We arrived late and they were pretty cool about it. Most of dishes were good so as the service. Chinese pancakes were tasteless probably the chef forgot the salt, :) one of chicken dish was too much soy sauce but flavor was good. The pumpkin with salty –duck-yoke was really good!
Dennis D.
Rating des Ortes: 1 Walnut Creek, CA
Avoid at all cost!!! This place is horrible! Greasy food and even worse service. And if you decide to gamble and go there, stay away from a waiter in black glasses, he is a joke. He was the only waiter last night and never acknowledged us when we walked in. Just mumbled something along the lines that we need to pick any table we want. We were the only customers in the restaurant and he never asked us how our meal was or if we need anything else. Our table was full of dirty dishes… On top of that, i asked for a side order of chow mien noodles to go along with our meal and we were charged a whooping $ 8.50 for that. They charge the same for their entrees of beef chow mien. Anyways, STAYAWAY!!!
Artin B.
Rating des Ortes: 1 Walnut Creek, CA
Stay away. Worst service, food definitely is not fresh and not clean. Young waiter with black glasses is the worst waiter I’ve ever seen in my life. I guess he hates his job as well people who are visiting this restaurant. I would never go there again. Everything there is wrong.
Rolo R.
Rating des Ortes: 1 San Francisco, CA
So many other better Chinese restaurant in the area. This place is not good at all. The food sucks., service sucks., oh yeah… side of rice $ 3.50 wth! Are you kidding me. Stay away from this place.
Rebecca X.
Rating des Ortes: 1 Pleasant Hill, CA
Used to love this place! But the last experience made me never wanna come back! Service sucks! Food is getting worse and worse! U don’t feel welcome in there! A lot of new good Chinese restaurant around! Go somewhere else!
Daniel B.
Rating des Ortes: 1 Richland, WA
Most boring Chinese food I’ve ever had. Their fried rice was white rice with a few pieces of egg mixed in. The Garlic Chicken was listed on the menu as spicy, but had no flavor. The only good side is the portions were good.
Tiffany Y.
Rating des Ortes: 4 Arlington, VA
Awesome find, tucked away behind some car dealerships, this is a great spot if you’re looking for some good, home-y Chinese food. Everything was delicious and authentic. –Appetizer: wine chicken — surprisingly, I really enjoyed this dish, the chicken was nicely spices and the skin wasn’t too thick. The flavor was perfect with a hint of wine. –Appetizer: Shanghai style smoked fish — very flavorful, nicely crisp pieces of fish with a slightly sweet sauce –Eels with yellow chives — traditional dish I tried for the first time — the soft texture of the eels and chives went well together, in a typical stir fry style –Chinese okra with fish gluten — I love the soft texture of Chinese okra and it’s always a refreshing supplement to heavier dishes. The fish gluten was also different, a mix between fish cake and tofu with a soft, chewy texture. –Mushroom and bean sprout wrapped in tofu skin — great vegetarian dish with a variety of vegetables wrapped in tofu skin and flavored with a nice savory sauce –Fried Seaweed Pumpkin — this was a unique and awesome dish, tempura battered pumpkin pieces with seaweed in the batter –Shanghai style fried thick noodle — these thick noodles had a perfect not too chewy texture and came with shredded pork –Fermented rice and sweet rice dumpling — traditional dessert of tang yuan(sweet rice dumpling filled with black sesame) in a rice wine soup — delicious end to the meal
Lorraine P.
Rating des Ortes: 3 San Francisco Bay Area, CA
The food is great, portions are generous… tonite, I called in a take-out order and somehow, they forgot to put the order in. What should have been ready when I got there was another 25 min wait. I’m a good, repeat customer. They should have discounted the meal or given a coupon for next time just, to maintain the goodwill. I must admit, I was happy with this place and never considered another establishment until this happened today. I will be looking at other restaurants now.
Andy Y.
Rating des Ortes: 5 Walnut Creek, CA
Good sign: the only customers in here are Asian. Even better sign: my wife and I are the only Asians in here that aren’t Chinese. Price and portions are good. Menu is more extensive than the common Chinese restaurant you can find anywhere. I can update this review later. I’m too busy enjoying my food…
David L.
Rating des Ortes: 3 La Mirada, CA
I did not find anything special about the food served in the restaurant. There are interesting items on the menu, but I was not impressed by the sauces. The best thing about dinner was the won ton soup. In a more than half empty restaurant, the service was poor. We never saw our waiter after the food was served.
