Golden Dragon (Colindale) — Restaurant in London

This one star rating is dedicated to the woman (at the front desk) today in charge of allocating tables/seatings, whom I found to have such poor customer service skills.

My family came here today to celebrate my Mum's birthday; there were seven of us. We had been made to wait at least one hour for a table. (They don't take booking reservations for lunch time, only for dinner time in the evenings. And they won't give you a table unless the whole group is there. But we already know that this is how they operate so it's fine).

So when we first arrived there, we told the lady at the front desk that we needed a table for 7 people, but that we were still waiting for two family members to arrive. She registered our family name into their system and told us to wait. So we did, no problem.

Eventually, my sister and my brother in law arrived, so we had notified the lady that everyone was now here and ready to be seated. However, we were informed that there was no available table for our group yet. So we waited, and waited patiently, checking around for empty tables that could accommodate us. My husband spotted a table for 8 in the corner, he came up to the lady to ask if that could be made available for us. My husband was told by her that it's 'RESERVED'. (But they don't take lunch time reservations, remember? So I don't know what's the deal with this). So, we waited some more. A few minutes later, that same table was given to another family. (???)

We have basically sat there in the waiting area (for quite some time now) watching other customers being allocated seats. (In the meantime, my daughter had started complaining that she was hungry and my Dad had started to get concerned about the car park hour limit - 3 hours - as he doesn't want to get a fine for it). When my husband came forward again to ask her for a table of 6 that have just been vacated, she said it's too small for us. Instead, she gave it to a family of 5. At this point, I got up to ask her if there is a table for 6 and that we could just add another chair. She replied in a challenging tone, "You want a smaller table, Ok, I'll find you a smaller table, follow me." So I did, and she was offering me a table for 4. I told her, "This is ridiculous". And a brief argument broke out between us. Therefore, my family and I decided to leave and head over to Wing Tai at Wing Yip (Cricklewood) instead.

I was very annoyed by her attitude, no apology whatsoever for making us wait for a long time. I understand that it's a very busy time but she could have said something like, "I'm sorry to keep you waiting, there is a table for 6 I could offer, would you be ok with that if we just add another chair, if you don't mind a bit of a squeeze". No effort to compromise at all.

We visit this restaurant at least twice a year and I have never encountered this kind of service from them until now. This lady at Golden Dragon seemed to lack awareness of who's been waiting in the queue for a long time.

This has never happened to us at Wing Tai in Wing Yip (Cricklewood) so I would rather go there next time (despite of the location being a bit...

I love Chinese food but have avoided it for many years because I'm not a fan of MSG/AjinoMoto, which is a standard ingredient that can make anything taste amazing. Surprisingly, many people don't even know about it. However, I really wanted to try this place and have been searching for a Chinese restaurant online for years that states they are MSG-free. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find such a place, although I'm sure it must exist. In regard to this particular place, there didn't seem to be any comments in the reviews mentioning the use of MSG, so I thought there was a chance this place doesn't use it. (Clearly, I am the Artificial Additive Avenger).

I brought this up because I avoid MSG like the plague, partly due to the linked side effects and the real aftereffects I experience when I unwittingly consume it.

Anyway, on to the review:

First, I called to inquire if it was necessary to make a reservation. They said that for large parties during the evening on a weekday, they do not take last-minute bookings and advised me to just come. They also mentioned that they did not want to wait for people who might not show up.

We arrived at 9 pm, knowing we had only one hour until the 10 pm closing time. We had planned in advance what to order to save time.

We were instantly greeted upon arrival and shown to our seats.

We ordered a few dishes to try everything, including lemon chicken, beef steak, roast chicken, egg fried rice (unfortunately covered in spring onions), seafood crispy noodle, squid, and some other dishes that I may have forgotten about.

Normally, I would break down the scores out of 10 for each dish, but since there are so many, I thought it would be best to summarize by saying that all the dishes were good. None of them tasted like they had MSG, which made me happy (although I may be wrong about this one point). I should have just asked, but I feel quite awkward doing so in Chinese restaurants because they usually look at you like you are dumb, and I can understand why. Anyway, the main point is that everything was good in terms of the food.

At one point, I accidentally dropped my apple juice as the straw got caught on my shirt. Embarrassingly, it spilled all over the table, but two members of staff literally rushed to the rescue, which showed me how attentive and on the ball the staff was.

The toilets were the only thing I did not enjoy about this place due to the damp toilet smell. I thought this let the place down.

The most important factor for me about this place was that I had no aftereffects from eating the food, which suggested to me that they may not use MSG since I always experience aftereffects from it. Maybe they do use it, but if they do, it must be in minimal quantities, although I would prefer zero use of it.

Overall, I was happy with my experience. The staff was welcoming and attentive, and the restaurant had a nice,...

I stumbled upon this restaurant in my search for a decent place to eat for Mother’s Day, and boy was I disappointed. From the moment we walked in, the atmosphere was dingy and dirty. The tables were sticky and the floors looked like they hadn't been cleaned in weeks.

Do NOT go to this restaurant if you value your health and tastebuds. The food was beyond terrible, it was inedible. My mother, grandmother, brother, dad and I all got food poisoning from the undercooked meats and the lack of hygiene in the kitchen was apparent from the scraps of food lying around. The staff were rude and unhelpful, showing no concern for our health or well-being. To add insult to injury, the prices were extremely overpriced for such low-quality food and service.

The service was absolutely horrendous. We waited nearly an hour just to get our menus, and another hour for our food to arrive. When the food arrived it came out cold and still raw in some areas. The drinks we ordered also took forever to come, and when they did, they were watered down and tasted awful.

To top it all off, we had to constantly ask for the bill and even had to get up and go to the door before they finally brought it over. And when we refused to pay the service charge, the waiter had the audacity to argue with us and say that's just how things are done there.

But the worst part was when we saw the staff taking the food we had sent back from our table and putting it in takeaway containers. I can only assume they were planning on serving it to other customers or reusing it in other dishes. Disgusting!

The overall atmosphere of the restaurant was dismal and depressing, making it hard to enjoy our Mother's Day dinner. I cannot believe this restaurant is still in business and I implore everyone to avoid it at all costs. I will be reporting this restaurant to environmental health and spreading the word to warn others about the horrendous experience we had at this so-called 'restaurant'. Save yourself the trouble and go somewhere else for a decent meal. Absolutely unacceptable. This was a terrible experience and I would never recommend this place to anyone. Save yourself the embarrassment and avoid this despicable restaurant at all costs. Trust me, you'll...