Worth’s Near Southside neighborhood.