Ashley F.
Rating des Ortes: 2 Walnut Creek, CA
I moved within a few blocks from Shanghai Gourmet and was excited to try it. The first time was very good but the last two times, it has been pretty terrible. Once, they got the order completely wrong and when I brought it up to them, they just looked at me and said nothing. The next time, it just didn’t taste very good. We wont be coming back with so many other good options in the neighborhood.
Reena Z.
Rating des Ortes: 1 Pleasant Hill, CA
Here’s what happened. I will never forget that day ever. Two of my friends and I went to that place randomly. We just wanted Chinese food. We all had came America to study two months or less. After we ordered the food. I accidentally dropped my tea cup. The hot tea was all over my pants and the my chair. No one came to help. I used my only napkin, then I grabbed two more from the table next to me to dry my pants and chair. Then the 50ish owner was so not happy I used those napkins from the other table. She started to talk to every waiter in Chinese that my parents didn’t teach me well, I didn’t have any education. I had no idea what to do in public… Unfortunately, I heart it and I understood it. But I didn’t say anything I didn’t do anything. It was my first two months in America, to be honest I was afraid to get in anything I might not be able to handle. I was so pissed, then they charged 15% tip automatically. I hate this place. I would give negative star if I could. The worst service ever. I hate hate hate this place…
Xiao Z.
Rating des Ortes: 1 Atlanta, GA
This Chinese restaurant is close to where we live but it is the worst one. We went back last Sunday for lunch. We ordered two pcs of deep fried YOUTIAO and one steamer of XIAOLONGBAO and a bowl of soy milk. Everything turned out to be extremely bad. YOUTIAO was very oily. Seemed they didn’t turn the heat high enough so the dough observed a lot of oil. XIAOLONGBAO had tough skin and I can tell it is not freshly made. Next time just got some frozen ones and steam at home. Soy milk was not smooth at all and with too much sugar. I knew it would be bad but I didn’t know this restaurant was getting worse and worse. Seems that they don’t really care about the food to feed people. I am wondering if they feed themselves with the food they serve. Our family will never go back again. Ps, they charge as high as Crysyal Jade in SF for XIAOLONGBAO.
James B.
Rating des Ortes: 5 Oakland, CA
I was never a fan of Chinese food. I always found it to be bland, salty, and oily. I married a Chinese(Shanghainese) woman and she introduced me to real Chinese food not realizing it was American style Chinese food that I didn’t like. If you go here expecting bland American style Chinese food you will be disappointed. I was impressed by everthing we ordered. The string beans were cooked perfectly and slightly spicy. Lion’s head meatballs are bomb and so is the smoked duck. Don’t forget the Shanghai dumplings with black vinegar. We will be coming back again.
Lin Z.
Rating des Ortes: 3 Media, PA
Very reasonably priced, decent quality family style Shanghai-nese food. On a recent trip with my Mom and fam, we had scallion pancakes, lions head meatballs in a claypot(not to worry, non-Asians… it’s pork, not lion meat), some type of soup with pork bones and tofu noodles tied in a knot, and moo shu pork. I guess we had a theme going.. . The soup was in a clear, rich tasting broth; the pork meat on the bones was meltingly tender. The scallion pancakes were slightly thicker and doughier than I like, and underseasoned(which would not have been a problem if they had remembered to bring a dipping sauce). Moo shu was nicely stir-fried, not greasy, and had a good stir-fried cabbage to meat ratio — to me that means more veggies than meat. The lions head meatballs – 5 or 6 generously sized meatballs– were served in a claypot with baby bokchoy and black mushrooms. The meatballs were very tender, as they should be, but too bland tasting. They could have used more seasoning — like ginger and finely minced garlic, and more salt. Overall this restaurant puts out satisfying dishes. Not stellar, but satisfying and consistent.
Jennifer W.
