Good Friends Restaurant Berlin — Restaurant in Berlin

I visited this restaurant with my mom, after years. This place was a family favourite for myself and my family; I was really looking forward to dining here again. To my dismay, my mom and I instantly noticed the decrease in quality.

1.) The waiters were rude and dismissive, eager to rush us/the ordering process.

2.) For a very pricey restaurant, the waiters were being embarrassingly cheap, refusing to give an extra tissue other than the two they had already served onto our table. When I said I need one more, (I blew my nose into my tissue and didn’t want to wipe my mouth with it) the waiter then approached our table and started pointing at my moms ONE TISSUE, saying: ‘look, you have’. I then had to explain that I USED MY TISSUE and need another. (!) how embarrassing for both myself and the cheap waiter! Only then did he get me ONE extra tissue all the while glaring at me (!)

2.) We ordered; 2 corn soups, deep fried salt & chilli tofu, gum bao chicken, & Szechuan aubergine hot pot ((normally our family favourites)). To our dismay, the tofu was over cooked, brown in Color, almost borderline burned. The chicken was overly salty (however that I can forgive, Chinese food is notorious for salt), The aubergine was saltless, flavourless and oily. Simply lucking any kind of spice or taste.

3.) Rude waiter; My mom is Polish and at times a bit energetic. When the waiter repeated our order wrong, saying two chicken corn soups, when we exclaimed initially a few times mom is vegetarian,- she perhaps got a tad excited and said ‘no, vegetarian for me’ .. to which the waiter SHUSHED HER, (with the shushing hand motion) telling her not to get so excited/not to yell (!!!) To me that was shocking, especially as Chinese people are not known to be the quietest of communicators?! The waiter was in such a rush (only God knows why, as we went at 14:00pm, a quiet time when the restaurant was half empty); he forgot our order of tofu; we had to remind him and a fellow waiter. When we requested a spoon or further chilli oils, we had to remind the waiters time and time again to please serve the requested items. Lastly, when it came to payment, the waiter almost demanded a tip, saying how much should he add onto the bill? I always tip, but due to his expectant, indignant behaviour and lack of adequate service to match such expectations, I simply told him to charge me for the amount stated on the bill, and after seeing his face of horror, handed him his tip in coins. I always tip, but hate when a waiter DEMANDS IT. Especially after offending my mom and barely doing his job right.

In conclusion; This used to be our ALL TIME FAVOURITE restaurant once upon a time, but currently, sadly the high price does not reflect the quality of the foods served. Lastly, the dismissive attitude of the waiters really cemented my decision to not revisit. 3 out of five stars; mediocre...

Quintessence:

Good Friends is a pretty good restaurant if you want to eat Cantonese cuisine. I recommend ordering the Cantonese dishes from their menu though, as they also offer a few dishes from other regions of China.

In detail:

My friend and I went to Good Friends on a weekday at around 6:30 pm. After entering the restaurant we were assigned to a table by one of the waiters. The way he spoke sounded a little bit bossy at first, but he was different when he took our order. Since we didn't want to sit at our assigned table we asked another waiter if we could sit somewhere else, and he agreed.

I was a little bit overwhelmed by the number of dishes they have on there menu.

We ordered the Xiaolongbao (dumplings with minced meat and hot soup inside), Charsiu (grilled pork), and stir-fried rice noodles with chicken and vegetables.

All dishes came at about the same time. Unfortunately the Xiaolongbao were not as hot as they are supposed to be when they were served. I also missed the soup inside of the Xiaolongbao when I ate them. But then again Xiaolongbao is not a Cantonese dish. The Charsiu was okay. Sadly though, there were a few sinews in our meat. The dish I enjoyed the most were the stir-fried rice noodles with chicken and vegetables. Good Friends uses freshly made rice noodles, which means the rice noodles had not been dried (as you might have experienced with Pho noodles in Asian grocery stores) before they...

Girl, guys, theys and thems... First a lil backstory, I used to work in a Chinese restaurant, have Chinese colleagues and eat with them all the time. The only complaint I have is that the food was too salty, from the tears I cried into it because it was so tasty. I went there with my boyfriend, and we both ROLLED out of the restaurant.

We ordered: Pork belly: It was melting in my mouth.... Even my boyfriend that isn't the biggest fan of the meat was enjoying it. Green beans with beef: gurl, let me tell you... It was crunchy, savory and just tickled my brain in a special way. Beef with veggies: The veggies were perfectly cooked, and the meat so tender. 10/10 A mix of Dim-Sums: it's like 2 of each, number 464 or something, very very tasty ❤️

The server was a big sweetheart, he checked up on us just enough times, without being overwhelming. I would suggest this restaurant to my closest friends and family, and definitely keep it away from my enemies, because girl... It was to die for.

100/10 Hoping to come back soon ❤️

P. S. The before and after shows you how much we appreciated...