Shi Lin Binondo — Restaurant in Manila

“Hindi na masarap”  commented one of my friends. When I invited my friends over to Binondo, they eagerly drove all the way from Acacia, Taguig because they knew that Shi Lin was a good place to eat and celebrate. It was a mixed celebration of belated wedding, advanced birthday and despedida BUT it wasn’t the memory we wanted to have. We came on a weekday past 1:00PM but there were still several diners coming. Poor service I can’t remember anyone greeting the guests “good afternoon, welcome to Shi Lin” or isn’t this standard in this branch? Service crews were unsmiling. I even gently told one server : “Kuya, smile naman” but he still didn’t smile. We had to repeatedly ask for table napkins til my friend just got up and went to get for us. The manager was busy with reports. I get it it’s the end of the month report time but couldn’t she wait an hour or 2 longer to help out with the branch? Food wasn’t as good Steamed fish with soy was quite salty. The bun of the pork, sausage bun was too thick. Some dumplings had a thicker “wrap” while others were just right or was it intentioned this way depending on the filling inside? I felt I was chewing more of the steamed dough that the dumpling itself. Not all dishes had serving spoons. REDEEMING POINTS: All food was served hot and almost simultaneously. No long wait or long intervals. The Dimsum Tower was worth the price P799+taxes=P870.00. There were 4 varieties with 6 pieces each: xiao long bao, mushroom & veggies dumplings, shrimp & pork dumplings, shrimp & pork bao. It makes a good presentation. Too bad the server couldn’t smile ATMOSPHERE : Aircon wasn’t working properly. It was warm despite the 2 cooling fans I just dined in their Circuit Ayala branch last month and service was superb on a Saturday evening with the restaurant filled...

Shi Lin is a surprising and under rated restaurant here in Lucky Chinatown Mall. It serves authentic Taiwanese dishes and gives a good casual dining experience. We had lunch here and ordered the braised Taiwan Beef noodles, The Century Egg congee, Xialong Bao, Char Siu Pork Bao and some Brown sugar milk tea. All of them tasted wonderfully delicious!! I was not expecting it to be so flavorful. Their Taiwan Beef noodles was really tasty, the broth was beefy and the meat was tender. Their Xialong Bao was not bad either it was meaty but it had very little soup inside. The char siu bao was very tender and flavourful. You can taste the smokey flavor of the port and the cut really thick! The congee was also good, except I don't eat egg. My fiancee did enjoy it though. The serving size was also big! Each dish was good for 2 people. It was meant to be shared but we had a big appetite, so we finished it all. The prices were alil expensive though but I would happily pay for that much if I would have that great tasting food and hefty servings, all the time. Overall my experience at Shi Lin was good. It would have been better less the wait the time and the price but shi Lin can expect me to return really...

11 Dec 2023, around 1pm, 2 pax. We were 3rd ob the wait-list but got seated in just a few minutes, although it was very close to what should have been the order pick up station. We are able to share what we ordered, all of which were well-seasoned. The fried rice with shrimp and egg was not too oily and did not skimp out on the shrimp. The fried pork chop was tender and tasted like it was boiled, marinated, and then fried but could be a bit juicier. The hot and sour soup leaned kore towards sour than spicy. My least liked dish was the stir-fried Taiwanese spinach which seemed overcooked. Our seats allowed us to hear the billing mishap, but they apologized and corrected everything. Our total bill was just around 1,100 so i'm going to say that it was still a good experience overall. I would like to return to see if the bad points i mentioned here were an isolated case...unfortunately, i wasn't to take photos because we were in a time...