一品豬肚雞煲仔飯 The Big Casserole — Restaurant in Richmond Hill

I went to this restaurant 2 times. The first time was last year and I remember I was curious: there was a super long waiting line outside of the restaurant. It was a cold day too. So I thought the food should be immensely mind blowing. It was good! I mean it could be me who changed my taste.

Today my friend actually wanted to go to the restaurant next to it. But I convinced to go back and check out again. It’s a rainy day anyways so I wanted some hot soup. There were some tell tale signs in the beginning but I brushed them off.

First off, the customers. The restaurant was actually busy. All tables were full and customers kept coming in. I waited for 15’ which wasn’t bad. The customers on both side of mine were annoying. Something was just off. The family sitting across my table were looking at me the whole time. It wasn’t glances, more like staring.

I remember how I liked the food from the last visit. It is fresh with not much ingredients or spices. And this is why my friend didn’t like it. He thinks it’s too plain with not much of food on plate or bowl or pot. I’m okay with it. I even thought it’s plentiful. The price is not bad either.

What I wanna say here is how disappointed I am with the customer service. Staff are not attentive and rude. My friend bowl & plate were wet. So he wanted to switch it to a different bowl. Staff never came back with a new bowl. They didn’t give us napkin either. They didn’t ask if we wanted water or tea. The tea was hot, it almost burned my friend’s mouth. Whenever I waved at them to come over, they had this irritated look on their face. But everything was still okay until the moment I asked for the bill to pay.

It’s the lady in her 40’ She asked if I wanted cash or debit. I said I need the machine. My friend gestured wiping down (so it means card) She stared at us and kept asking several times. I said credit. She glared at me & said: “I asked you cash or debit.”

It is the top of this bizarre experience. It’s not what she said or I did, it’s the tone & underlining of the interaction. So what? I wanted to pay with card and not cash. Even if the machine doesn’t have credit option, I’ll pay with debit. I can guarantee it’s not the English issue. If she can pick on credit versus debit, she knows how to make or break conversations.

Then maybe there is some kinda restaurants which thrive on humiliate their customers (yes it exists) but it could be these are staff who are underpaid. Almost all of staff today never smiled or greeted customers. They were super slow on customers’ request, inefficient and unhappy.

I can’t believe with this attitude & work ethics this restaurant is still filled 🙄 with customers & high rating. Oh and another thing I noticed is customers tend to order a lot in this restaurant. I think management should train their staff again to honor the trust & money customers choose to invest in this restaurant. They deserve better service than what is currently offering. What a let down!

I won’t recommend The Big Casserole to any of my family members, friends, colleagues or acquaintances. And I won’t come back...

Food: 4 Stars Service: 3 Stars Ambience: 3 Stars Value: 3 Stars Overall: 3.25 Stars

Went here with my mom for dinner. The service was alright, though it took quite a while for them to come take our order, even though it wasn't very busy. We had to wait longer than expected, which was a bit disappointing given how few people were there. The staff seemed a bit distracted, but once they finally got to us, they were polite and accommodating. The restaurant has a Cantonese style, and the smell of pork stomach wasn't exactly pleasant—it seemed like it wasn't prepped quite right, which affected the overall atmosphere a bit.

The menu is pretty small, with only a few items to choose from, but we decided to try the classic sausage and dried pork rice. It turned out to be quite flavourful and not too salty, which was a pleasant surprise. We also had the Classic Fish Cake and Balls Soup, which was comforting, warm, and again nicely seasoned—just the right balance without being overly salty like we initially worried it might be. The portion sizes were decent, and everything was served hot, which made the experience better.

My favourite part of the meal was definitely the Cold Popping Bubble Coconut Milk—it was so refreshing and delicious! It had just the right amount of sweetness, and the popping bubbles added a fun twist to the drink. I'd absolutely come back just to grab that to go if I'm driving by, and it's definitely something I'd recommend to others who are in the area. It's not often you find such a unique and refreshing drink like that.

Overall, it was a mixed experience. The service could use some improvement, and the smell of the pork stomach was a bit off-putting, but there were some nice dishes, and that coconut milk was definitely a standout. If they worked on a few of the minor details, I think it could be a much better experience.

xx...

We were expecting the best food of our lives after seeing the thousands of high ratings, but maybe the 2 hour waitlist dampened our spirits a little bit. A couple friends had been here before and said the hot pot was meh, so we decided to try the clay pot rice since we all like that dish. We were all starving and wanted to try all the flavours so we ordered 5 clay pots and the fried dumplings. First I'll say the dumplings were extremely delicious and if I came here next time I would order those again. For the clay pot rice, they were underwhelming. Out of the 5 options we picked, I really only liked the chicken and mushroom one (and I also don't even like chicken that much, but this was so silky and soft). Everything else was so bland, except for the salted egg and minced pork one, obviously bc there was salted egg in it. We had to ask for soya sauce. However, they were extremely good value, at around $18/pot and you can feed like 4 people, and the next day they tasted a bit better maybe bc the soya sauce had soaked in. I'm sure the other dishes at this resto are amazing, like the namesake casserole, but I wouldn't get too excited about the clay pot unless you love clay pot rice. They have good speciality drinks tho, and would recommend the popping boba coconut milk.

As well, the 2 hour waitlist on a Saturday night was atrocious. But we still waited so what does that say about our characters lol 🤷🏻‍♀️ I would not recommend waiting that long, and only come here if there is little to no wait. It's not that worth it lol. Maybe just make a reservation instead. Also the foyer is extremely cold and windy with people constantly opening the doors, so that's another reason not to wait.

They do speak English, canto, and mando, so you're set for this place if you speak any of...