Xiang Zi HotPot — Restaurant in Markham

[Overall Review] Known for their spicy broth, beautiful interior and quality ingredients. I have to say they are on the pricier side at about $50 per person for AYCE, but the quality, service, and overall experience made it worth it. It's probably not a place we would go to often, but for celebrations and larger gathering this would a great option!

[More detailed review] We went here on a Sunday night, with a party of 9. I called in advance to make a reservation and they set us up in a private room that could have sat up to 12 people. Each person got their own individual pot which is nice and covid friendly. I notice that the tables outside for 4 were shared pots vs single pots like what we got in private room. It's a huge restaurant, with two stories. The moment you open the doors, you're quickly transported into China, or thats how we felt with the amazing interior and long hallway. We were greeted by the hostess after making our way down the long beautiful decorated hallway then brought through this beautiful arch where the middle was their "buffet" style set up but due to covid was only accessible for the servers. Past the buffet set up were two beautiful set up stairs that brought you upstairs where they had more tables along with their private rooms. The hostess brought us up to our private room, which was also beautiful decorated. At the table each person had an apron they could wear to protect their clothes, along with a ziplock baggie for your masks.

Once we were all seated, a server came with an Ipad and told us to select our broth, you have a choice between a single broth or select two different type for a half and half. I went with the Tomato for my first choice and second choice the mushroom broth. My husband got their spicy broth (which they are known for) and you can also select the spice level, he went with spicy (but later wished he had gotten extra extra spicy as it wasn't spicy enough for his liking - he has a high spice tolerance) After we got to select our broths, the server came by with a sauce cart, and asked us what we would like, due to covid she made the sauce for us, we just had to tell her what we wanted. This was the part I didn't like as much, since I like my sauce a particular way, but regardless it was still good.

After selecting our broths and sauces, she left us an ipad for us to order our food. Each person was allowed to order 2 items under the premium category, I went with the scallops and beef cubes and my husband went for the beef cubes and lamb skewers. Due to us having 9 people, it was a little hassle and took awhile for each of us to go through with just one ipad. Wish they gave us two ipads for larger parties.

When the food started arriving, they dropped down some dry ice and poured water into it to give us a beautiful presentation, the table soon started flowing with the dry ice effect which was a huge WOW factor for everyone. Extra dishes were left onto the side on a cart to not over crowd the tables.

We were pretty blown away, by all of the presentation they put into each dish, the server was also incredible and always on top of things. Each item we ordered was also of quality and the desserts were amazing as well.

One thing I wanted to add is that, if you can't read chinese, I highly recommend you have Google Translate with you, as there was some items on the menu that was in chinese, and we had to use google translate. Also when I made a reservation they texted me in chinese which I did not understand, so I had to get my...

So I visited this place wayyyy back (pre-covid), visited again once they reopened to the public after quarantine measures were lifted and recently, came BACK for my gf's mom's bday.

The first time I came w/ my friends (pre-covid) this resto blew my mind. It's a 2 floor resto with ice beds and buffet stations on the main floor.

The way the resto USED to work before covid, was that they laid out all the seafood and meat at the buffet station. I'm talking SCALLOPS, ABALONE, SEA CUCUMBER, etc. And ALL of these premium items were INCLUDED in the price and you could grab an UNLIMITED amount and then they would REFILL the ice bed. I vividly remember gleefully bringing two full plates of giant scallops back to my table on that first visit. My friends and I thought we had discovered the casino jackpot when it came to good hotpot. Yes, the price was mad high compared to its counterparts in york region, but we thought it was definitely justified given how much was actually included in the overall price.

Fast forward to post-quarantine, my friends and I visited and were SOO disappointed with the way the resto was running. They removed all the seafood and unique items from the ice beds and buffet stations. Instead, they replaced everything with cold appetizers and salads as well as desserts. They implemented an ipad ordering system (1 ipad per table) and all the premium seafood that had once been INCLUDED in the overall price, suddenly became a limit of 2 per person. Upset is not even the right word. I had literally been looking forward to unlimited scallops but now I only get 2? LAME. The premium angus beef cubes weren't really premium either btw. You're better off sticking with the regular sliced beef, lamb, pork on the menu as it's marbled enough. The angus cubes were actually kinda tough. My friends and I had a good laugh as the cubes were listed as a premium item. I thought it was understandable at the time why they moved things off the ice bed in the open for anyone to touch, but removing premium seafood from the AYCE price altogether seemed very sneaky and shady.

Fast forward again to present day and my gf's mom (and her sis's bf) decided to host a joint bday dinner here. I had my fingers crossed hoping that the resto reverted to laying everything back out on the ice beds. To my dismay, they stuck w/ the same stations and ipad ordering system from my 2nd visit.

If there's one thing that's remained consistent, it's good service and the quality of the sliced meat. Very well marbled meat, EXCELLENT sauce bar (very promptly refilled too) and the table service is A++. They brought the initial round of meat to the table with some dry ice presentation which was really cool for video taking.

Perhaps, I'm being harsh or finicky but it can't be helped. I remember what this place was like pre-covid and how much value you got with the premium items included, like the unlimited scallops.

I'm struggling to award 4 stars even though they might deserve it based on the meat quality. You're essentially paying a higher price at Xiangzi for a meal that USED to include a TON more items in the price.

Caveats:

unlimited melonas which is nice unlimited coconut milk which is nice (these are so bad for you but I love em) aprons provided for every guest and seat covers for your jackets/outerwear private...

Xiang Zi is a a premium all-you-can-eat hotpot place located in the Whole Foods plaza on Birchmount and Hwy 7. It's been opened for a while and I've heard great things, but I also heard it was very expensive (especially when you consider the four $$$$ in this listing on Google Maps!). After trying a bunch of mediocre hotpot places in the area, I finally gave Xiang Zi a try.

Parking is just fine - even though it shares the parking lot with Whole Foods and other restaurants and retail stores, there is ample parking. Beware that there are some parking spots that are limited to quick pickups (within 30min). I made a reservation for 3 at 6:30pm on a Monday night over the phone very easily. When you arrive, you're met with very large wooden doors and it's pretty aesthetic walking into the restaurant. It's a couple of long hallways and someone will greet you at the end. They have several tables - some with a large shared hotpot (booths) and others with smaller individual hotpots (tables). They show you how to use their iPad and what you're limited on, what costs extra, and ask you what soup base you want. We got the shared hotpot and got the mushroom soup base which was an extra $18.99. I believe the individual hotpots are about $6-8 extra. If you want a split large hotpot, it's $27.99.

They have a free sauce station, in the middle of the restaurant. You can go up to the station to pick your own sauces. They also have cute little cans of sesame oil! As for food, each person is limited to 2 premium items, which range from things like duck intestines, mussels, scallops, and skewers. I found that I wasn't craving for a lot of the premium items and being limited to 2 was just enough. The rest of the food was great - I especially liked their fresh cut lamb and beef. They don't have the widest selection, but the food is great quality which makes up for it. Each order has several portions - which they list in the description of the item on the iPad. They also have several desserts, including some fruits, Chinese desserts, Melona bars (coconut, mango, melon), and cakes (green tea, tiramisu, cheesecake). Service throughout the meal was also very great. They gave us little plastic ziploc bags to put our masks in, but I wish they also had other covers - my bag still smells like the broth the day after!

Weekday dinner price for adults was $35.99, which honestly is pretty much the same for any AYCE restaurants these days. In total, it was about $53 per person for our soup base (including tax and tip). I wouldn't say it's super pricey unless you get their extra-cost premium items. You can't really compare to the past prices of places like Little Sheep haha.

9/10 would...