China Star

Businesses are forgetting one major point: Customers make the business. No customers, no business! This place leaves a lot to desire, a lot! No greeting customers. Food blah! Extra greasy, with a bad after taste! The rice tastes like it was days old and is being used over and over again! Just no bueño!
And the picture showing their takeout containers and presentation, definitely wasn’t our experience. The containers were styrofoam and the food, sloppily prepared!

Really cheap? Pretty fast delivery? Open late? Yes to all three.
Is the food good? Not really. We were either outright unhappy (one dish went into the trash untouched) or just unimpressed with China Star. The fried rice was nothing special, and the egg drop soup was totally bland. Probably there are better Chinese takeout spots around here.

It’s open pretty late. 11pm or later, even on weekdays. So what? You might ask. It’s just generic Chinese take-​out with a bulletproof window. There’s a million of them. Sure there are, but at 11:30pm, call or drive around and see if you can order from one. Chances are they’re closed. That’s what happened to me late one Sunday after working on cars all day at my friend’s garage. We thought it would be simple, those backlit yellow and red letter signs never go off. The shining beacon in the urban night sky for wontons, dutchies, and chips. Nope.
In fact, I had lived about two miles away when I first realized this. So I made that two mile drive every time I wanted Chinese take-​out in the final hours of the day. One thing I should mention is that they do achieve wok hei, at least with the fried rice. Wok hei, or «breath of the wok», is that sort of smokey burning flavor attained only from very high heat and the carbon steel of a wok. Also I’m not sure if it was part of my conscious decision or sheer luck, because I now live less than a block away from China Star. I can see it from my window as I write this. It’s 11:37pm on a Monday night, and yes, it’s still open.

This delivery/​take-​out only Chinese on Girard is great on price and presentation but the food is kind of meh.
Walking into this establishment makes one somewhat uneasy. Maybe it’s the inch thick bullet proof glass, or the fact that you can buy cigarettes and Imodium, or maybe the two broke down chairs next to the ATM machine, maybe the sticky floors… not really sure if it’s one of these things or a combination of all… I really felt like taking a hot shower though when I got home.