Don't make the same mistake we made and try to dine in here; I repeat, this is NOT a dine in operation, I repeat, not for dine in LOL. Gai's Kitchen is located inside of Bethlehem Church and when they say kitchen, they really mean it, there's no dine in or host stand to place an order haha. Despite this though, my friend and I were allowed to eat here in the church cafeteria adjacent to the kitchen after stumbling our way into the church and placing our order online, but just so everyone is aware this is for pickup, take out or DoorDash really.
Now on to the food! My favorite thing we ordered was the Leshan Beef soup, so comforting, warming, and flavorful! Xiao, the owner, was kind enough to teach us how to best enjoy it which was to first take a sip of the broth, have some of the veggies, then dip the beef into the chili powder. The billionaires fried rice was unfortunately a bit under seasoned but at least the portion size was quite generous. The mapo tofu was very authentic and the numbing spice they used was top notch, although Xiao did mention that they would hopefully be moving towards using a more tender cut of tofu than the medium/hard tofu they're currently using which I think would be delightful. The snowflakes dumplings were good although I question how well the crispness of the dumpling lace will hold up during carry out considering we got to have these fresh. All in all very promising and authentic, I'm excited to see what else might make it onto the menu and how things might still improve from here, they're working out some kinks with the soft opening and they've only been open for 2 weeks! read more