Din Tai Fung — Restaurant in Bellevue

On January 13th, I had lunch with friends and family at Din Tai Fung located in Lincoln Square Bellevue, Washington. Among all the Din Tai Fung branches I've visited in various countries, this was the most unpleasant dining experience. It is disheartening to see such poor service at this internationally renowned Taiwanese brand.

Whenever I visit a new country or city, dining at Din Tai Fung has become a habit. The wonderful dining experiences and delicious Taiwanese flavors always make me feel at home and proud.

Three of us girls, after happily shopping at the mall, decided to dine at Din Tai Fung in Lincoln Square Bellevue for the first time. Since American malls are pet-friendly, allowing pets in bags as long as they don't touch the ground, we brought along a small Yorkshire Terrier in a pet backpack. After queuing and being seated, we happily ordered a table full of food, praising the spacious and large restaurant filled with local white customers, a true pride of Taiwan.

Halfway through our meal, a young white male waiter rudely informed us across the round table that pets were not allowed in the restaurant and asked us to place the pet backpack on the floor. Knowing that our Yorkshire Terrier tends to bark when the backpack is placed on the ground, we hurriedly tried to finish our meal to avoid causing trouble. However, the young white male waiter seemed angry and rudely reiterated that pets were not allowed unless they were service dogs. We placed the pet backpack on the floor and tried to eat quickly, but the dog barked a few times. The waiter then brought over a female Asian manager who rudely told us our meal was over and asked us to leave immediately.

We were unaware that pet backpacks were not allowed when we were seated, and we understood the restaurant's responsibility to other customers, so we were willing to pay and leave immediately.

The white male waiter said, "We'll pack up the unfinished food for you to take away, and the chocolate xiaolongbao you ordered will be canceled as it hasn't been prepared yet." We were puzzled because we ordered it specifically to eat. Why cancel our dessert without asking if we wanted it to go? We didn't want to make a fuss, so we paid with Apple Pay and completed the transaction.

At this point, another waiter brought out the dessert, the chocolate xiaolongbao that the previous waiter said wasn't prepared, and it was already canceled on the bill.

The rude white male waiter then appeared with the card machine, added the chocolate xiaolongbao to the order, and asked us to pay again. We were stunned.

It turns out that this Din Tai Fung waiter could cancel our desired dessert and then, due to poor communication, force us to pay for it after it was prepared.

Having visited Din Tai Fung in at least 10 cities overseas and having been fortunate to be served by the founder Yang Ji Hua in Taiwan, who was warm, considerate, polite, and kind, this experience made us want to cry—not because the food was delicious, but because it was heartbreaking to see this Taiwanese brand being tarnished in a Washington mall. We never expected such a thing to happen.

We understand the challenges of the service industry, being service workers ourselves. We know that no matter how good a brand is, if the frontline staff lack the brand spirit, the company's reputation will suffer. We later reported this to the female manager, and it seems the service from top to bottom in this branch is equally terrible, making people hesitant to return. We hope Din Tai Fung can improve, and that the overseas staff can uphold the...

The host and manager had such poor communication with some attitude. Upon arrival I specifically asked if they have space for a big party - the host said yes. I even specified that we would like to wait for the private room to ensure we’re all in the same space to celebrate my birthday. She also said yes as long as everyone is present. I checked in with her 2x to make sure it is 2 tables that we are needing next to each other. She has not once told me she could not make it happen. Once our table was ready, they walked us to our tables - these tables were completely in two different spaces. It made no sense. Half of us was in the private room while the other half was in the general space. Yes the tables were near but we could not see each other, it was blocked by an entire wall/curtain. I then asked if she could put us in another space and we were willing to wait or if the people she sat down could switch with us - they didn’t even try. Their seating arrangement did not make sense. And I asked to even wait for the private room to be open and they proceeded to tell me we need to spend a minimum- that is no problem we can totally hit it. But why tell me that and not accommodate? We came here at the same time as another smaller party - while they barely sat down we asked to speak to the manager to work with us. We asked him to speak to the smaller party he just sat down to switch tables with us. He just ignored us. We also asked if we can squeeze into the one larger table- he told us it would be a liability to have everyone in one big table - I totally understand that, we originally asked for 2 tables near each other. He said he can’t do anything by about it. As that was near. Then proceeds to come back and offer us 2 even smaller tables and ask us to squeeze - how is that not a liability when the original table was much much larger. It was absolutely ridiculous. The entire time there they just ruin the atmosphere by walking by and giving us dirty looks.

I know my party and I was not throwing a fit because the did the same thing later that night to another family. Splitter them up and they couldn’t even see each other. What’s the point in coming in to dine with each other if you can’t even eat together?

S/o to the waiter Gloria though, because she was so nice and patient with us. She made the...

Had probably the worst experience at a DTF. Service and food was just terrible. We were seated on time for our reservation at 13:30 thinking that it was great start but then everything just fell apart after.

Service: The whole staff here is completely disorganized. Our server Alondra was not a good waitress at all. If you look at the attached photo, we ordered a vegetable & pork spicy wonton but it says comp because it NEVER reached our table. More like a cancel than comp. We placed that order the same time as everything else but we were told by Alondra at about 60 minutes into our meal that it's coming out shortly as she pointed it out on her tablet but the problem to that is she knew this information like a business day ago and didn't even let us know. We had to get her attention and ask about it. To make matters worse, she asked if we wanted to wait for it as if waiting for an hour wasn’t enough already.

Other tables that came after us and ordered after us received their food a lot faster than we did.

Food delivery: Let me explain how the food was delivered - Seaweed & Beancurd Salad (5min wait) Hot & Sour Soup (+15 min wait) XLB (+10 min wait) String Beans w/ Garlic (+5 min wait) Braised Beef Noodle Soup (+2 min wait) The two drinks (+10min wait) Kale w/ Garlic (+10min wait) Vegetable & Pork Spicy Wontons (never came)

I also want to point out that when these items were delivered, all the staff had the expression as if they were not sure if the food belonged to our table and hesitated to place the food down onto the table.

Food quality: Best - Braised Beef Noodle Soup This was probably the highlight of all the dishes as it had good flavor and overall good taste.

Worst - Kale w/ Garlic What a disgusting kale this dish was. The garlic pieces are almost black on the edges indicating that the pan was way too hot when this was made and the garlic flavor didn't even get cooked into the kale. The kale texture tasted like a month old and was extremely bitter to taste from the burnt garlic.

Everything else in between was like a 2/10 and compared to their other locations like the one in Portland, OR, it’s...