Rating des Ortes: 2 Antioch, CA
My mom was getting her car fixed in the same shopping center so we decided to have lunch here. She’s not a fan of Kinder’s(next door) so Chinese it is. We were seated within 5 minutes, even though it was around lunch time. Our table had two glasses of water ready for us. My mom was sick at the time so she wanted to get some soup with noodles. We choose the one with choy sum, white rice noodles, and fish fillet. I thought that it was decent for the price and we split it. My mom told me that it had too much MSG and gave me most of it to eat. When the bill came they charged us $ 2 more than the menu price. For some odd reason I remembered that it cost $ 8.50 but we were charged $ 10.95($ 12 something after tax). Called the waiter(Mandarin speaking but I spoke to them in english) and asked him why we were charged more than what was listed on the menu. He looked confused, maybe cause no one really asked before, but he brought it to his manager to see what they could do. He came back with what they believed to be the corrected version but charged us $ 9.50($ 10 something after tax). Asked him why again and he told my mom in Mandarin that it’s because they upgraded our order so we could share. If they told us before hand then we wouldn’t have been confused. In the end I paid the $ 10 on my card(didn’t leave a tip) and my mom personally handed $ 2 to the waiter instead. Just make sure you check your bill before you pay. Or keep a menu around to double check. $ 2 might not seem much but I’m a poor college student going through nursing school so every dollar counts.
Jess S.
Rating des Ortes: 3 Concord, CA
My family has been going to this place for AGES. AGES I TELLYOU. It’s a solidly great Chinese place in the east bay. I mean really, if you’re looking for a real Chinese place with Chinese/Shanghainese Grandma Approval, Shanghai Gourmet(also known as jao jao lok or however you spell it) get 5 stars on Unilocal. This is the kind of place you go and are like«why yes, this is an authentic chinese place.» The décor is kind of… meh. Sometimes service is stupidly slow or abysmally slow. Pretty hit or miss, from my experience over the years. Last time I was here with my family seriously, it took them forever to come to our table and I got so pissed that I almost walked up to the counter to give them our order(and this was with a Chinese speaking grandma in our group). Not exactly the cleanest place. Usually the food is pretty decent(I like the shanghainese style fried rice — it basically has some kind of choi in it and bacon, which is way more delicious than normal fried rice, though probably more greasy with the subtle flavor of bacon and choi permeating each grain of rice). Last time though, I don’t know, maybe they were having a terrible day but ours was burnt in the clay pot! So much sadness, we actually left rice in the pot because it was more charcoal than rice at that point. 3 stars for nostalgia, 2 stars for my last trip, cause seriously that was pretty terrible and if this were anything but a Chinese restaurant my family has been going to for ages, I would have given it a straight up two star and never gone back. But alas, we will probably be coming here again sometime in the next month. Hopefully service will be better and our fried rice not burnt.
Peter J.
Rating des Ortes: 4 Contra Costa County, CA
Ok, some my friend is part Chinese and Vietmanese, it was Chinese new year and she wanted to go out to eat, sure, why not. This was my first time at this Chinese restaurant, we ordered the tea infused duck, and some seafood noodles. The duck came with some kind of a bread/roll to use with the duck. The seafood pasta was a really big hit. One thing I’m not so sure about was when I went into the restroom to wash up, I saw someone that works there leave, and not wash hands? Hopefully he washed his hands in the kitchen. The waiters and waitresses that work here walk around with turbo charged legs, so, you might have to flag them down. There was plenty of leftovers.
L L.
Rating des Ortes: 5 Walnut Creek, CA
One of my favorite Chinese restaurants in the area. Try the salmon fried rice, corn soup, baos and the dim sum(on weekends). Great lunch specials. Only downside is that the food is sometimes greasy. Pick up some frozen baos and dumplings here too.
George F.
Rating des Ortes: 4 San Ramon, CA
We have been coming here for Shanghainese cuisine for over 15 years. They have a huge menu but you need to order the right dishes. If your looking for cheap Cantonese food(egg rolls, fried rice, chow mein) this is not the place. It is tucked away in a strip mall right next to Kinders BBQ. The following are my choices to order Shaoxing Style Wine Chicken Kou Fu Smoked Chicken Spicy Beef Combination Ham & Fresh Pork w/Bamboo Shouts Soup Clay Pot Fish Fillets and Sour Sauerkraut Assorted Seafood, Meat and Vegetable Clay Pot. Shanghai Style Prawns Braised Pork Meatballs Lobster with E-Fu Noodle Crispy Tea Smoked Duck Eels with Yellow Chives Braised Fish Fins and Tails Tip: There are some cooked dishes in a refrigerated case and some frozen dumplings in the front. It is best to stay way from those since they are not made fresh every day.