LiLong by Taste of Shanghai Chatswood — Restaurant in Sydney

Not impressed. We came early around 530 pm on a Sunday. The restaurant was not all that busy on arrival but it became increasingly busy. Staff were running around and appeared to be trying to train inexperienced juniors from what I heard and saw. AND it was expensive-$105 for two and around $30+ per main dish. They do at least take Dine and Discover vouchers. The waitress was rushed and told us over and over how busy she was, even though there were several waiters and waitresses. We had one menu only, had to get another from another table. Although there were many bottles of wine, we were not given a wine list and had to ask for this too. And she slapped it down saying "This is being updated." There was very little selection of wines . My partner went to the bar to see what was available apart from the drinks menu and was speaking to a young staff person when the manager rudely interrupted him by issuing instructions (we assume since it wasnt in English) to the staffer so that the conversation was terminated. Then we had to order our drinks only at the same time as the food and had to ask for them twice as they were so slow. I ordered a second drink and we were ready to leave and it still hadn't come so had to ask again. Then they brought us a third drink another 15 mins later which I hadn't ordered- obviously the previous one. You have to mark your food choices on a sheet, so its difficult to ask any questions, such as whether the food is gluten free . The music was also way too loud so that even the waitress complained that she couldn't hear properly because of it. The food came fast and it was.... ok, although mine was quite greasy. My partner's dish was not as described in the menu as it lacked a selection of seafood. Although I enjoy spicy dishes, I couldn't eat mine without fishing out nearly an entire bowl of hot chilli slices from it! It was not marked on the menu as very spicy. Overall the poor customer service really let this place down. They need a capable manager who has the capacity to organise the functioning of the restaurant and train the staff adequately. If you are charging these kind of prices then decent service...

We had a big family dinner with elder relatives and kids present. From the outset prior to this occasion my parents had nothing but good things to say about the restaurant so naturally we all had high hopes for a lovely evening.

We ordered starters and mains. Initially only a fraction of the starters were served in addition to all of our fried rice (some 3 large bowls which we ordered with the intention of enjoying with our main course).

90 minutes since the first round of starters (and 3 bowls of rice) were served to our table, we couldn’t help but notice we had not been served anything else. It took 4 separate inquiries with waiters who were not communicating with each other to make our query known. When we finally had the attention of a more senior member of staff, that person became incredibly defensive with us when we asked about the status of the order (saying vaguely there were issues in the kitchen).

When pressed further about what was going on, he became very defensive and raised his tone of voice when speaking to my parents and other elderly people in my family. To add insult to injury he thought it would be appropriate to a make a comment about how it was common for people of an Indian background to not know how to order at his restaurant. I did not see the need for this comment. It was an incredibly rude and humiliating experience.

I can imagine that running a restaurant can be stressful and that maybe there was an issue in the kitchen. I can even understand in some respects the restaurant’s failure to communicate any such issues to customers patiently waiting for their food. What I cannot forgive is treating customers (and elderly ones at that) with disrespect publicly and making a comment about someone’s race. No matter how good the food is, that kind of behaviour should not...

Food: 2/5 We ordered pan fried buns, salt and pepper pork, duck soup, seasonal vegetables and some fried rice. Everything was mediocre and nothing really had great flavour in comparison to the usual standard they use to have perhaps a year ago. We were expecting standards similar to other Taste of Shanghai stores. The duck soup was far too salty. The fried rice was not really fried at all and had lumps of unfried rice. The salt and pepper pork only consisted of small pork strips and did not have much flavour. All in all it seems that from the experience that the store is trying to cut costs in their food, which reflects the quality

Service: 2/5 We were seated in the outside area, but it was clear they were severely understaffed for a busy Sunday night, another indicator that they are cutting costs. Whenever we needed to ask for a spare bowl or alike, we had to walk inside because there simply wasn't any staff outside waiting. Furthermore, their online ordering system takes very long as you need to ask staff for a code, which is difficult when they are understaffed. Food took 20 mins to come out, and even when we ordered tea, which should generally be served immediately, we had to again ask the staff if could give us our tea since we have waited 20 minutes for some tea.

Atmosphere: 2/5 Interior decoration is nice, however there are lots of signs and posters of different deals of the day that are just stuffed behind a booth, very obviously sticking out.

Overall very poor form for the restaurant. It leaves me with the impression that they are cutting costs with their subpar food...