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    Gourmet Kingdom

    3.6 (367 reviews)
    ModerateChinese
    Closed 11:00 am - 3:00 pm, 4:30 PM - 9:30 PM

    Order Gourmet Kingdom Takeout or Delivery

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    GOURMET KINGDOM ATMOSPHERE

    What's the vibe?
    Casual
    Moderate noise
    Good for groups
    Dogs allowed

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    Recommended Reviews - Gourmet Kingdom

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    Pork rib and cilantro
    Matthew S.

    It's really disappointing leaving this review after coming here 12-13 years but we've had 2 bad takeout experiences in a row and won't be coming back. They've been having consistency issues for a while but the dry fried pork ribs and Kung Pao chicken we ordered were so far away from what they used to be. Everything tasted like Sweet Baby Rays, not what I'm looking for in Szechuan. I really wish we could return this food but previous customer service experiences with them have only proven frustrating. We only kept coming because the food was good, and now it's not

    Outside. Storefront. Old restaurant building.
    Daniel B.

    Unfortunately, Gourmet Kingdom was a letdown for us. Based on my experience, I can only give this place two stars ("Could've been better"). It's disappointing because my oldest sister and her kids like this place, as do others my wife and I know, and the reviews and pictures on Yelp looked promising. The food wasn't bad, but the service was not good and the ambiance needs some serious work. This is an old restaurant. It's evident when you look at the building from the outside in. I'm fine with that. Old buildings can add character and history, but this was a case of letting a place go. When we visited for dinner, the space was dark and not very clean. The lights were turned off in large sections of the dining room. The only place customers were being seated was at the front of the house, next to the street-facing windows. There was also a large group in a private room in the back. On either side of the large dining room, in darkened spaces, was an old buffet and boxes of inventory. These parts of the dining room had become storage for the restaurant. Practical, sure, but not good for the atmosphere. Again, that didn't really bother me. What got me were the sticky menus, sticky tables, sticky, worn-out, and uncomfortable booths, the corroded faucets in the men's restroom, etc. This place could use a good deep-cleaning and renovation, or at least some upgrades. Service was poor for three main reasons: (1) Extensive wait. We waited at least one hour to get our food. (2) Food allergy. I told both the owner and the server that I was allergic to shrimp. They both understood and said they would remove the shrimp from the seafood noodle soup. However, when the soup finally came out, it had shrimp in it. (3) Wrong charges. They charged us for tea we didn't order nor receive. For one dish, they charged us a higher price than was printed on the menu. I have nothing personal against owner David and our server. They were nice. They needed help (understaffed). The restaurant wasn't that busy during our visit. It was David and two servers plus who knows how many cooks in the kitchen. I suspect David did some of the cooking and there might have been only one other, maybe two others, helping out in the kitchen. I appreciated that David came to our table to greet us, answer any questions about the menu that we had, and gave us his recommendations. After placing our order with our server, I turned to my wife and told her that I wasn't confident that our entire order would come out right. For almost every item I ordered, our server sounded surprised like, "Huh? We have that on the menu?" I made sure to point at the menu numbers along with the Chinese and English text because I think several of the dishes on the menu are similar and can potentially be easily mixed up. Also, many of the menu descriptions were not very descriptive at all. Here's what we went with: * L3. Sweet and Sour Jelly Fish ($8.25) * L14. Shredded Beef Tripe in Chili Sauce ($7.25) - showed up as "L14. Spicy Beef Tripe" on receipt at $8.79 including tax (different than menu price) * F7. Beef Noodle Soup ($8.95) * F9. Three Flavor Soup ($8.25) - showed up as "Seafood Vegetable Noodle Soup" on receipt * Black Sea Bass (market price = $24.67 including tax during our visit) - from the specials menu, last page of book menu * Water Spinach ($13.50) - not on menu, also known as Chinese spinach, Chinese watercress, and ong choy In general, the food ranged from OK to good. Our table's favorite dish was F7. Beef Noodle Soup. The noodle soups are served in big, generous portions. I believe they're made with thick wheat noodles. Not egg or rice noodles. The Beef Noodle Soup had a decently-flavored red broth with various cuts of beef that included tendon and collagen plus bok choy and fresh cilantro. I do not recommend the F9. Three Flavor or Seafood Vegetable Noodle Soup because, simply put, it's a relatively bland Shanghainese-style dish where not as much seasoning is used. The quality of the ingredients was fine, though. The ingredients included swai fish (Vietnamese/striped catfish), small shrimp, bamboo shoots, tomato, cabbage, spring onion, wood ear, and snow peas. I asked the owner about another noodle soup on the menu, F8. "Ms. Song's Noodle Soup" and he told me it was very similar to F9. above except he didn't mention that it had any vegetables in it. The Sweet and Sour Jelly Fish and Shredded Beef Tripe in Chili Sauce were tasty. I liked that the jellyfish was cut into thick slices, though it was a bit too chewy. The beef tripe had a nice consistency and was seasoned well, but it lacked any Sichuan peppercorns and thus any numbing effect. The Black Sea Bass was flavored well, but the meat tasted overcooked and slightly tough. I love that they had Water Spinach with garlic, but it tasted somewhat old and tough. Large portion size, however, so that was good. Owner David told us he took over the restaurant over 11 years ago.

