3.5 it was good, there's air conditioning. We sat down and a lady was nice to put some seats…read moretogether for us to unload. We eventually got teapot of hot water (requested). We got beef fried rice and dumplings. A bit of MSG after effects. The eggs in the fried rice was slightly orange in color. Pretty. Got the taste just right with saltt and oil. Beef was tender. Dumplings had shredded "mok yee" and shrimp. There were 10 dumplings. Very generous. Other tables had duck. I noticed they recognize white people faster than non-white. Seat them faster and more attention.

Food quality terrible Staff rude and dismissive…read more Awful Experience Will not return or recommend

Chinatown - every city saves a pocket of land for it. It's home to a mixture of tourist-luring…read moreshacks masquerading as restaurants and food joints that only the locals would eat at. Walking in Sydney's Chinatown strip, you are eternally pestered by human placards highlighting the best they have to offer. But venture a little further, and you'll find this little gem with no cajoling called Old Town Hong Kong Cuisine. Looking around, you definitely know this isn't part of the old guard - you know what I'm talking about: pink covers, white tablecloths, red lanterns, cheap ornate statues, dank maroon carpet... For a place that's called "Old Town", it's refreshingly chic! For a Chinese restaurant, this place has service that even rivals its higher-end cousins like Din Tai Fung and Chefs Gallery. The staff is friendly - our waitress today is a lovely grandma who happily seats us inside and hands us two menus. She speaks Cantonese to everyone that looks remotely Asian. Love it! Among the surprisingly number of non-Hong Kong dishes, I unwittingly opted for the Curry Beef Brisket with Rice (A tasty Mecanese dish) and the Pan-Fried Pork Dumplings in Birds Nest (A northern Chinese specialty). What have I done? When the Curry Beef Brisket with Rice came out, I was salivating. The aroma that emits from it proved to be intoxicating to the senses, with its mix of curry, beef, chicken skin and potatoes. My first bite transported me right back to Macau: the melt-in-your-mouth meat chunks offered beefy flavours that added a delicious sweetness that melded so well with the piquant of the curry powder and mysterious cocktail of herbs and spices. Blending into the curry is the chicken skin that's so soft you can literally swallow it. Slightly charred were the potatoes that tried to elude my ever-searching spoon offering a little bite to contrast the soft meats. This was heavenly! Next up, Pan-Fried Pork Dumplings in Birds Nest: a chef recommendation with a picture looking like a pancake. The thin pancake layer with delicate bubbles sits atop hiding the morsels of dumplings underneath its fried canopy. One bite and I was hooked as the dumplings' pastry is doughy and at the right thickness while the meat inside is flavored just right. The fusion of meat and its outer casing is akin to marriage: 'til death do us part. But the fun doesn't stop there, that Birds Nest is for eating and adds an entertaining smoky crunch to the dumplings. As I approach the end of my meal, I desperately wanted to eat more and make room in my stomach. But alas, it was not to be. When it came for me to pay the bill, I saw the satay chilli oil flakes that tempt me to come back for the yum cha (and I will). This is the kind of Chinese restaurant that every other Chinese restaurant in Sydney should aspire to be: cheerful, cheap, and satisfying like childhood memories of yore. ~ Jambon Cochon

Neat fit out - no red velvet to be seen. Food is good but…read morethe Xiao long bay were a little bit dry. The duck buns were really good. The har gow were great. Problem is Tim Ho Wan in Hong Kong where I had the best har gow in the world. And I have been spoilt by Din Tai Fung's and Lynn Shanghai's soup dumpers. Old Town Hong Kong is worth a visit, especially if you have already been to DTF forty thousand times, but the real Hong Kong leaves it for dead.

My experience here was extremely frustrating from the moment I walked in. I asked for a table for…read moreone and was left waiting for 15 minutes sitting by the door, only to watch another solo customer come in after me and get seated before I did. That alone was irritating, but what made it worse was the complete lack of communication between the host and waitstaff. I was later told one of the waitresses assumed I was waiting for a to-go order instead of simply asking me, which is incredibly frustrating and avoidable. Even after the confusion, I was still seated right next to the door instead of being properly placed inside the restaurant, which only added to the feeling of being brushed off and poorly handled. What made the situation stand out even more was how little accountability there seemed to be. The host and one waitress both apologized, and I was given a discount on my egg rolls, but no manager or anyone in a higher position came over to address the issue. I was even told the owner was present, and it was obvious he was aware of what happened, yet he never came over to acknowledge it or say anything. That part was honestly the most disappointing. To be fair, the food itself was excellent -- flavorful, hot, and served quickly -- but the poor service, lack of communication, and overall frustration of the experience overshadowed what could have otherwise been a great meal.

This place was... fine. The service? Fine. The ambiance? Also fine. Unfortunately, nothing stood…read moreout, and the food left no lasting impression. With so many other great options nearby, I'd recommend giving this one a pass.

