Everyone is claiming that Sika Deer Chinese Cuisine is Northern Chinese food, but I wouldn't really call Shanghai "northern" China. The chinese name for the restaurant literally translates to "remember river south" and the river is a reference to the YangTze River (changjiang river), and it's southern side essentially encompasses the greater shanghai region (including hangzhou and suzhou).
I realize anyone checking out the Yelp page for this restaurant is not here for a history/geography lesson, but I thought I should point out that the food here isn't supposed to be Northern Cuisine, but Shanghainese cuisine, and its Chinese name is of a famous chinese poem.
I have no idea what the English name comes from.
Anyhow, their xiao long bao, or little soup dumplings (typical shanghainese dish) are pretty legit. The skin is perfectly thin and does not break when you pick it up with a chopstick from the top. Their stir fried rice cake was pretty good so their shanghainese cuisine is overall really good.
They have a lot of other shanghainese essentials, but also some non-shanghainese dishes, which might be the cause of confusion. For example, we had their excellent twice-cooked pork but it's actually a szechuan dish. I'm not sure what area of cuisine is their fried duck (rather than roast) served with gua bao, but my aunt and my mom seemed to love it.
I keep changing my review as i'm writing it between three and four stars because the food is pretty good, but the portions are small for their prices. The restaurant tries really hard to mimic the highish end restaurant in Shanghai of similar names, and the interior certain suggests they're doing a decent job. However, their exterior begs to differ. The bright yellow sign with red characters is a pretty tacky.
You know what, I think I'm going to go with four star. I'm going to come back and try their vegetable rice, one of my favourite shanghainese dish growing up. It is one of the few good Shanghainese restaurants i know in toronto, and the ratings might change should I find better.