Noodle Arts — Restaurant in Vancouver

OK.... so where to start. First thing is, I almost missed this place because of 3 fake reviews, and one unfair on their opening day.

This place is amazing. Authentic Lanzhou noodles. 100%Legit. The wife says they are better than she had there. After our meal we talked with the owner and she told us that her family has over 60 restaurants across generations in Lanzhou. She brought their expertise and flavor here.

She is extremely friendly, and has pored her heart and soul into this place.

We were actually lucky to get in here. We were 3 minutes late for the place down the street, which shall remain nameless, and I'm actually glad we got turned away.

I didn't realize that Noodle Arts closes for the sane interval as Density down the street (name changed to protect the sheeple xiao long bao place). Not only did the owner and others take our order, they stayed almost an hour past their closing time, and never even said a word. The other place would have attacked us with pitchforks, cleavers, broken bottles and chopsticks to get us to leave by 3:01. OK, maybe I exaggerate..... they wouldn't use chopsticks.

Go figure, but "Noodle Arts" has amazing noodles, and everything is first rate (top ingredients). Anything with flour is hand pulled. Thin to thick, flat or shaved.... it's all great. The pan-fried dumplings were loaded with meat/filling and possibly the best I've had. We went back to the sheeple place after I posted this review, and their pan-fried soup dumplings, the rolled fried dumplings, and the regular fried dumplimgs were all extremely inferior to Noodle Arts.

And at the other place, we were in our seat at least 45 minutes before their siesta, and they rushed to get us to put in our complete order. We asked that they give us the dessert (chocolate & yummy) dumplings last...... and they said "of coirse..no problem." Guess what came out first? No problem was out the window, and we were stuck with dessert dumplings waiting for us..... almost as inpatiently as the workers.

If you are in Vancouver and looking for Chinese, don't miss this place. Skip the line down the street, and come here. You can order chocolate dumplings later.

Also, Nikka, who apparently has been with them since the beginning, is a great server. Very attentive and a pleasure to deal with. Young, but an extremely intense listener, and observer. Not Chinese, but she is definitely one of the most customer oriented servers I met while in Canada.

To the Yelp moderators..... get rid of the fake reviews. I would tell Yelp, but they don't seem to care when Trolls attack...

Service: we should have left when the female waitress was coughing while giving us the menu. It was my fault for not doing so, resulting in one of the worst dining experiences of my life.

Atmosphere: a stupid Taylor swift album was blaring and the restaurant had no other people. Again, my fault for not leaving on the spot.

Food: Sweet and sour soup with basa fillet was not worth the price. The broth was good, but the basa fillet was grainy and really gross, tasted like dirty tilapia. There weren’t many greens, which would have helped. So I had broth for like $18. Really crappy. My husband ordered vegan noodles that were tasteless, no salt, no pepper, zero flavor, huge disappointment. There were chili dumplings that were okay.

The worst part of this experiences was the tall Asian waitress. She stared at us relentlessly through the whole meal blankly — super uncomfortable. But failing to actually give any service. We had to ask for plates for our family style meal, only had one fork and only two napkins for two people. Very stupid and inept service.

She paced around the restaurant as well, and also burped really loud at one point. Just very very disgusting.

I could not to leave, the worst restaurant ever. Please save your money, it’s not cheap, and that waitress is ...

I ordered combo B - Lan Zhou beef noodle, I was amazed by its flavor. Being a North western Chinese, I was touched by its authenticity because I don't see many good Chinese restaurants in downtown. Then I ordered beef wrap and lamb carrot dumpling. To be honest I always find the dumplings in Vancouver to be somewhat not delicious so I didn't have that much expectation for it, but this one is really good, it's tasty and comfy food. I also like the apricot sweet desert - it has a piece of apricot and Chinese hawberry, again, I really like it. The side dishes are simple but flavory. The tea is special, the flavor is light but pleasant. I feel like they don't just run it as a business, they care about the food they deliever. In addition, the environment is clean and the owner is very friendly. During the whole time of dining, i kept saying "so good" or "the service is good" to my friend. I mean, everyone has their preference about food but for me, for what I ordered, i was impressed and definitely will go again! Good...