Central East Asian Cuisine 家乡印象 — Restaurant in Chicago

It’s a bit out of the way towards the end of the old Chinatown strip, and I was also a bit hesitant to try because of the lower google rating especially since there are so many other restaurants around, but I’m glad we tried it. I’ll definitely be back!

Clean, modern decor with authentic Xinjiang flavors. Super reasonably priced, it was understaffed when we came but the only server was friendly and helpful.

The big plate chicken was huge, even the smaller, 2-person portion I felt could easily be shared among 3 or 4 if you’re ordering other dishes. And you should definitely order other dishes! The made-to-order baked bao and skewers are both great as well.

The only thing to note is that a lot of items take a bit of time to come out because they’re made fresh. I didn’t really mind because the quality of the food was really good. Hope this...

This was an interesting experience to say the least. It was very authentic, and there were some very tasty moments, but there were some things holding back the rating.

The food was good quality and the medium spicy oil was absolutely phenomenal, but very spicy. The atmosphere was cool.

On the negative side, the service was underwhelming. Stand up and serve yourself, styrofoam cups, and the table wasn't totally clean. But I will say, we always had water when we needed it, so it's not like service was non-existent. My least favorite aspect was the pricing. It was a headache to keep track of, and it felt like some things were weirdly priced. But, it wasn't necessarily expensive, just tough to track your spending.

Overall, I'd go back here. But not if I was necessarily trying to impress.

Also, I would love to dip a burrito in the hot pot....

Went to checkout this newly opened Xinjiang restaurant a couple months ago. It was such an disappointment. 新疆椒麻鸡/Spices Chicken with Green Sichuan Pepper was overloaded with spices in a bad way, and the chicken tasted like plastic sealed souvenir food you can buy at tourist attractions back in China. 新疆缸子肉/Mutton Soup tased ok but it was covered by like an inch of oil, could not remember how did I even tasted it. 新疆炒米粉/Egg Fried Rice Noodle, the waiter warned me it’s extremely spicy, but it came not spicy at all, and the meat in it did not taste like fresh. 火焰山架子肉/Tandoor Lamb, is it a joke? It was not even eatable, 70% of the meat were pure fat, I was having a had time to understand how could they even serve this dish. The worst of my 2024 first half of year...