Chinatown Restaurant

Family gathering. Service good and food delicious especially Peking Duck

Family Chinese meal while in San Francisco. Food excellent and staff friendly. Very traditional but relaxed.

Best place in China town by far and probably the best Chinese food in San Francisco.

Great location for walking around Chinatown after dinner.

Old school China town. Some great history, fun location, and very good service. Food is good for the value Highly recommend the experience.

I showed up to my registration but the door was locked and no one answered for a very long time. A lady answered who cant answer questions. She just said no no even when I showed her my reservation.

We ate on a weekend afternoon in a largely empty upstairs dining room; so it was very quiet. The food was tasty and plentiful. The menu was long. The food was eaten on plates over plain white paper placemats set over the white tablecloth.

The ambience was non-luxurious "Old San Francisco", with photos of a very Chinese Chinatown of the past hung on the wall. Historic Portsmouth Square is diagonally across the street.

Service was polite but sporadic.

The bathrooms were downstairs, in good condition.

Prices were moderate.

Chinatown Restaurant is a recommendation based on good food, a historic location (in the original Yerba Buena village and in traditional Chinatown), and a sense of old, working-class, ethnic San Francisco.

The food was excellent. Service was good. Nice and quiet.

Did the dim sum special and it was alright. Wasn’t that tasty.

Horribly food and service. Restaurant was dirty. To be avoided at all cost

We have eaten in this restaurant previously. Tonight was, unfortunately, disastrous. We were seated quickly and given menus...and that’s the last time we saw a staff member. We waited 27 minutes to place an order before giving up and going elsewhere. Thank goodness we were in Chinatown, where there is no shortage of good restaurants.

I hope your experience is better.

Would definitely go back for good food at a very reasonable price.

Good overall. Reasonable priced and very good food.

Good food and service. We liked the quiet atmosphere. There were a lot of food options from which to choose.

Essen, was bestellt wurde, kam nicht. Suppen schmecken nur nach Pfeffer und die Hauptspeisen sehr künstlich.

When in China Town we wanted traditional Dim Sum. We booked the restaurant to find out you basically get Tapas but only if you order 2 or more (cannot combine meat and vegetarian). We ordered off the menu instead. They forgot to order my soup. We then waited 45 minutes for the food. BTW WE WERE THE ONLY PEOPLE IN THE RESTAURANT. When another table was seated they also ordered and their food was brought within 10 minutes (we still had received nothing).
After eating we asked for the check (only written in chinese, I know china town blah blah blah, but come on now) and THEY HAD ALREADY ADDED 20% TIP FOR A PARTY OF 2.
The food was ok at best but really WE WANTED TRADITIONAL DIM SUM!!!! DONT ADVERTISE WHAT YOU DONT HAVE!!!

Don’t bother. So many other choices.

Not a good experience. Staff was pleasant and friendly, but the food was bad. I’ve eaten dim sum all over the world and this was not good. Also, they overcharged me by adding an additional item that I did not order. Thankfully, I always check my bill before I pay it. I brought the error to the attention of one of the staff members and they gave me cash back since they had already charged my card. Won’t be going back.Not angry at all, just very disappointed.

Very fast service. A little too rushed for our taste. Food was tasty.

Our appetizers arrived after dinner was served. My wife’s beef Lo mein was very good. My lemongrass chicken was not very good - green onions were not cooked properly and were hard. It took 25 minutes to get someone to take our $ to pay the bill at the end as they got too busy for the number of staff they had.

Overall, not impressed.

The food was tasteless. Can’t understand how it gets good ratings. Only for tourists who never had real Chinese food.

Zero Ambiance. Restaurant is really tired. They had the lights all the way up , so no mood lighting, you are eating in a bright room. And no music, just the the sound of people quietly talking! All tourists, including myself. That said...the food was good. Nothing really special but all of it tasted good and it came out in the appropriate time. It seemed like a well run restaurant just zero ambiance.

Great family restaurant. Will go back again.

