Golden Phoenix

[DoctorTaco]

I'll miss the "ICE BEVO" sign on those old buildings.

[Pete]

That market is crazy busy.

Go in there any day and you'll see lots of the local restaurants loading up on all types of things.

It's no wonder they want to expand it by moving the restaurant to the new construction.

[corwin1968]

Funny that this should get posted up today as I was planning to post an update to my Golden Phoenix experiences.

My wife's cousin was coming thru town on his way to Dallas and wanted to take us out for dinner and we chose Golden Phoenix because he really likes the food.

My wife and I arrived first and not knowing the total number of people in our party, we told the host 6-8 people. This was after we waited for about five minutes in the entrance area, with numerous employees looking at us the whole time.

We were seated at one of the big round tables with a lazy Susan (nice!) and they brought a stack of plates, napkins, etc.. A few minutes later my wife's cousin showed up and a few minutes after that, the rest of our party, which now totaled six people.

The waiter came over and took our orders (six or seven entrees and three appetizers) and once our food came out, we never saw another waiter or waitress. Luckily, they had brought eight glasses of water so two people got refills from those. My wife's cousin even had to go find someone to get the check and pay the bill.

As usual, the food was EXCELLENT. The seafood hotpot was out of this world and much better than the same dish we had at Szchezuan Bistro the day before. They have a dish that is chunks of filet mignon in a sauce (eta: "cubed filet mignon stir fried in special garlic butter sauce") that is absolutely delicious and the walnut shrimp was also quite tasty. I forget the other dishes although I ate from each one (Asian style).

All in all, it was par for the course. Excellent food with horrible service. At least all of the employees were pleasant this time and none of them argued with us.

[corwin1968]

That market is crazy busy.

Go in there any day and you'll see lots of the local restaurants loading up on all types of things.

It's no wonder they want to expand it by moving the restaurant to the new construction.

If you like the greens commonly used in Asian cuisine, Chinatown on the weekends has the best and freshest selection.

[Martin]

i remember visiting this market once and seeing an item that really intrigued me... evidently there's a breed of chicken that is all-black... feathers, beak, comb, meat... everything. this market had some of that meat for sale and i had never seen anything like it before and haven't seen it at any other market since.

[Pete]

I drive by here all the time, and after the demolition there has been no further work.

Their building permit was issued so not sure the reason for the stall. The lot is still fenced off and filled with rubble.

[corwin1968]

My wife and I just came from eating at Golden Phoenix for the first time since the early months of the pandemic.

First, we had gone to Chinatown market on Saturday and a section of the wall is now open to Golden Phoenix and there is a counter with the BBQ/roast meat glass cabinet available to both patrons in the restaurant and people in the Chinatown market. Very nice!

Today, we decided to eat at Golden Phoenix and were shocked to find that the entire interior of the restaurant has been completely remodeled and it is very, very nice. You can't even tell it's the same restaurant space. Also, the far South wall looks like it was left in a temporary state, presumably for when/if they start construction next door.

The menu is brand new and extremely well done, with a lot of very high quality photos. Prices have definately gone up though, gotta pay for the remodel. The food was delicious as ever and the service was as bad as ever.

When we arrived, we were taken to a table by a young man and my wife, not really liking the table he chose, asked if we could sit at one of about five empty tables nearby. The answer was a curt "No".

Our waiter was an older gentleman who has waited on us many times in the past and he took our drink orders and brought us menus and a dim sum card, but no dim sum menu, which we know they have. When we were ordering, he appeared to be extremely distracted and bored as we were making our choices.

A bit later, a waitress with one dim sum tray came to the dining area and started stopping at tables. We were excited because we haven't tried their Dim Sum yet, but after stopping at every table but ours, she sped right on past us and took the tray back to the holding area. A bit later, we flagged down a waitress and asked about dim sum and she asked if we wanted a menu or for her to just bring the tray and show us what she had. We asked for the tray and then she left and about 15 minutes later, we had to flag down another wait person to ask for the dim sum tray, which was finally brought out to us.

We had another encounter with Mr. "No", but I forget what it was because by that time, the experience was so absurd that I couldn't even be irritated by it.

After waiting a while after finishing our food, we finally had to flag down a waitress for our check and to-go boxes, which seems to be a constant there.

One thing I will give them credit for is that they actually refilled our drinks on a regular basis. That is an absolute first, so maybe things will start improving.

I often tell people that Golden Phoenix has the best Chinese food in town, although I also warn people about the service. Given they have raised their prices quite a bit and invested what is probably a large sum of money in renovations, you would think they would invest some time, effort and resources into improving the quality of their customer service.

[Pete]

^
Thanks for the detailed review.

Their latest plan -- after demolishing all the buildings to the south -- was to relocate Golden Phoenix to an entirely new building to the south and then expand the supermarket into their old space.

I guess that changed again. And there has been zero movement on the site of the demolition which happened a couple of years ago.

[jompster]

I had the same experience as Corwin above, but I noticed they did away with a lot of my favorite things. On top of the bad service, I doubt I'll go there much unless I want a broken rice platter. The soup I ordered my first time post-remodel was awful (it was supposed to have shrimp and squid, but it had no squid and only two shrimps). The broken rice (second trip) was a mercy re-do, and I'm not a fan of the decor.

[Teo9969]

If you're looking for another Chinese food winner in the "area" there are 2 really good ones:

Szechuan Story literally right down the street - I think 27th or 28th and Classen.

Then Chow's on 30th and May has never let me down and some of the things I've had there have been next level food. Need to get in there sometime to actually sit down and eat and get the food right from the kitchen.

[corwin1968]

If you're looking for another Chinese food winner in the "area" there are 2 really good ones:

Szechuan Story literally right down the street - I think 27th or 28th and Classen.

Then Chow's on 30th and May has never let me down and some of the things I've had there have been next level food. Need to get in there sometime to actually sit down and eat and get the food right from the kitchen.

We didn't know about Szechuan Story, so thanks for mentioning that one. Definately on our list to try soon.

[Thomas Vu]

We didn't know about Szechuan Story, so thanks for mentioning that one. Definately on our list to try soon.

Did you like Tsubaki Szechuan when it was around?

[corwin1968]

Did you like Tsubaki Szechuan when it was around?

Was that the one that was in the little section attached to Super Cao Ngyuen?

If so, we only ate there once and I don't remember thinking it was great, but I also think we went in very near closing time, so I would cut them a little slack in my opinion of the food.

We do really like Cafe Oasis in that little strip. Despite the fact that a close friend hangs out with the owners, it's pretty good food.

[Thomas Vu]

Was that the one that was in the little section attached to Super Cao Ngyuen?

If so, we only ate there once and I don't remember thinking it was great, but I also think we went in very near closing time, so I would cut them a little slack in my opinion of the food.

We do really like Cafe Oasis in that little strip. Despite the fact that a close friend hangs out with the owners, it's pretty good food.

It's the part of the ownership of them and the cook. If you didn't like it then, may not enjoy it now.