I was really excited to try the Wok and Bowl, I had heard that their Pho soup was amazing and wanted to try it. So, the first oppotunity I had, on Labour Day, I went in with a guest...
The young bearded man behind the counter wasn't really interested in taking our order and pointed us to the self order wicket. When I had a question, he barely looked up from his phone, I had to repeat the question a few times before he was able to answer me. Nevertheless, I punched my order into the cash (which didn't give me a discount for doing the cashier's job) and found that many of the items were not available.
I asked why dishes on the menu weren't available, he answered "we ran out of sauce". How do you run out of sauce when there is a Kosher supermarket right across the street (which I'm sure had plenty of bottles of 'sauce' that could have been purchased). But I digress, I ordered General Tso Chicken (combo - smaller size) and Sesame Chicken (combo), a Pho Soup and a Ramen Soup. The total was nearly $100 after taxes. I also purchased 2 drinks, but they were not available from the nearly empty drink fridge. I settled on two other drinks, oh I nearly forgot, they also were out of fried rice, but had plenty of steamed white rice...Which was quite confusing.
I sat down at the table and waited...and waited...and waited some more...and then after waiting, I waited...
While I waited, the two teenage boys behind the counter had gotten themselves some meals and were munching away, Talking to and serving customers with full mouths and handling takout containers with their dirty hands. When they needed their hands for a task, they would just put their half eaten food on the counter, do their task and get back to fressing. It didn't seem very sanitary, but I was hungry, so I figured I'd stick it out and waited some more.
Finally, after around 15 minutes, one of the teenagers looked at me and asked what my order number was. I told him, he went to the back and came out and didn't give me any information. He just went back to his meal.
About 5 minutes later, the General Tso and Sesame Chicken dishes came out. No sign of the soups. I sat and waited 5 minutes, while my food got cold, hoping and praying that the soups would appear...Spoiler alert: They didn't.
I got up and went to the counter, interrupting the teenager from his food. He look annoyed and asked me what I wanted. I asked him if my soup was coming. He said, oh ya, it's uh right here in the back, It'll be a few minutes. I told him to forget the soup and refund me. He turned a bit nasty and told me to take the soup home with me. He pointed out that I was only waiting 20 "not bad for a busy restaurant" minutes. I demanded a refund, which he begrudgedly gave me ($40 after taxes).
I went back to the table and looked at the two meals, a General Tso, and a Sesame Chicken, they looked identical, except one had a sprinkling of Sesame seeds on it. I tasted both of them, they both tased pretty much the same. The General Tso had a teeny bit more spice to it.
I assumed they ran out of Sesame sauce too, because in my experience eating at other Chinese restaurants, General Tso and Sesame look completely different. I then overheard the bearded teenager tell someone that they didn't have any chicken that wasn't battered that night and they ran out of sauce, so "pretty much everything [was] the same."
I don't know if the owners of the restaurant reads these reviews. If they do: This is not the way to stay in business. If you don't have the ingredients to serve your menu, close the place for the evening. Every single customer that was in the restaurant with me that night was disappointed and word of mouth is very damaging. It was so bad that the teenagers behind the counter were openly joking about the complaints, within earshot of customers.
I hate giving negative reviews, I don't want this business go under, but in order to survive, the owner must take serious action and fix these problems ASAP. I really...
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