OVERVIEW:
This is the review of the Panda Express on the Fulton Street outside shopping mall (It opened the early 2017): The side dishes are pretty good with big flavor (4 stars level) but their fried rice comes with them is always so terribly awful (read details below). So, I have no choice but to give only 3 stars for them, sadly.
NOTE: Panda Express is one of the most popular casual restaurant chains, specializing serving popular American-Chinese dishes. As of today, January 25, 2018, the yelp features 15 Panda Express restaurants (including one closed place). I visited panda Express at several airports before. The menu and foods, that they served are all identical.
(1). FOODS:
For the price of about $11 including tax, you can have the plain fried rice and two meat dishes at the Panda Express. I ordered orange chicken and string bean chicken (there were just OK). Nevertheless, their plain fried rice was really tasteless and mushy FAKE FRIED RICE - LOW QUALITY AND NOT GOOD AT ALL - it is NOT how traditional high quality fried rice is cooked in China or Japan at all. Their fried rice served here was as horrific as the "fried rice" sold shamelessly in a paper container at the frozen section of the grocery store! The fried rice must be "fried" but they have no idea what they are doing at all whatsoever here. Even at the 10PM, this restaurant newly made the mountain of (about 50+ servings) fried rice and placed for the serving station. And this place will close within 30 minutes with only a few customers eating here. This means this newly-made fried rice will be placed in the refrigerator over night to be served for the people for the next day. ARE YOU COMPLETELY INSANE? THEY ARE MAKING A TICKING BOMB OF THE FOOD POISONING HERE. I do not even want to know what they do to all these meat and other foods on the serving containers, that were exposed to the dirty city air all day long here after closing.
REFERENCE: GREAT FRIED RICE AT THE CHEF YU CHINESE RESTAURANT: The combination fried rice at the upscale luxurious Chef Yu Chinese restaurant by the Times Square is only about $10 but it is a work of art. You can also taste the high quality gorgeous sesame oil used in their dish there. Their other dishes are also good. Visit my page to see the photographs and detailed review of Chef Yu.
(2). INTERIOR/MOOD:
Clean, well-lit fast food chain style. It is NOT for bringing your date or special someone. LOL
The single person unisex bathroom is medium large size, clean, and well-lit. It is located all the way in the back. Nice.
(3). BUSINESS:
This Panda Express Chinese restaurant is very conveniently located on the Fulton Street (outside shopping mall), and operates until 10:30PM (although, they stop making any additional foods and start cleaning the kitchen around 9:55PM). (There are several small Chinese restaurants in the area but they all completely close before 9:50PM.)
The chefs at this location are NOT Chinese nor Asians, at least today January 25, 2017, when I visited. Also, I was the only Asian there. This tells something very profound about how Asian community supporting or not supporting this American-Chinese restaurant chain.
This Panda Express is just another quick generic systematic food joints (restaurant chain) like McDonald's, Wendy's, White Castle, Subway, etc. It fills your stomach but absolutely nothing more & nothing less.
PR ACTIVITIES: The plastic container, which serve your order is nicely designed by this company. The chopsticks' paper package and the fortune cookie are also designed and made by this company and with the word "Panda Express" boldly printed on them as well. They know what they are doing. Very American style repetitious packaging and marketing business practice.
(4) VALUE:
The price here is NOT cheap or compatible to the nearby Chinese restaurants, that are actually owned and operated by the real Chinese people. This is not located at the airport and there are so many Chinese restaurants in this busy high foot traffic area of Brooklyn, New York.
There are still several 24/7 open & operating diner style restaurants in the busy area like here. So, you might want to dine there, especially late at night.
Dr. Takeshi Yamada
Review & Photographs: January 25 (Thu), 2018 read more