Mandarin Palace — Restaurant in London

Unfortunately didn't enjoy my experience at this restaurant, although the food is of good quality it was insanely overpriced. My family and I visited for chinese new year and were extremely disappointed. The set menu was £68, we were told we had to have the set menu there was no other option (we were only 6 people not a huge group) to then see many tables of other people ordering from the a la carte menu which we really would have preferred. When asked they just told us most people were having set menu which wasn't even true...

The food did not reflect the high price, there was only 1 duck leg to share between 3 people for pancakes... the lobster was of good quality but the rest of the meal was made up of average dishes that were yummy but nothing special. £68 is ludicrous for this, I have had better set menus in central London at higher end establishments for less money. My mum is a vegetarian so some vegetarian options were provided for her, although some of them were nice like the Aubergine and Tofu dishes... 2 courses of the set menu were exactly the same; the faux duck and the faux salt and pepper chicken were literally exactly the same dish with exactly the same ingredients. Who wants to pay for a set menu and have 2 courses exactly the same? I said to the staff this wasn't acceptable and they claimed it was different because it had salt and pepper?!?! On top of all of this we asked for a pot of jasmine tea for 4 people, the price of this was not on the menu but the table was set with tea cups and in a majority of chinese restaurants they usually offer this for free so I thought it wouldn't be that much money. When the bill came they had attempted to charge us £18.50 for one pot of jasmine tea?! I queried it and he told us we had had 2 pots and they charge per person not for the pot. I told him we had ordered and received 1 pot for 4 people and only 4 people drank the tea he then changed it to £10.50. £10.50 for a pot of jasmine tea is crazy!!! I wouldn't come back to this establishment and there are much nicer places in Gants Hill to eat that aren't trying to money grab (eg. Royale spicy Dosa which is just...

I shall counter-act the pointless review below and give reasons why you should eat at the Mandarin Palace (note to reviewer below me - why post something that is useless - I don't know you so why should I trust a reasonless, ergo arrogant, review? Bloody awful). We go regularly for Dim Sum, which is easily on par with anything in China Town. The fact that there is always plenty of East Asian families in there eating is a good sign. Occasionally the service can be a bit slow, and the nature of Dim Sum means a bit disjointed sometimes. But it is generally pretty tasty (although my friend thought the chicken feet weren't up to par - however she was appeased by the congee!!) with the BBQ pork, crispy noodles, aforesaid congee and steamed goods really standing out. I've eaten from their evening menu before - it's okay. Go for the Dim Sum. Drinks are well priced, and to be honest, I don't see it as overly expensive from a Dim Sum point of view, although the evening menu is a little pricier than some other local places. If the manageress is in she always comes over and says hello - and then potters around checking and saying hi to everyone else too. It's a nice touch that makes the experience seem more personal. One point though to the MP if they read this - when you carried out your make-over, what on Earth possessed you to replace the old, dark upholstered chairs with cream fabric? 3 years in and as I suspected, they have not faired well against...

We celebrated New Years Eve here with a party of 8, with a 6 course set menu. Overall, it was an okay experience - decent food but dull/poor service.

Positives: The selection of dishes were nice and tasted decent; I particularly enjoyed the traditional starters - good satay chicken and good sesame prawn toast albeit a bit too greasy.

The place was decorated well and the live singer on keyboard was fun.

Negatives: I don't think it is value for money. At a cost of £48/head, I felt the portion sizes were too small e.g. - we had to share one small/medium lobster between 8 people haha.

The staff really need to be trained on customer service. I felt like I was being served by robots most of the night. No smile and the general vibe you get is "Sorry I'm too busy, go ask someone else...". However, one of the waiters (tall gentleman) was very helpful though and fulfilled any requests promptly.

I do think it was a bit cheeky to add a compulsory 10% service charge. Given that it was New Years Eve, you would expect a happy customer service. However the staff didn't really offer much of a festive atmosphere. Service charge should be optional - not forced upon, otherwise you might as well add another £5 onto the £48 price.

More generous portions and a smile or two from the waiter could go a long way. Oh and the owner/manager could do with some...