Fortune Villa 聚福樓 — Restaurant in Markham

New restaurant, so expect lots of people to dine here in the first few weeks as everyone likes to try a new spot.

This is not a big space but it does the job to serve the local communities. Nice decor and very typical fine dining interior design.

We had tried its dim sum and dinner combo. I have to say, the overall quality is good but nothing stands out but does its job.

However, I do find the dim sum pricing a lil bit on the pricey side.

I do have to emphasize that the service here overall are superb. Everyone from the manager level to regular server and even the staff who dropped of the dim sum dishes were polite and friendly.

Moreover, the dinner combo is also pricier than its competitors. For example, at $118 CDN + tax, the combo doesn't comes with any fresh seafood, for 4 people, at $118, it doesn't offer even a dish or Vancouver crabs or East Coast lobsters. And 2 out of the 4 dishes, they forced you to pick the grilled black cod fish and a plate of BBQ duck. Imagine you want to visit this place twice a week? Would you go there and eat the same 2 out of 4 dishes?

I really think they should give its customers more flexibility in choosing all 4 dishes and not forced us to order the same 2 dishes out of the 4 dishes.

Moreover, if you are less than 4 people, say 2 people, there aren't any combo for 2 and aren't enough typical al la carte dishes to grab dinner. They mainly offered specialty expensive individual dishes that most wouldn't want to order. For example, I wouldn't want to order 2-eats of grub fish, it's not tasty and not a fan.

Also, their VIP card is so restrictive, most places may give you 5-10% off, not here, they don't give you on special discount dishes. You can use your VIP card on dinner combos. So...exactly when can you use your VIP card? Mainly during regular dim sum pricing time. Super restrictive with the VIP card that you may as well don't bother getting one.

However, this restaurant will have loyal customers coz around this place, there aren't many Chinese traditional restaurant around. So, many who live nearby and don't drive or have a car will opt to walk over...

For a restaurant that is aiming to be a high end Chinese restaurant, the taste is pretty meh and is the same quality as that of lower end places, like Fancy Chinese Restaurant.

However, their shrimp was bad in the fried shrimp wontons. My mom had 1, and realized it was bad. She figured it's just the one, but turns out the second one was bad too. We sent it back and requested it be cancelled.

When we said that, the manager (60s man, balding) didn't even RESPOND to us. We thought he didn't hear us, so we said it again louder, then he acknowledged us. As a service staff, WHY doesn't he verbally respond? He wasn't handling dishes or talking with anyone else.

The salted fried capelin fish... Oy. The batter was definitely fried but why was it soft and not crunchy? We were actually able to pinch the batter and it stayed that shape instead of breaking off.

The siumai was bland and boring. No shrimp taste and no mushroom taste. It felt like a regular pork meatball.

Their shrimp dumplings were disappointing. The wrap was so thick and opaque. At least it didn't stick to my teeth. I have had way better quality for much lower prices, even in Markham.

Their congee was the only good dish. Lots of toppings, taste was fine, not too salty. Viscosity was okay... But I like thicker congees.

A manager lady also got our order wrong. She inputted it wrong and we had to hunt down the balding manager to get it fixed.

We came for early bird dimsum, in which the price for SML sizes were all $5.30, which is typically the price of a medium dish elsewhere. Their taste didn't even match the price point.

I would not...

I used to go to this place often, but my most recent visit was horrendous. They tried to charge us extra and changed our dishes to a cheaper one without any warning or discount. The small old manager was extremely rude to our table and would not let anyone talk. When the female manager would take over, he would keep nagging and complain afterwards.

First off, our entire table clearly mentioned that we did not want to spend an additional $15 for the lettuce wraps. When he said that it would be on the house, we agreed. But he decided to charge us for it anyway, claiming that he never said it. Given the entire table of 8 listening and previously already deciding that we did not want the additional cost, it is clear that he is scamming us into paying a higher price.

Second, the original combo we ordered had the huge dish of baked grouper served over fire. This was the star of the combo, worth around $50 originally. We ordered the exact same combo weeks ago, so we are very well aware of each dish. However, what was served instead was a plate of fried vegetables with thin slices of white fish. The old manager claims to have told the table, but when asked, only mentioned it to one person at the table who did not understand Cantonese. We definitely would not have ordered the same set knowing this detail.

It was the first time we invited our extended family to celebrate a birthday, but it was ruined by this old manager’s rudeness and scamming. We spent over 30 minutes conversing with him instead of...