聚鲜楼 KL KITCHEN CHINESE SEAFOOD CUISINE — Restaurant in Toronto

Ever since sometime in late 2023, I began going to this gem of a restaurant somewhat frequently whenever I'm in downtown Toronto. I must say that they're one of the better Chinese restaurants in the area as the quality of their food is comparable to those in Markham and Scarborough in regards to the taste and presentation.

The restaurant is usually packed on the weekends and you can usually expect a wait time of anywhere between 10 to 30 min. This is why I personally prefer to come here on the weekdays when they are busy but not to the point of "bursting at the seams" so to speak lol (but of course, if more people start heeding this advice and altering their behaviour, then soon there won't be any advantage to coming here on the weekdays instead lol XD). The space inside the restaurant is pretty tight I would say since all the tables are placed very close to each other with not much room to move around or to go in and out of your table if you wish to use the restroom. You can easily accidentally "swipe" the neighbouring table or your own when you're going in and out (especially when you're sitting in the booth) so just be mindful of that if you don't want to turn your sweater, t-shirt, jacket, etc into a kitchen towel lol XD! The 2 person table is also pretty small when you're ordering stuff like the hotpot plus some other dishes lol. However, this is the price you have to pay in order to enjoy their delicious food lol XD and I would say that overall, it's worth it lol... Just be extra careful =D.

Anyway, they offer 3 hotpots there, namely the one with the whole chicken, the one with a whole tilapia, and the one with chicken and pork tripe. All 3 of them have a different soup base and I personally think the one with the whole chicken has a very delicious soup as it has ginseng, red dates, etc in it. However, the tilapia one has the soup with the most "pure" flavour so it's also delicious in its own way in my opinion. The one with the chicken and tripe has a really strong tripe and white pepper flavour so while it's not bad, it's not my favourite lol. I usually come here with my "partner in crime" XD so I would say that for 2 people, one of these hotpots plus maybe one other dish is already sufficient, especially if you plan to drink some of the soup too (I see a lot of people piling up their tables with the hotpot plus several other dishes and being unable to finish their food in the end lol). Even if you don't intentionally drink the soup, you're bound to drink some of it as the chicken, tilapia, or tripe are bound to absorb some of the soup so try not to make the mistake of underestimating how full you can get from it lol XD. The whole chicken and the tilipia ones come with napa cabbage but you can always order more vegetables (such as watercress, more napa, etc) to put into the hotpot if you're into eating healthy ;)

Other than their signature hotpots, they also serve claypot rice, stir fried dishes, fried noodles/rice, etc. Their claypot rice is tasty though they don't offer as much variety as some of the claypot rice places in Markham and Scarborough. They also serve dessert (糖水), such as the red bean dessert (紅豆沙) and the mung bean dessert (綠豆沙) while some of the other Chinese restaurants in Chinatown don't offer any dessert.

Lastly, they open till very late (2 AM from Sunday to Thursday and 4 AM on Fridays and Saturdays), so you know you can rely on them to be there for you when most of the other places are closed for the day.

TL;DR - I recommend this gem of a restaurant as they are one of the better Chinese restaurants in Chinatown, with food comparable to those at the Markham/Scarborough Chinese...

Used to come here with my friends regularly, but found a bug in my food on my most recent visit. Service would be one star, but the one manager was very polite and we are regularly served by him, offered to comp part of the meal. The other manager and his friends were rather aggressive and standoffish, he was having drinks with another table during our visit, then He and his nosey friends felt the need to insert themselves into the issue and they came to tell us “we should just deal with it.” There was no reason for his nosey friends to interfere in the matter. It was very disrespectful and has generally soured my opinion of this establishment. I will probably not be back.

Edit: If he is a customer and did not want to be included in my review he should not have acted like an employee and included himself in your business telling me I should just eat the bugs in my food and generally acting like he owned the place. Why am I being harassed by your other customers after finding a bug in my food, and why are you allowing drunk people to harass other customers in your establishment? That makes the experience even worse. Some drunk customer accosted me while I was paying for a dinner that had a bug in it?

There was no mention of the gross old cabbage in my initial review because that wasn’t an issue compared to the dead bug I found in my food. We ate some of the cabbage and didn’t complain initially because we frequent this business and wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt. But after the bug we were all disgusted. We were offered a partial comp, but the receipt we were initially provided was entirely in mandarin or Cantonese which I do not speak nor read, I don’t think it is rude to ask for an itemised receipt in English in Canada.

Also threatening your customers with legal action for their honest review but not saying anything when one of your drunk patrons approaches another table to tell them they should just eat bugs they are served when they are paying for the...

Worst dinning experience in Toronto, EVER. Terrible staff and service.

Once we sat down for less than 5 minutes, staff was rushing us to order. We ordered 5 dishes which is enough for 6 people, but waiter keeps repeating that we didn’t order vegetables, like he is hinting that we should.

Staff brings over dessert when we are not even done with our mains. They were very quick taking away empty plates from our table, at one point the waiter even takes away a bowl full of rice without asking! It feels like they just want us to finish quickly and leave.

When we finally get to dessert, they bring us the bills all of a sudden, saying that we need to go since the next booking has arrived and are waiting outside…..speechless

We were at our table for only 1 hour and already kicking us out. The restaurant didn’t mention there is a maximum dinning hour when we were booking our table.

The food was ok, but I’d rather go somewhere I can sit comfortably and enjoy. Don’t even bother coming. not...