Kreplach, meaning little krap (a piece of pastry), and kneidlach (aka matzoh balls) are yet other linguistically diminutive names (see the -ling in dumpling, the xiao in xiao long bao) for a wrapped parcel, proving that dumplings are the ultimate ‘small thing’ across all cultures. They show that the heart of the cuisine is always in its most miniature of items. In London both of these specifically Ashkenazi Jewish comfort dumplings can be found at B&K Salt Beef Bar in Edgware, swimming around in a healing chicken lokshen soup.

Every Indian loves their own regional samosa. There are those heavy, hooded Punjabi ones, studded with carom and filled with potato and peas; their flake trail runs all down Southall’s South Road. There’s the little shingara, which Bengalis and Bangladeshis will say is not a samosa but absolutely is. And then all the east African variants brought over from Gujarat. So obviously the best samosa is the Goan chamuça: thin filo pastry, full of onions and spiced minced meat. If a Punjabi one knocks you out for the day then it’s possible to eat Goan ones by the dozen and not tire. For those who don’t have a Goan mum, then Casa de Goa in Hounslow will do.

Ant and Dec, Morecambe and Wise, a contrarian take no-one asked for and Brendan O’Neill: where there is siu mai, there will always be har gow. These two dumplings exist in tandem, the first true tests of any dim sum parlour. Therefore the recommendations for these go to the best dim sum places in London at every price point: Orient, Joy King Lau, Phoenix Palace, and Yi-Ban for expansive venues on the cheap — the latter’s views of London City Airport are particularly stunning — Shikumen and Royal China at the mid-range; and Michelin-starred A. Wong at the high end, where the siu mai come with pork crackling (yes) and the har gow come with a rice vinegar ... “cloud”(?) But for somewhere which is relatively off the radar, and with a dim sum menu that is outperforming its reputation, then try Kam Tong in Queensway.

Pierogi are so good because Poland is one of the few dumpling cultures to have realised that the best accompaniment is butter and sour cream — a lubricant that facilitates the consumption more pierogi. Mamuska, formerly of Elephant and Castle and lately of Lambeth North, do some mean ones: pork; beef; cheese, potato, and onion; sauerkraut and mushroom. Two toppings are to be chosen from the holy trinity of cream, bacon, or onions; no one has discovered what happens if all three are applied. But the best pierogi can be found at Wroclove, the Tooting restaurant that unfortunately didn’t consider the tagline Wroclive, Wroclaugh, Wroclove, where they come stuffed with goose for those wishing revenge against the horrible, honking beast.

The word gyoza has almost been tainted by the Wasabi brand and every single faux-Japanese chain that sells ungenerous, desiccated things that go under the same name. There is better out there. Seto in Camden used to be called Seto Ramen, and does indeed serve ramen, but the best things on the entire menu are the gyoza — plump and cushioned with pork, fried to a char on one side and served with a pot of homemade chilli oil, rich with dried shrimp. Get the gyoza, and a ramen on the side.

The chameleon of the dumpling world, jiaozi have different sub-genres depending on whether they have been boiled, steamed, fried or are in soup. However the standard usage of jiaozi usually refers to the steamed kind, which are best at the triangular, green-fronted specialist Jen Cafe. They come chubby and crimped, filled with pork mince and chive. A spartan dumpling to enjoy while watching other diners come in and order the instant noodles by mistake.

Xiao long bao emit an incredible amount of chaotic energy, attracting the worst kind of dumpling nerds who want skins the translucency of an amniotic sac and have strong opinions on how and whether to pierce the skin. Let people burn their mouths if they want to. For years and years everyone was told there aren’t any great XLB in London, that Din Tai Fung need to come over. And then ... Din Tai Fung announced two restaurants and opened one restaurant, there were queues for a bit, and everyone went home, having moved on to whatever the new thing is. XLB may be the tonkotsu of dumplings but they can still be glorious in the right hands, so it’s unfortunate that those nerds are right and almost no one does them well. Din Tai Fung is still the best bet to avoid the saddest sight in all dining: an arid, desiccated xiao long bao.

