I agree with you about the dumplings-well, the meat ones, because what gives them that special Chinese flavour is because the meat is off and stinks to high heaven. Dumplings with leek or just mushroom are not bad- however, fried dumplings, guo tie, are really often quite tasty, with vegetable filling of course.

It's not the fillings that put me off jaozi and baozi. It's the coarse pastry used to enclose the fillings. I find it doesn't agree with my digestive system.

I would advise to steer clear of all Chinese meat- it is only a question of time before one comes a cropper....the accentuated sheepy smell you've experienced means it is off, but that's normal. That's my intuitive guess only mind.

The lamb/mutton is sliced using an electric machine with a big rotating wheel. When the meat is sliced, it's sliced before your eyes from a large 5 jin meat sausage that's kept in a freezer. I think it's just the strong smell of sheep meat. Maybe lamb won't have such a strong smell.

Back in the late 90's in Hohhot, ordinary pork was 5-6 RMB /jin. Mutton was 7.5 RMB/jin. But that wouldn't be the best quality of rolled mutton. The best would cost 10 or 11 RMB/jin then.

Now, ordinary pork costs 12 RMB/jin here. But rolled mutton has skyrocketed in price compared to pork.