Saturday Dumpling Co. on a roll as it adds 2 Minneapolis locations

Saturday Dumpling Co., the viral dumpling makers who began as a pandemic pop-up and went brick-and-mortar in late 2024, will open a second location at a food hall this summer, followed by another standalone restaurant this fall.

The northeast Minneapolis dumpling purveyor is setting up at the Market at Malcolm Yards (501 30th Av. SE., Mpls.) at the end of August.

Then, they will move into the space that was last a Cafe Ceres, at 5401 Penn Av. S. in Minneapolis, with an aim to open by Small Business Saturday over Thanksgiving weekend.

“When it rains it pours,” laughed Peter Bian, co-founder of Saturday Dumpling Co. “A lot of work ahead of us.”

Bian and co-founder Linda Cao first imagined the Malcom Yards residency before they’d even opened their northeast Minneapolis restaurant, at 519 Central Av. NE., in late 2024.

“We always loved Malcolm Yards, loved going there, loved the energy there,” Bian said. “It was always on our radar to be at that food hall.”

They had initially planned to move in late last year, but the deal got delayed, which turned out to be a blessing to the busy budding restaurateurs. “We were knee-deep in Northeast SDC, and were like, OK, that’s a great idea,” Bian said.

Bian plans to introduce some new dishes to the Malcom Yards audience, alongside their signature dumplings.

New menu items include scallion pancake wraps. Many customers are fans of the scallion pancake breakfast burritos at the northeast Minneapolis location, but these will be different, Bian said. Those are made with a tortilla-like wrap, while the food hall wraps — with fillings such as a gingery Hainanese chicken, char siu chicken or pressed tofu — will be built on traditional scallion pancakes that he is sourcing from a family friend’s company in China.

The other new category of food he’s introducing to the food hall has direct links to Saturday Dumpling Company’s other big summer news: an official new food at the Minnesota State Fair.

SDC is collaborating with O’Gara’s to bring cheesy mashed potato-stuffed dumplings to the fair.

It took some testing to make a new kind of dumpling that could withstand fair-level speed: this flakier dough can go from the freezer to the fryer and onto the plate in 4 minutes.

To start, they’ll be filling these new “dumpling poppers” with Buffalo chicken, crab Rangoon and bacon jalapeño.

Dumpling poppers might wind up on the menu at the northeast location later, but first, they need to get through the fair. O’Gara’s has ordered 140,000 dumplings so far, and they’ve just sent off the first half of the order. “Depending on how well it’s going, they were saying it could keep on going,” Bian said.

That’s not all.

Expansion of their fast-casual brands into more neighborhoods was always the plan, and when Daniel del Prado closed all Cafe Ceres locations this past spring, Bian reached out.

“It was the perfect size,” Bian said. “It was one of the first neighborhoods that we were looking at for our first location. I’ve always loved that south Minneapolis, Armatage area.”

Bian is still deciding which other parts of his menus will come to the new location. One thing he’s certain about is the Szechuan Chicken Caesar on scallion focaccia. “You might see more sandwiches and maybe some breakfast sandwiches on a breakfast menu,” he said.

But dumplings, he added, “will always be a throughline for all of our restaurants.”

There’s more in the works at Malcolm Yards, too. The former Abang Yoli stand now has a temporary vendor while market leadership searches for a new full-time tenant: Chick’n Flip.

From the team behind EggFlip and SushiFlip, Chick’n Flip offers fried chicken sandwiches, tenders and wings.

“We’re excited to bring Chick’n Flip to Malcolm Yards and can’t wait for everyone to come out and experience a glimpse of what we’ve been working on and what’s to come,” owner Flip Koumalasy said in a statement.

The four-year-old Market at Malcolm Yards has seen some turnover recently, but vacancies have not lasted long.

Momo Dosa is closing today (July 31), posting last week that the food hall did not renew its lease. Abang Yoli, which got its start at the Market when it first opened, closed its stand on July 13 to focus on one brick-and-mortar location in Minnetonka.

And after Revival Smoked Meats closed earlier this year, that stand became Kinsley’s Smokehouse Deli.