The emergence of manti — to be clear, the small, spinning top shaped dumplings that veer from the size of Turkish agnolotti up to small ravioli — in London in the five years or so can be traced thus: A hidden Harringay secret, to Selin Kiazim’s Oklava Bakery (nee Kyseri), to trend, and now to every nu-Anatolian restaurant in the city. The original can still be found on Green Lanes at Hala: seemingly about a hundred tiny dumplings covered in yoghurt and chilli oil, way too rich for one person to eat but a perfect thing to order for the table. Across the road at Gozleme House, it’s possible to buy them frozen by the kilo to make at home (top tip: they go really well with Lao Gan Ma chilli oil fried in butter).

What is the most food one can get for the least money in London? Surely, surely, it is the sambusaks at Falafel and Shawarma in Camberwell, the cheapest thing on an already unreasonably cheap menu. Here four filo pastry triangles, samosas in all but name, filled with spiced minced beef, with the option of chilli sauce or garlic sauce (get both) costs £1.50.

Imagine someone pointing at a Cornish pasty and saying “soup dumpling. Essentially, that is the salteña, Bolivian versions of empanadas which are so much more than they appear. For one, they are baked rather than fried, and filled not with just meat but with gelatinous rich beef or chicken stew, often sweet with raisins, as well as chopped egg and a whole olive (sometimes dastardly unpitted), dribbling and squirting everywhere from the first bite. It’s possible to get versions of these around Elephant and Castle at many of the Colombian bakeries, but the real deal can be found at Jenecheru on Old Kent Road. 

The pillowy, pneumatic potato and ricotta dumplings at 40 Maltby St which are just called dumplings but might be called gnocchi if the word gnocchi — like all Continental culinary nomenclature — were not banned from the 40 Maltby St menu.

Most of the kibbeh people know are deep fried, cracking with bulgur wheat and immensely tasty. Those teardrop mincemeat dumplings can be found at (Lebanese) Yasmina in Acton and (Iraqi) Juma in Borough Market. But consider the boiled version, the purists choice, where they are sweet and sticky as gulab jamun, filled with syrupy meat juice. Those kibbeh, known in Turkish as icli kofte (see also, Hala) are the star of Dede Tantuni, where they are a must order alongside the titular tantuni itself.

This category is so fluid that almost anything, up to and including the universe itself, can be considered a dumpling. Are west African swallow foods dumplings? Well if knodel are dumplings then so are banku and fufu, those marble white globes of starch pounded into elastic stress balls. The Ghanaian banku, made from a mix of cassava and fermented corn, has a slightly sour taste and at Asafo in Streatham comes shaped like a Twinkie, to pair with fried tilapia or okro soup. Pounded yam fufu can be found almost anywhere, but at the new Chuku’s in Tottenham they come, not as a whole chunk, but divided into three manageable pieces, bobbing in a tricoloured egusi soup like little matzo balls.

Some people might be thinking why is ravioli on here, but despite the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) scaremongering, Italian restaurants are still perfectly safe places to eat. It’s now possible to eat ravioli LITERALLY ANYWHERE in London: at every single new-wave pasta place that has opened up in the last week: Padella, Bancone, Officina 00, Palatino, Pastaio, Manteca, Lina Stores, the other Lina Stores, the other Padella, Legare. Another one has probably opened since this was written.

Lithuanian cuisine is an exercise in how many combinations of pork, potato, and dairy it’s possible to eat before exhaustion sets in — with enough sauerkraut and beetroot horseradish, the answer is “all of them”. The high point of the entire cuisine is surely cepelinai — little zeppelin balloon dumplings — which, at Leytonstone’s Lithuanian chain pub Berneliu Uziega, come stuffed with pork or cheese curds, the potato casing providing a proper Taiwanese QQ texture, with a genius chopped bacon and onion condiment on the side.

London’s axis of momo runs from Woolwich Arsenal station to Plumstead, where the Gurkhas settled by the barracks and gave up guns and took up knives to start great restaurants. These ice gem pleated dumplings, Nepalese momos, are well served at Kailash Momo and even better served at Maya DDs where they come boiled, fried, souped, drenched in sweet chilli, or bobbing in a tangy Nik-Nak orange pickled curry (the mighty jhol momo). It’s possible to eat four or five variations here and never feel fatigued.