桃花源 Taoyuan Restaurant — Restaurant in Markham

Totally not a happy camper. We placed the order ourselves (write on paper on what we want). The waitress came to pick up our order, hasn't confirmed with us on the order which for the past two times when I visited, they did. Anyways, I just thought may be if she has question on the order she will come back to us. After waited for 10-15 minutes, the waitress brought the paper with our order on it and asked us if that was our order. We were like ??? and said yes. Then she left to place in our order - which she should have done that 15 minutes ago. We ordered five dishes, there were four of us, each of us got one dish, and we ordered the 藥膳雞鍋to share. After another 10 minutes wait, two dishes arrived. Another 5 minutes after, a bowl of soup arrived with another dish. We asked which meal does the soup go with, the waitress looks confused but told us it's with the third dish, since the first two dishes doesn't come with soup. Another 5 minutes after the fourth dish arrived. After we finished our dishes, the 藥膳雞鍋 hasn't arrived yet, so we checked with the waitress. Then she asked if the one we ordered was the hotpot, we said yes that's the one we ordered. She gave us a look of "omg why??!!" and walked away. We immediately knew that she mistaken the 藥膳雞鍋we ordered was the bowl of soup that arrived earlier (which we only took two sip of it). The 藥膳雞鍋arrived 10 minutes after, the waiter didn't bring us the laddle so we asked for it, then he got us the skimmer & slotted serving spoon instead which we couldn't use those to serve the soup.... So we asked again and this time he got it, the laddle was the one we asked for. When it was around 9:10pm, the waitress wanted us to pay first as they were closing up (the closed by 10pm), we asked for two soup containers to pack the soup and one food container for one of the dishes. We checked the bill and found out they charged us the bowl of soup which the waitress mentioned it came with one of the dishes. They charged $3.00 which honestly we didn't care much, it's just how interesting that the waitress saw that we were discussing, and explained to us that the soup costs $3.00 while it normally costs $5.50. So in a sense they already gave us a "discount" on a bowl of soup that we didn't even order, which it was a mistake that they have made and we had to pay for it, while they were so generous and gave us $2.50 discount... She actually realized it was her mistake otherwise there shouldn't be any "discount" for us. This is not the first time I came to this restaurant, the past two times the service was way better. Food is good, soup is a bit salty but acceptable (add hot water in it would help to tune down a bit). May be this is just a one time weird experience, but I don't think I would want to...

Pros: Extensive menu Everything from Zen Q is also available

Cons: Portion sizes could be better

My family has always been a fan of Zen Q. They offered a couple of entrees and snacks but I would never consider them a full on restaurant to bring the family to. Taoyuan Neverland fixes all that. Combining with Zen Q into one location, it offers the same great items that Zen Q offered with a whole new level of options for dining in as well.

Taoyuan Neverland is not the biggest space. They do manage to fit in as many seats as possible. It's a little tight in some areas, but you can maneuver around OK as long as you're careful. This place is pretty packed during peak hours, so come prepared for a little wait if you come during those times.

Taoyuan Neverland's menu is as extensive as any HK style cafe menu I have ever seen. There's also a plethora of Taiwanese style entrees as well. They also have a good amount of specials throughout the day. They had so much to offer than I had a pickle of time deciding what I wanted to order. The prices are all pretty in line with what you expect.

Food comes out pretty quickly after you order it. In terms of comparing it against Zen Q in the past, it's much better. I never liked the noodles at Zen Q before. The noodles now offered are better. It's not the best you'll ever find, but it's up there with all the other HK style cafes. All the drinks you've had at Zen Q are still here so you get the best of both worlds. My only gripe was the portion sizes. They were on the smaller side, though I am a big eater.

Zen Q was never in my thoughts as a dining option. With Taoyuan Neverland, I can now definitely put it up there...

Servers (maybe just the 1?) didn't know their restaurant brand very well. We have been to many zen q before and we were wondering why this set meal didn't have side dishes we could choose from. In the end she told us that diff zen q branches operate menus differently... She didn't even know others operated differently until we said that Woodbine gave us choices. She said that Kennedy cooks when ordered versus Woodbine had cooked à bunch of dishes and just plops them to the rice.

Overall, food was good. The Taiwanese chicken was better than next door's Ten Ren and this place has a lot more rice! No sides though unless you really count the 4 pieces of broccoli lol. Plum sauce ribs were great! The sauce was delicious but the ribs are meatier next door.

The ambience was squishy. This could be a family place but it's rather small and ventilation isn't the best. It's comfier to sit next door.

I will say though that their fruit drinks are quite sweet so if you are watching your sugar, you could even get 25% or 0% sugar and the tapioca/jellies will be more than enough sugar.

Would I come here again? Probably on a co day. Zen q doesn't have as many drink choices and the lacking side dishes thing makes me go next...