Koi Asian Cuisine & Lounge — Restaurant in Evanston Township

The reason that I give one star is the bad service, manner, and attitude of the server we met here. I’m not gonna say the tastes right now because this bad service might make me criticize the taste worse. First, let me start with the bad service — I went there with my friend to buy him dinner. We ordered prix-fixe and shaolong bao as a starter. Also, my friend ordered sprite. Very simple order was. However, when we got miso soup for appetizer, the sprite wasn’t out. Patiently, we were just waiting for server to bring the sholong bao and sprite, thinking the dinner time could be busy so waiting was not the matter. However, our Maki came out but not sprite and shaolong bao did. Okay. When our entre came out, we let the server (who brought the food, not the man got our order) know we didn’t get shaolong bao and sprite yet. The server said he would check and he was gone. And nothing happened till I called the server who got our order and talked him about this. He can forget, I understand, it was busy time. However, I got mad at his response because he said shaolong bao was still in steaming and that would originally take long. Excuse me? I’ve eaten shaolong bao so many times and I know how it looks. It doesn’t need to steam more than one hour. Also, this is the starter menu. It should’ve come out at least before we had entre. Okay, putting it back and thinking again, not coming sprite would just make us simply assume that the server forgot shaolong bao as well. Or if it seemed to be delayed due to the business, at least, when we asked, didn’t the server need to let us know? Eventually, we got the sprite first and the shaolong bao a few minutes later – from here, I will describe the foods in the order that I ate. Miso soup is hard to be wrong — was fine and the taste I know. The rolls (Maki) were as great as we could never imagine this bad thing would happened. And (no sprite, no shaolong bao) the entre — we ordered the tao’s chicken, a.k.a. orange chicken, and the schwan beef. Both came with steamed rice. Honestly to say, the tao’s chicken and schwan beef had similar tastes, even though two are from different regions, definately distinct foods. Also, the meat of tao’s chicken was chunk unlike usually flat and thick — well this could be the variation and recipe by the chef but not effective because I couldn’t feel the fried batter’s crispy. Moreover, I could not really understand the schwan’s taste was like that. I’m not saying the foods were bad or disgusting. Tao’s chicken was not tao’s chicken and schwan’s beef was not schwan’s beef: don’t expect the authentic Chinese taste. Well, we finally got the sprite to wash it away and finally got the shaolong bao later. Wow. This made me lose the words. Simply to say, it was dry inside, not juicy, and smelled the flour. Okay. It might be true the shaolong bao was in steaming because we got the so dry one! I’m done with this restaurant. This is the first review in google I’ve ever left. Oh, yes, lastly, when you entered this restaurant, don’t expect the host will take care of you right away and well becasue she was suddenly gone away without telling us anything and we were being embarrassed and standing! Fortunately, (or not) we could get the bar seats (that the server never came to clean our dishes for us at all)tho! Thanks...

Got food poisoned for our wedding celebration there and no refund issued so far.

Edit: RE restaurant owner: We reserved for a table of 12 people a month in advance, and 10 people showed up. Only 2 people ate the blanched broccoli we now question. One (my husband) had food poisoning symptoms after. While we'd like to believe that it was not Koi's fault, he and I shared all of our food prior to the food poisoning incident, except for the broccoli. We now ask for compensation that includes the bill we paid for the whole table, current medical expenses, and changes in our travel schedule, which already added up to more than $300, and additionally for the stress the food poisoning has caused for the entire family. We'll leave it up to the insurance company to decide whether this is fair.

My husband and I went there recently to celebrate our recent wedding with some local friends, spending $240 including 20% tips (see photo attached). However, my husband got food poisoned for an entire week from their food and we had to visit the ER on New Year's Eve. Since we had to visit the hospital with out-of-network insurance coverage, it's unclear whether we'd end up with bills of hundreds of dollars. We were very careful about tracing the source of the contaminated food and waited till we got the lab results back to contact the restaurant, providing receipts, doctor's notes, and lab results as additional evidence. The restaurant so far still hasn't owned up for the contaminated broccoli they served, and told us to contact their insurance company, no refund issued to us so far.

Here are more details about the food poisoning instance: we believe it was additional blanched broccoli that came with the walnut shrimp dish, not a small sprinkle of broccoli garnish. The lab results came back as Campylobacter bacteria, which come from raw vegetables and poultry and would need a large dose to cause severe food poisoning. The food poisoning symptoms typically start 1-2 days after the consumption of the contaminated food, which would make it impossible for us to directly nail down the source until we see the lab results. We were also contacted by a local health department, who asked us about all raw vegetables and poultry we recently consumed. Since only my husband had raw vegetables at Koi (I didn't eat it because of my personal preference and we shared all other food) and no poultry within the 1-2 day window, it left us no options but to believe that it was Koi, despite the great food and experience I had there a few years ago. Fortunately, no other friend at the table was affected, and I don't believe that is enough evidence to say that the food is 100% safe.

Would never go again and urge cautions of all...

My husband and I just went to Koi for the first time. We were disappointed. It has a really nice atmosphere, and decent sushi, so it gets one star. The problem is that their menu lists all these Chinese dishes from “8 different regions of China” with a bunch of hullabaloo about each regions cuisine and so forth. All of this hype makes it seem like their food might be authentic. My husband speaks Mandarin and can read Chinese characters, so we decided to get a hard-to-find dish that usually has Szechuan peppercorns in it, which are notoriously spicy (they actually impart a numbing quality to the food, you don’t eat the peppercorns). The menu lists peppercorns in the ingredients of several dishes in English, and had the real name of the dishes in Chinese characters, so we thought we’d be good. We asked our waiter to find out if they could add peppercorns to our food and he checked with the kitchen and said they could. Our food comes out... with bell peppers. No Szechuan peppercorns. We asked our waiter why... he checked again and it’s because they don’t have any. No peppercorns to be found in the entire kitchen, even though they are listed as an ingredient in multiple of their dishes in not one, but two languages! Not only that, but the food was just American Chinese food, the same you would get at any Chinese takeout place, except with a better presentation and for more money. After the peppercorn incident, our waiter took this rude attitude with us that continued for the entire meal, which we didn’t think was entirely fair, since he had told us something that wasn’t true. The 3rd strike came when we spoke to the manager and asked how they could list dishes on their menu that they don’t even have the capacity to make, and he said he was just the manager, not the owner, and they don’t claim to be authentic. Uh... except your menu does claim to be authentic! He comped us a couple drinks. It’s like ordering a gourmet burger at a restaurant and being served a grilled cheese, and then being told they don’t claim to have authentic burgers, meanwhile your server can’t answer a simple question about ingredients. We decided this place survives entirely on the fact that it’s a nice looking place to eat Chinese food, so you can bring the family or book club or golf buddies here for dinner and you won’t be sitting at a tiny cafe table in the corner of a takeout place. Which is absolutely fine, nothing wrong with that, but why have a menu that claims to be something you’re not? Because most people in Evanston can’t tell the difference? That’s an unacceptable business...