    Alicia B.

    I am genuinely shocked that this place has such low reviews on Yelp. It was expensive, for sure, but everything we ordered for lunch was delicious. It is one of the only restaurants in Chapel Hill with traditional Sichuan dishes. The highlights of our meal were the 回锅肉 (twice cooked pork) and their 香辣鱼 (sichuan spicy fish). The pork was addictively sweet, spicy, and salty, perfectly paired with white rice. The fish was battered then fried, and had a shatteringly crisp shell and tender, flaky fish sprinkled with various spices making it a bit spicy and salty. It paired wonderfully with the sauce from the twice cooked pork.

    lo mein with hard meat and noodles

    ordered food on Chinese New Year. Steamed pork belly with rice flour, lo mien house special and steamed whole fish with soy sauce. the lo mien and steamed pork belly are swimming in oil. Complained to the manager but responded "what you order is what we freshly cook" I told him meat and lo mein are very hard like cooked 5 days ago and swimming in oil. Teamed fish taste is ok but very small fish, very expensive for the price. It's a waste of money.

    Pecan Shrimp
    Rayad S.

    From the outside, Gourmet Kingdom looks like an unassuming, hole-in-the-wall restaurant. Yet, I cannot recommend this restaurant enough for its authentic, multi-award-winning Szechuan-style food. For the full experience, try dining "family style" where you order various dishes for the group to share. Some of my favorites are Mapo tofu, Pecan shrimp, spicy fried fish, and Mongolian beef (SEE PHOTOS). The overall service is amazing and the food is unbeatable so check them out! FOOD: 9/10 PRICE: 9/10 SERVICE: 9/10 VIBES: 6/10 Would I try again? DO IT EVERY WEEK :)

    Tran N.

    This place is a must when you go to this area. It is the most authentic Chinese place you could find. Most of the dishes I get here are quite spicy so I hope you are ready to sweat. I would recommend getting the twiced cook pork, bashu chicken or fish, eggplant with garlic (not spicy), and szechuan fish. Those are the main ones I get there. If you are coming with two people then three dishes is PLENTY. It is better going with a larger group of people so you can try more dishes. However if you go with a larger group it is probably better for one person to pay and then everyone to pay that one person back. They can be a little difficult when splitting more than five credit cards or so.

    Szechuan spicy fish, mapo tofu, and eggplants
    Marina N.

    One of my go-to stops whenever I'm in town and am eating with 4+ people. I would 110% recommend sharing family style. Their food is super authentic and you really can't go wrong with anything on the menu. We got three dishes to share with 4 people and that was more than enough! My three go-to dishes that brings me so much comfort are the eggplants, mapo tofu, and the szechuan spicy fish. For some reason, the food was a bit more spicier than I was used to when I've come before, which I didn't mind, but my friends who don't really eat spicy foods definitely felt the kick. If you have time to come during lunch, I'd recommend that because their lunch menu has pretty good prices and is SUPER filling!

    Steamed buns at Gourmet Kingdom, Carrboro (original order is 7 buns in a vinegar sauce, $8.95)
    Lan S.

    Anytime we're in or near Chapel Hill-Carrboro, we try to go to Gourmet Kingdom for North Carolina's best Szechuan food. Just wanted to report that we ate there again this week, and that it's as good as ever. We had dinner there and also ordered some dishes to go to take back to Asheville for family members. We especially liked the spicy chicken with three kinds of peppers (and, yes, it is quite spicy) and also an old favorite, shredded pork with black fungus in garlic sauce. Both were terrific. The green beans were good, too. The kung pao lotus root wasn't quite as good as usual, perhaps because it didn't have as much flavorful sauce as usual. As an appetizer, we tried the steamed buns, which are basically just meat dumplings in a vinegar sauce. That was fine, but it wouldn't be a favorite.

    Cumin lamb

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    7 months ago

    Terrible food, slow service, and dirty restaurant. My friends who recommended this place advice will never be listened to again!

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    7 years ago

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    2 years ago

    This restaurant is by far the best and most authentic Szechuan restaurant in the area. The food is always fresh and delicious.

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    6 years ago

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    2 years ago

    I love this place. Great portions. Always fresh. My favorite dish is currently the duck in beer sauce.

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    2 years ago

    Good food. Good service. Nice place. Had sweet and sour chicken. It was good. Thank you.

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    Wheat - Tomato beef noodles

    Wheat

    4.2(43 reviews)
    0.8 mi

    We typically order from Jade Palace but decided to branch off and Wheat didn't disappoint. I…read moreappreciate being able to order delivery directly from the store and it arrived promptly and fresh! We ordered the beef "burrito," which is beef wrapped in a scallion pancake, with Peking duck sauce, the General Tsaos chicken, and noodles with scallion oil. We added on a soup and the cucumber salad to get the discount and it honestly was amazing. Everything had so much flavor and there was so much we wanted to try! The only thing was that the noodles were a little bland and clumped together but I was able to doctor them up, and I wish the beef appetizer came with a dipping sauce. Overall though, I cannot wait to order again and this might be our next date night. Definitely a hidden gem in Chapel Hill!

