Wanna Bao

The best Shanghainese/Szechuan food in Houston!!!! The service is always spot on--literally every time we go. It has very cozy vibes and the dishes seem homemade in the best way possible. 10/10 for Wanna Bao.

One of the best spots for Xiao Long Bao in Houston in my opinion. Most of their other dishes are great as well. Some of my favorites are the cucumber salad, red chili oil dumplings, dancing beef, spicy popcorn chicken and tropical fried rice. I have yet to come across a dish here that I don't like.

Outside of food, the restaurant itself is nicely setup with a fair amount of seating. I've never needed to reserve ahead of time.

Pretty good food here, but dang is this a hopping spot! Had a work meeting a little early in the evening, but at 5:45 on the dot, peeps were pouring in like they were giving away pink Stanley mugs or something.

The food was good, especially the XLB (sorry, forgot to snap a pic), and the crispy chicken popcorn (nice heat!).

I would put the tea smoked duck up there too. The duck itself was scrumptious but with that quantity, you only get 4 wraps? It's like rocking up to a Tex-Mex joint and ordering two lbs of fajitas and getting 4 tortillas.

I normally don't order the hot and sour soup but my friend wanted some. It was nice too, not super memorable.

I'd definitely give this place a shot again.

Shabby on the outside, chic on the inside! Another cool place in the neighborhood. They can accommodate large parties (13) if you call and reserve. The service here was on point both times we went.

I don't eat pork, so I've only tried the chicken dumplings. Soup and not soup. Both were great but neither were the best I've ever had. Also tried the shaking beef which is served over rice crackers. I preferred to with regular rice instead. The rice crackers were super salty. I've also tried Crispy Spicy Chicken Popcorn, which we didn't like. The presentation was beautiful, but the food was salty and...zingy (?) almost in a bad way.

I do want to give it a third chance since it's so close by. We'll see.

Vibey, somewhat hipster, really a crown jewel in their own right. I came for their xiao long bao (soup dumplings), and their crispy pork bottom baos; not pictured cause we were hungry and they were so damn good.

I really love this place, and it's not my first visit. High recommend to anyone looking for a really nice meal. Staff are really nice and attentive, the tea and beer selections are awesome, the food tho... is amazing. Hugh recommendation on the spicy popcorn chicken, their red oil dumpling, their scallion pancakes, and obviously their xiao long baos. You won't regret it!

Wanna Bao is must try in the heart of Houston. I recommend this place for my out of town friends. It's clean & well lit all around. The service is alright here because it's inconsistent each time. Whoever created the Wanna Bao menu deserves the world, it boldens the words and underlines important factors of each dish. The description is spot on too. There's so many options for their drinks: red/white wine, rose, beer, sake, and tea!
Throughout my visits, I've got their green beans, eggplant, soup dumplings, garlic cucumber salad, spicy popcorn chicken, soup dumplings, crispy bottom baos, jasmine tea smoked duck, red oil dumplings, and xiao long baos. The cucumber salad is my favorite starter. I always get their fried green beans, eggplant, soup dumplings, & spicy popcorn chicken. The jasmine tea smoked duck wasn't my favorite however my boyfriend enjoys it every-time. I wished it open later so there's many more chances for me to go in during late dinner.

Had dinner at Wanna Bao on a Saturday for dinner. First this place has a small parking lot but we were able to find free parking, but be careful as some street parking is paid parking.
Second we did not have a reservation but the wait was only 10-15 minutes. We got lucky as the place is a bit small and does get busy. We started with the pork dumplings which were delicious, I highly recommend them. We also had Red Oil Dumpling. Along with Dancing Pork Belly. And some Crispy Spicy Chicken Popcorn and some Mayo Tofu. There were only 3 of us eating and yes we ordered too much food. We had leftovers. Everything was delicious!! And the food had LOTS of spice!!! My mouth was on fire!.
The service is fast and good.
I will go back but next time I will only order food with 1 chilie pepper .

My boyfriend and I love this place. We treat it like a great feast each time we've been here. It's so hard to order just one thing when everything on the menu is delicious!
The staff is always very friendly and can give recommendations on what they like
The place itself is small and I will say the table space can get pretty crowded. When we first came last year it wasn't too busy but in a year it's definitely grown in popularity. We had about less than a 10 minute wait to be seated.

still one of the best soup dumplings I've had! Takes 12 mins to prepare, the dough is thin to where you're nervous about lifting the dumpling in case it breaks and all the delicious broth gets lost. There's plenty of broth, it's hot & comforting. The pork and big chunks of shrimp are moist and delicious. Definitely get them!

this time around we ordered some new dishes:
- fish drizzled in scheuzuan sauce: if you like the beef version then you'll like this bc the sauce is very similar. Comes with bean sprouts and greens like Bok Choy which is nice. The fish is tender and tasted delicious over a bed of rice with sauce.

- jasmine tea smoked duck (half): my first time having a smoked duck! Usually we get roasted duck where the skin is crispy but this was a nice change. It comes with sauce, sliced scallion, cucumber, and the tortilla like bread to wrap everything in (I personally prefer this over the buns). Soooo good! The duck was nicely smoked & juicy.

- mapo tofu with ground beef: one of my favorite dishes in general. The tofu was soft and the sauce was numbing and spicy. Just the way I liked it.

It truly breaks my heart to be giving them 2 stars after being so thoroughly impressed with them earlier in 2023 when first moving to Houston. However was utterly disappointed by the lack of mala/spice/seasoning in the dishes we ordered during our most recent visit.

Hoping to enter the New Year with some mouth numbing but soul warming Sichuan food, Hubby and I paid this place another visit in 2024. Wanna Bao's menu is filled with chili pepper icons to indicate the level of spiciness of the dishes, but being no stranger to spice or Sichuan food, we just went ahead and ordered our usual favorite dishes of Mapo Tofu, Xiao Long Bao, Hui Guo Rou, as well as their signature shrimp/pork crispy bottom Bao, and of course Fuqi Fei Pian, which for some reason they insisted on calling beef salad (we later found out why lol). Although fuqi feipian is a cold app, the "beef salad" was wet, lifeless and not only didn't have any of the quintessential mouth tingling goodness of Sichuan spice, it overall lacked any kind of seasoning at all. Our Mapo tofu itself had good flavor but spice was also somewhat muted as if the chief was afraid to truly cook it authentically (hmm wonder why). Even the Xiao Long Bao seemed to be lacking in the necessary soupy goodness that was supposed to come with the chewy dough skin. We were not at all impressed by the equally flavorless bottom Bao. The only slight redemption was the Hui Guo Rou although the portion size was considerably small, with a majority of the dish being the leeks and various other vegetables making up the dish, rather than the pork.

The restaurant itself is lovely, with warm wood tones meeting industrial, and pretty decor. Service was prompt, with our dishes coming out quickly. The staff was friendly enough, with staff members checking in on us. However ultimately, no matter how friendly the staff and lovely the ambiance, the food needs to speak for itself, and Wanna Bao let us know loud and clear, that if you're craving authentic Sichuan food, this maybe isn't the place for you.