I would have hoped a family-owned, long-time Chinatown restaurant would have more pride in their presentation and ingredients. We had typical "family fare," a beef dish, a chicken dish, and the combination chow mein. We had to ask for steamed rice since none was brought with the dishes. Said dishes were not even hot, which they should have been, coming straight from the wok, as one would hope they would. The presentation was bland, the greens overcooked - particularly surprising was the use of "American" broccoli instead of gai lan ("Chinese" broccoli), no flavor of ginger and garlic as would be expected in Cantonese cooking.

The service was perfunctory - we were not made to feel either welcome or unwelcome but as just another pair of tourists showing up at dinner time.

Needless to say, we were disappointed. We did not expect anything fancy but were hoping for something other than "grinding it out," which is how this felt. Hence, 1 star for each category.

The food was ok. It’s Chinatown, can’t expect amazing but their take on Chinese food was interesting to say the least. Tofu and vegetables in egg drop soup wasn’t my favorite. The Seasame chicken tasted like BBQ sauce. Oh and you have to pay for your water. Finally, the bathroom was not in good shape. The service was better than the food I thought. They gave us green tea ice cream at the end which wasn’t bad. If we come back to San Fran, we won’t come back to this place.

We aren't sure why this restaurant is highly recommended. The food was just not great. We can't recommend this one.

Service was very slow. So make sure you have plenty of time to spare.

I eat out a lot and use open table at least 3 times a week. I almost never review a place. But I gotta tell you that this place was bad. I had a reservation for 9 and I didn't get seated until 9:30 because they didn't have anyone watching the door and host stand. I then ordered a ton of food to try. The BBQ poke was ok and the was it. The Dim Sum was either way cold just bad. The kung pow chicken was horrible in the beat a few young had egg shells in it. The service was awful. And that all o have to say

Me esperaba una mejor comida para las recomendaciones que tenia y el lugar donde esta localizado. No soy gran fanatico de la comida china y hoy lo confirme.

Horrible. Could do better in a cheap buffet

We wanted to experience an authentic and historic Chinese restaurant in Chinatown. We certainly picked right. We made a reservation on Open Table. Chinatown Restaurant was opened in 1919. The only part of the restaurant that was open for lunch was on the second floor – so bear in mind that you have to climb steps. We were thoroughly taken with the photographs on the walls depicting the early times in Chinatown and the people. They were absolutely stunning. We knew we had the right place as there were few tourists in this restaurant - mostly Chinese people dining here. They start you off with complimentary dumplings with a nice dipping sauce. We were not overly hungry, so we split a Sesame Chicken. The food was beautifully prepared and presented. They ended our meal with a fortune cookie (of course) and a delicious green tea sorbet. What a great way to end a delicious meal in a lovely restaurant!

The food came to the table cold. The restaurant was cold with small ineffective room heaters instead of central heating. The food was not very tasty or well prepared.

Freezing cold! Maybe try putting the heat on in the winter?

My family of 6 arrived at this restaurant and we pleased by the great food and friendly service. This is on the nice side of restaurants and it is clear that the place is clean and professional.

Food was hot and tasty, ambiance - lacking. When I stated I had a reservation no one knew what I was talking about; one staff member asked if I had faxed it. I'm surprised I got points for this visit.

Overpriced with less than exceptional dim sum. With all the great spots search a little harder. I believe they're past their prime.

We saw that it was a highly rated restaurant. Only reason why we went. Unfortunately, service was poor and the food was undercooked and tasteless. The staff, even after making eye contact, walked right by the table when we tried to get their attention. When we complained about the fish dish still being raw on the inside, we were met with incredulity. It took two requests for them to remake the dish. Finally instead of only adding a small amount for employee health insurance, they added that plus a full 18% tip to the bill. Needless to say it was not deserved.

Low quality food. We left without finishing. Brusque service. Bleak atmosphere.

This restaurant had no record of our reservation. They swore they did not take reservations and had no idea what Open Table was. In fact, they barely spoke English at all. However, they did find us a table and the food was good, though the service left a lot to be desired.