Spicy Joint Chinatown — Restaurant in Sydney

The Spicy Joint Chinatown used to be our family's and friends' favourite Chinese restaurant in Sydney in the past few years until since 6 months ago. In those years, every time when we went away, the first thing we did on arrival to Sydney was to come to have dinner here just us or with friends. It never disappointed us - the food was always fantastic with consistency in ingredients, flavours, quantities and presentations... sadly this is no longer the case. Menus changed but still with beautiful pictures but huge disparities with actual dishes on the table. Looking around the huge restaurant that used to be packed at 6:30pm on Saturday night now half full, maybe old timers had the same feeling...

After getting shockingly disappointed six months ago with friends dining at this beloved place, we thought we should give it another try, hoping last time was just a one-off bad experience...

OMG 😨 it was not and it was worse 🥶 It had to be the worse Sichuan good we have ever had in Syd! Every dish we ordered was bad: our favourite Chille fish used to come with sizzling hot fragrant spices with chunky tender juicy delicious fish pieces and fresh cryspy beansprouts in generous quantities and of beautiful wow presentations. But instead it came with a bowl of lukewarm oil casually tossed in with a few thinly sliced tasteless fish pieces (totally different fish from before) with chewy beansprouts that don't look fresh! The steamed spare ribs came also lukewarm with tasteless mullets piled high on the steamer with a few equally tasteless spareribs and disproportionate amount of pumpkins in it - nothing like what it used to be, very sad 😢 We can go on describing each dish that was so badly cooked (even rice😱)...

We left feeling very sad... Now we have given it another try and confirmed this place has changed and unfortunately for us for the bad.. Goodbye Spicy Joint! We still hope you take this feedback positively and try to make changes for the better. We and our large groups of friends hope you will do so 🤞 We will certainly return if you can bring back the former Spicy Joint glory we ever so...

Great food ruined by terrible hygiene and rude service.Today, I travelled a long way just to dine at a Chinese restaurant in Sydney called Spicy Joint, hoping for a delicious meal. I ordered the stir-fried Chinese cabbage with crispy pork, only to find a strand of hair in the dish. I politely informed the staff and expected them to replace the dish — a basic standard in food service. However, instead of preparing a new plate, the male staff member (who seemed to be the manager — with his hair tied up in a bun) simply picked the hair out with chopsticks right in front of me and tried to serve it back like nothing happened. I told him I wasn’t comfortable with that and asked for a fresh dish, but from that point on, I didn’t feel like ordering it again. What shocked me even more was his attitude — aggressive and visibly annoyed — even though I had remained calm and respectful throughout. It made me question if it was my fault for finding hair in my food. To make things worse, when I moved on to eat the fish soup I had also ordered, I found another strand of hair in it. At that point, I lost my appetite completely. It’s extremely disappointing, because the food actually tasted good. But the service was unacceptable, and the hygiene standards were alarming. This was honestly the worst customer service I’ve experienced at a restaurant.

Spicy Joint — I hope you take this feedback seriously. No one deserves to be treated like an inconvenience for expecting basic cleanliness...

I just tried this Sichuanese restaurant in Sydney Chinatown area for lunch today. I ordered their dan-dan noodle soup, spicy beef burger and spicy dumpling - Chengdu style (Note: Chengdu is capital city of Sichuan province in China).

Food: 4/5 All the food are really good, not too spicy but with authentic Sichuan spice tastes, except the burger bun was a bit too dry. I especially like their small bite portions for the dishes which is very accommodating for people who sometimes have their meal alone plus people like me who start to adopt low-carb diet will appreciate it so much. I still like to have my noodle / pasta, etc but cannot justify the big portion provided in most Sydney restaurants nowadays. I also need to add, their tea collection is also good and nice to have after such spicy food meal.

Price: 5/5 Since their portions for individual dishes are mostly small-size, the price points are very good value. I spent only less than $13 for the above meals I mentioned.

Service and Ambience: 4/5 The service of the floor staff members are good and attentive plus all of them spoke reasonable English which is quite rare for Chinese joints in Chinatown area. The ambience is also good with soft, instrumental Chinese songs played in a quite spacious and clean areas.

I will be back next time to try their shared main-dishes...