Liuyishou Hotpot Edmonton — Restaurant in Edmonton

came by earlier today. TL;DR service was horrendeous, likely because of understaffing. food was mostly fine.

for context, I had called in advance this morning, and booked a reservation at a 4:00 PM slot. when I came by it was early, so I waited. 4 PM rolled around and the table still wasn't ready, so I got up to ask about it. but before I could say anything, I got a terse reply from one of the servers--something along the lines of "I know, I know, your table's getting cleaned." I get they were stressed (and I will get to that later), but surely there must be a better way to phrase that (i.e., "sorry, your table's still getting cleaned")! the way it was phrased really threw me for a loop.

I wound up waiting an EXTRA 25 MINUTES before being seated, which is quite frankly unacceptable. IIRC it was difficult for them to find a suitable table because of how busy ir was. fortunately an apology was given and, in spite of what happened, I'm really sympathetic towards the workers here. I think only 2 of them were manning the whole front of house (till payments & dining) for a while, and they seemed harried. hopefully I'm wrong, but this place seems understaffed! if management is reading this, you likely need to make sure there's better staffing levels so that stress and burnout are minimized. also my broth was refilled at least once, but my water wasn't and--after the hotpot food was served--it took a while before anyone came by in general.

the food was great for the most part, except for the chips by the fruit + snacks bar (beside the sauces). those chips had been left out there for a WHILE, and it showed in the deteriorated quality. I wouldn't be surprised if the other items at the bar are of similar quality. I also liked their sesame sauce.

overall, it's really hard for me to recommend this place unless some major changes...

Good quality food, Extremely poor service. We Won't come again.

Brought my family here for the first time. The food is pricier (but ingredients are high quality) From the front desk person to the waitor, we found the service quality to be poor.

Server didn't ask if it was our first time, no offer to explain how the ordering worked, no reccomendations, didn't offer drinks(we had to ask) , didn't offer desserts, no offer for to go boxes, I had to ask how to order appetizers (because they aren't on the menu)

Some of our dishes (soup spoons, tea cups, long plates ) were greasy and grimey. Spicy broth was too oily. The waitor never checked on us to see how we were doing and ask if we needed anything and we felt rushed when the waitor asked us to pay for the bill before we were even finished! Absolutely Zero, customer service! Every interaction we had with them, I needed to initiate.

We had such a bad dining experience we won't be coming back. Easily the worst experience we've had as far as I can remember.

The hot pot next door has way better and courteous service and much better value.

Read the other reviews about this restaurant and you'll see a common thread with the service. Many of my comments have already been experienced by other diners over 9 months ago and no apparent changes! It's nice that the management apologized and offered a 50$ coupon but that's simply not going to cut it for me. They've had many other comments about their poor service and if the Management was sincere about improving, they would of addressed their...

We reserved a table for 10,the server Allen was prompt, friendly, and patient. He explained the menu and how the process worked (as this was my first time here). The broths were not that flavourful, but overall the veggies and meat were delicious (maybe I just ordered the wrong broth). The restaurant is clean but looks a little run down. The seats were comfortable and it was easy to visit with our group as it was not noisy. We stayed until close always made us feel welcome and kept checking on us. In fact Allen even brought my daughter extra cream puffs after the last call because she was sad she missed it. The sauce bar was great but I wish they had fresh cut garlic, the garlic looked like it was precut type you buy at the store. I know a few reviews said they thought the potato chips were tacky but I actually loved having a little salty crunchy snack with my meal. Overall we ate like kings and our bill for 10 people was under $400 and that was with ordering drinks and extras. My only real concern about this place was that it felt really unsafe in the area it was in and I was worried to park my car. There were a lot of unhoused people, people yelling and acting bizarrely, and some people peeing on the nearby businesses. When you leave the street and go inside you forgot about everything out there but it can be a little unnerving as you were driving around the area looking for parking. I wish you could park in front of the restaurant so that you can keep an eye...