This is one of those restaurants you would take your guests out to impress. Enter via Sussex St and…read moremake your way up the stairs featuring stunning koi fish and you'll find yourself in what appears to be a mini aquarium. Bright blue tanks filled with live seafood, where customers can select seafood of their choice. East Ocean restaurant specialises in live seafood cooking, from parrot fish, to coral trout, barramundi, abalone, eel, lobster and crab to name a few, they certainly shows off their high quality seafood. The restaurant also serves traditional Chinese dishes and causal yum cha with plenty of amazing dumplings amongst your favourite yum cha options from the yum cha cart. You can even order your yum cha via their ipad technology.  Before sitting down to order, make sure you take time to take in the stunning new renovations. The decor flows beautifully from the aquarium space into the main dining room with the koi print featuring on the chairs and in the private dining rooms (both small and large). A deep blue hue features in the print and lighting, making this space ooze a cool sophistication. They have even made considered decisions, such as incorporating fish in the gold chopstick rests on the table.  We are seated at our table by professional wait staff who provide us with menus, tea and dipping sauces ready for our dinner. We peruse the menu and there are endless choices of options we would be more than happy to have. If you're in a larger dining group, we would recommend selecting live seafood and having it cooked to your flavour preference. The fish is at market price, so you do keep having to check with wait staff as to the cost of the particular fish.  We are in a small dining party so we opt for a few smaller dishes to share so we could try a variety of things. Peking duck is a must order for us, and we like that it comes served two ways; firstly with the pancakes, to wrap with greens and hoi sin, and later it is served as San Choy Bao. The duck is finely chopped with vegetables, garlic and soy sauce and we scoop it ourselves into lettuce leaves that act as cups. East ocean signature stir fry seafood with pork and vegetables. This stir fry had prawns, mussels, octopus...... We liked the sound of a the sliced boiled free range chicken in ginger and scallion sauce and although it doesn't look like the fanciest dish around, it tastes extra good. The meat is served cold and the flesh is moist and juicy, flavoured with the ginger. Dip this in the scallion sauce and it works so well. To accompany this we have some lightly tossed snow peas, rice and Chinese tea. The lazy Susan in the middle of the table makes for sharing to be quite easy. You always have to leave room for dessert at a Chinese restaurant and this is primarily due to Mango Pancakes. These are thin crepe pancakes filled with diced mango and cream, a perfect summer dessert. We finish off with fresh fruit, as is common for a Chinese restaurant and a good way to clean the palette. The menu has a good range of seafood, pork, beef, vegetables, rice and noodles so it would be suitable for any dining party. They are known for their seafood, so we would recommend incorporating as many seafood dishes as you can. It also suits those with particular nutrition requirements, and these are easily identified on the menu. Although we didn't drink on our visit, the restaurant has a huge bar and wine list available. We would like to thank Spooning Australia for arranging our visit and to East Ocean Restaurant for the hospitality provided. We love this restaurant and look forward to returning to try the yum cha sometime.

Hands down one of the best dim sum places here in Sydney and this is from a HongKonger. Their egg…read moredarts are absolutely hands down the best I've tasted here in Sydney. So delicious. The other dim sum dishes are wonderful especially their beef rice rolls. It's really too bad the locals don't travel to this restaurant due to traffic and parking, they are really missing out.

Lovely authentic Chinese food. Amazing service. The restaurant is well lit and feels like home…read moresitting in to eat yummy food. Favourite was definitely the satay chicken. My 2 year old ate everything and loved it also.

I really dislike writing a negative review but to be fair in this case I really felt I needed to…read more First time eating here after the restaurant was recommended to me. We dined in and thought being a Friday night it might get busy so we booked for 6pm. We had dim sims which were nice and ordered Ham and Chicken Roll and was told oh that will take a long time to make but we were happy to wait. We ordered a bit of fresh chilli an soy and were charged $3.80. The Ham and Chicken Roll came out overcooked and quite small and I thought gee for $16.50 this was really overpriced. The Sate Chicken was nice and we ordered a large Fried Rice (pic attached) and when it arrived I questioned if it was a small Fried Rice and was told abruptly its a large mmmm it was seriously smaller than a normal small rice. We also ordered Chicken Chow Mein with chilli and noodles seperate please as they just get soggy if they are underneath the dish and it came out no chilli and noodles underneath not on the side, when I said that they forgot the chilli I was told that there is some on the table, talk about really poor customer service. We also ordered Chinese tea but it never arrived. Whilst we were there 2 people had complaints re takeaways 1 had items missing and one the dish was incorrect but she wouldn't accept that the dish was incorrect and debated with the customer in not such a nice tone of voice. Service was extremely slow even thought the whole time we were the only ones in the restaurant I now know why we were the only customers dining in. To top it off I checked the bill when I got home and was overcharged by $6. Needless to say that was my first and last visit. I know its really tough in small business but being honest and giving good customer service would result in more than 2 customers in your restaurant on a Friday night. I will be going back to Kao Yui or Soco at Blaxland.