    2nd time coming here, but probably not returning for a third. My girl & I entered to see a less…read morethan ideal Sanitation Score (low A), and we got seated right away. Our original plan was to get 1 Braised Beef Noodle Soup and 1 Beef Filet & Tripe that we'd both share, but we only got half of that plan fulfilled this time. The waiter said that they are out of the tripe appetizer, which we enjoyed in our first visit few months ago. So we were really disappointed that they were out of their best appetizer. Wheat is a small indoor restaurant in downtown Chapel Hill, on the same spot as where another bad Chinese restaurant used to be. Its cramped space and uninviting ambiance make Wheat an unpleasant spot to eat. It took around 15 min. for us to get our 1 order of Braised Beef Noodle Soup, which tasted the same as we remembered when we first tried it. It comes with about 4 chunks of braised beef, 1 egg. 1 baby bokchoy, and noodles in spicy & sour soup with chili oil. $14+ for a beef noodle dish like this is not bad but I can think of other restaurants in Triangle NC that serve a similar beef noodle soup with better ambiance and customer service. Overall Score: 2.4/5

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    Wheat - Inside. View from entrance.

    Inside. View from entrance.

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    Cham Thai Cuisine At Carrboro - Pad Thai

    Cham Thai Cuisine At Carrboro

    4.3(162 reviews)
    0.1 mi
    $$

    I was excited to try Cham Thai it after reading a number of enthusiastic reviews, particularly from…read moreCalifornians who said it reminded them of the kind of delicious authentic Thai food that's easy to find out there and that I got used to living in Los Angeles for five years. Our party of four was seated immediately at 6:30pm on a Friday evening. We ordered three dishes: - pad see ew with shrimp - red curry with shrimp - massaman curry with tofu The pad see ew was the standout: the large shrimp and the broccoli were cooked perfectly, and it had good flavor overall. The two curries were disappointing. The tofu in the massaman curry was cut very small and seemed over-fried, and the sauce lacked the creamy richness I associate with that dish -- the kind that comes from potatoes simmering in the curry for a long time (and the potatoes seemed barely cooked). The red curry had only two pieces of eggplant (!) and was overwhelmed by too many red and green bell peppers -- they dominated the flavor profile. Like the pad see ew, the red curry did include large, well-cooked shrimp, which was its saving grace. Both curry dishes also had far more bamboo shoots than seemed necessary (as another Yelper notes, about 5x what other places put in). Using so much of an an inexpensive filler vegetable looks like a way the restaurant is trying to save money -- just sayin'. I also tasted a companion's tom kha soup, which was essentially warm coconut milk with very little additional flavor. More bamboo shoots... One note about both serving sizes and presentation: the serving platters at Cham Thai are extremely wide and very shallow, which spreads the food out into a very thin layer over a large area and gives the impression of a larger portion of food than is actually there (noting this because many reviews say that the "portions are huge" -- not our experience). For diners needing gluten-free options, the messaging from the staff was very confusing. At first we were told confidently by our server that "any dish on the menu could be easily be made gluten-free" because the kitchen "has three sauces: regular, vegan, and gluten-free." When we ordered a dish gluten-free, however, the server paused, said he "needed to check something," left, and returned to say that dish could NOT be prepared gluten-free after all (?). A "Cashew Nut" entree ordered gluten-free arrived missing the cashews; after checking with the kitchen, the server explained they had been omitted because the fried cashews in the dish could not be guaranteed gluten-free due to cross-contamination. It would have been helpful to know that ahead of time, or given raw cashews when the dish was served to us. Our server apologized and eventually gave us a bowl of raw cashews on the side. It's also worthy of note that NONE of the eleven dishes they call "Recommendations" on the menu are vegetarian (see photo). All in all, our meal at Cham Thai didn't quite live up to the restaurant's Yelp reviews. There is better Thai food in the Chapel Hill/Carrboro area.

    Clean Asian decor. Very friendly and speedy service. You can't beat the deals on the lunch special…read morewhich comes with fried wontons and a soup or salad. The salad was simple but delicious. Just lettuce and spiraled carrots with what I assumed was grated carrots with a tasty ginger sauce added. The fried wontons on the plate come with a sweet dipping sauce. I ordered the Spicy Bamboo Shoots with chicken which was hot enough to get a reaction from my body. But not sweating hot. The dish was very tasty and satisfying. I'll have to come back for lunch and try some of their other specials.

    Photos
    Cham Thai Cuisine At Carrboro - Interior

    Interior

    Cham Thai Cuisine At Carrboro - Chicken Pad Thai, Shrimp Panang Curry, Spicy Crispy Tofu

    Chicken Pad Thai, Shrimp Panang Curry, Spicy Crispy Tofu

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    Gourmet Kingdom - chinese - Updated May 2026

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