Red Lantern | Solaire Resort North — Restaurant in Quezon City

This was my fourth time dining at Red Lantern at Solaire North, and I had hoped the experience would improve. Unfortunately, it has been consistently disappointing across all visits.

Let’s begin with the positive which is your staff’s warm, polite, and welcoming demeanor.

That said, the overall dining experience particularly the food and service flow fell significantly short of expectations, especially for a restaurant that has been featured in Tatler Dining’s Top 20 Restaurants for 2025. Personally, I find such recognition to be misleading, at least based on my multiple visits.

I understand that your restaurant offers all you can eat dim sum option. We booked the second seating at 1:30 PM, and from the outset, several issues became evident:

The Food Was Consistently Served Cold. Every single dish we ordered arrived cold. Not lukewarm, but truly (death) cold. It gave the impression that the food had been prepared much earlier in the day and simply held until our seating time. Dishes that should have been served hot and fresh like the barbecued roasted pork belly with cucumber, the honey glazed barbecued pork, har gao, siu mai, and the steamed fluffy barbecued pork buns were all disappointingly cold and lacked any freshness or crispness.

I understand your restaurant uses a system where we tick off our preferred items on the menu checklist. However, there seems to be no organized system for tracking or cross referencing what was actually ordered. Items arrived in no discernible order, and several dishes we selected never made it to our table. For example, the shredded chicken and fish cake soup, which we looked forward to, never arrived. Instead, we were served items we didn’t request.

After dessert was served, only then did some of the missing items arrive. Again, completely cold. This included the deep fried cheese and prawn spring rolls, mashed yam puff dumplings with diced chicken and mushroom, and what obviously seemed like the fried version of har gao, which was not the deep-fried jiaozi with mango mayo we had selected. The temperature and presentation of these dishes were unacceptable for a restaurant that claims a “relentless pursuit of culinary excellence.” None of the dishes felt refined, balanced, or thoughtfully prepared.

When dessert was served, no fresh utensils were provided, which meant using our used silverware from the main course. For a restaurant positioned as premium dining, this was unacceptable.

While the staff were kind and tried their best, the kitchen operations and service system remain deeply flawed.

For the price point and brand reputation of Solaire, guests reasonably expect precision, freshness, and premium standards that were not met.

A comparable establishment like Lung Hin of Marco Polo or China Blue at Conrad Manila demonstrates how refined Chinese cuisine and service can truly elevate the dining experience.

Unfortunately, Red Lantern continues to miss the mark. I sincerely hope they take these points constructively and address them...

DO NOT COME HERE!!!!! Terrible terrible experience! Extremely disappointed with this branch! Made a reservation online a day before. They texted me at 11:45pm and said that they will add me to the waiting list and they cannot guarantee the waiting time. So I came here on the day of my reservation only to be told they will not be able to accomodate my reservation because their system is overbooking. As if it is my fault. I asked them the night before if my reservations canceled and they im just on their waiting list and cannot guarantee waiting time. The receptionist here are so rude. Like bakit pa ako pinapunta all they way here expecting a table when they dont even plan to give me one in the first place. I mean thats the purpose of reservation diba? So spoke to the manager and she said I can wait until 1;30pm and they’ll give me a table. So its already 1:30 and still no table. Theyre just bluffing making you hope for a table when instead they dont intend to give you one in the first place. Grabe...

We ate at the Paranaque branch before and enjoyed it, so we decided to dine at the QC branch as well.

Service was incredibly slow. Picture below is what our table looked like after more than 20 minutes of waiting -- two small dishes for a table of 8. We had to follow up multiple times to get our dishes. We kept being told that "matagal po talaga lutuin insert dish" but with the timeframe for the dimsum lunch being only 1 hour and 30 minutes, speedier service should be given.

Unlike the Red Lantern in Paranaque which is situated away from the casinos, the one in QC is right outside the casino. We were sat near the entrance so we could smell the cigarettes. If you are planning to bring children, consider the Paranaque branch instead.

Food is good which is really the only redeeming factor here.

Overall, very mediocre. Wish we dined at the Paranaque...