You seriously can't swing a cat without hitting a Thai restaurant in Sydney. They are as frequent…read moreas bottle shops and pubs. Came out to the Spot with some friends for dinner on a Wednesday night and one of them recommended Chao. Never been and had passed by it so we decided to give it a go. Not before picking up two bottles of white wine for $15! We sat outside and the waitress brought us out some menus. There was so much to choose from and the pictures didn't help. I was debating between the crispy pork and the basil chili stir fry. The waitress said the crispy pork was really popular, so I went for it. My friends ordered a chicken curry and a Pad See Ew. The Noodles came out like a minute later with the steamed rice. We weren't sure if it was ours cause it came out so fast. Then our other dishes came out. So we dug in! My crispy pork was really tasty and came with green beans and carrots. It was pretty yummy! I tasted a bit of the curry but I'm not a fan of coconut so it was just okay. Also tried a bit of the noodles, also very tasty. Overall we spent $20 each with the corkage fee, so not too shabby!

With a number of thai restaurants in this area of Randwick, I don't understand how this place is…read morestill in business. Hmmmm Came here on a Sunday afternoon for a quick lunch before heading to the beach and there was no one in the restaurant (should have taken the hint). Food came literally 5 mins after we placed our orders (2nd hint...). Dont get me wrong. I love fast service...but 5 mins ?! I was right. The food didnt taste good at all. My pad see ew had no flavours or what so ever, and I did not even finish my food. My boyfriend's chilli basil cashew nut with beef was even worse . It had a tomato-based sauce?! Definitely wont be back.

Despite making a reservation online through their website, my name was not on the list. Thankfully,…read morethe restaurant was pretty empty (7.30pm on a Friday...hmmm), they seated 7 of us at a big table in a corner. FOOD -- One can choose either the buffet ($25pp) or the ala carte menu. Note that the buffet does not include the soup base (ranging from $12-$16) or sauces (about $1.20 per type of sauce). We (bunch of finance geeks) spent over 15 mins debating if it was cheaper to do the buffet. In the end we chose not to. It turned out to be a good decision, cause the meal cost each of us around $21pp (excluding softdrinks). We ordered about 20-22 plates of veggies/meat. The food was pretty good, everything was quite fresh. My favourites are probably the spam & beef rolls. Who knew spam tasted so good when boiled in spicy broth ? :) SERVICE -- A.R.G.H. This is the only reason why Im giving this restaurant a 3 star instead of a 4. Ordering through the iPad is a stupid idea because you can only see 2-3 items per "page", so it was time consuming to "go-through" the menu. (especially when i am HUNGRY, A.R.G.H) Getting the attention of a waitress/waiter was the worst. Maybe because we were sitting in a corner but it was almost impossible to catch their attention. We gave up and took turns to walk over to the cashier counter each time we needed something from them. A.R.G.H They should consider doing what some korean restaurants do - putting an alert/bell system on each table. Lastly, I heard from my guy friends that the male bathroom was NASTY ! (boo!!)

Can't comment on the service (other than a few unique things) because we came when it was during…read moreits quieter times (Tuesday night) so it was as expected but as a hotpot lover I found the food to be very good compared to the other buffet hotpots around the city. The unique thing about this place is that they gave protective sleeves for your jackets because hotpot smells tend to stay with clothing for some time. Average spend is around $30 for the all you can eat menu (and also unlimited softdrink, but don't fill up on soft drink) which is very fair when there are other places which charge about $35 (without the drink thing).

Chilies, chilies, chilies! You'd be hard-pressed to find a Szechuan specialty without a red hot…read morechili as the essential ingredient. Everyone's had Chinese food before, but it's once you focus on regional cuisines that you start appreciating the discrepancies within this massive culinary realm. The most famous Chinese restaurant in Sydney happens to be purely Szechuan. Luckily for me, Glebe is home to Spicy Szechuan, where I've had some of the best Chinese food yet. They surely don't skimp on quality at this place; most of the plates are large and are so packed with flavor that you instantly forget that Chinese takeout exists. Don't come here if you're vegetarian--the best dishes have succulent pork, moist chicken, and tender beef. The crispy deep-fried chicken with chilies is to die for. A half-chicken is fried to crunchy perfection and smothered in a bright red chili oil sauce. It's hard to explain, but the dried chili is just as vital to taste as it is for the heat level of the dish. But if I could recommend one thing, it would have to be the fish flavored eggplant (yu xiang qie zi). The name is a misnomer as there's no fish, but only meaty eggplant slices, ground pork, and a thick spicy sauce that is unparalleled in flavor. It might be the best version of this dish I've had. Oh, and sometimes there are tour buses parked in the front. It's that good.

We went on a Thursday night and the restaurant was relatively empty. Let me start out by saying the…read morefood was absolutely delicious. We ordered the spicy boiled fish, dan dan noodles, and scallion pancakes. All were very good! I'm knocking off 2 stars because of our overall experience. I consider myself an understanding customer. I kept an open mind and came here for the food, not the service. However, the treatment we received was beyond terrible. They make their customers order on tablets, which is totally fine. The problem was that the UI is completely in Chinese. Sure, there are photos of the food items, but all the buttons were in Chinese. I couldn't find an option to switch to English either. I'm not Chinese and cannot read Chinese, so I was very flustered. When I asked a waitress for help, she looked at me like I was a complete moron. She had the face like "duh, this is the button to add an item". So rude. This interaction definitely dampened by overall experience of the place. Conclusion: The food here is great, but you may experience a hard time if you are not a Mandarin speaker.