shancheng lameizi hot pot — Restaurant in Irvine

After reading the reviews, I had high hopes for a good experience. That was not the case. First walking in, they were very inviting. The server had asked if we had been here before to which we had said “No”. She then explained how we can choose the broth and how they have a variety of items you can choose. We were very grateful that she had explained this and hoped to have time to discuss what we’d like to order. She left the table and came back with a picture book. This was helpful and again, we were looking forward to discussing what we’d like. Until, she went thru the entire menu with us and had us choose each individual item that we wanted to try. This wasn’t an issue until we realized that they had combos of meat that we could’ve ordered, to which wasn’t brought to our attention until other diners had came in and ordered those combos and didn’t have random meats that she had upsold to try. The ordering process was very rushed and she was marking the order sheet for us so when the food came, it all felt very random. At the time, we were the only diners in there at 3pm so I didn’t understand the hurry. The only things we had enjoyed was the pork and the sesame balls. The fresh beef was cut so thick that it was so hard to eat no matter how long you cooked it. The spicy beef was horrible. It was just a mouthful of red pepper flakes, and even after you cooked it, it was just caked in red pepper flakes that you’d never believe there was beef under there. The seafood was okay. The broth was fine. I honestly left feeling almost sick. Don’t get me wrong, I understand all the great reviews regarding the service, however, this experience doesn’t even make me want to try hot pot...

The new hotpot place in Irvine. We went on a weekday around 6pm. There was no line. We got a table when we walked in but we saw there were already many people inside the restaurant.

The server was very friendly and explain to us how the system work. We ordered our soup and dishes. The soup came out very quick. While waiting for the dishes, we went to the snack bar and sauce bar. We find there was not as many selections as at HDL and no labels on many of the sauces and items at the bar. We were guessing by looking at the color and texture.

The soup took a while to boil. The dishes came out before the soup boiled. We tasted the tomato soup and found it to a bit bland compared to HDL.

The vegetables are fresh and very delicious. I love the sauce that I mixed for myself. There are only 2 types of tofu that come with he tofu combo. I was hoping they include some deep fried tofu skin in the combo but none. The mushroom combo has more combination of different t Mushrooms. The hotpot noodle is OK only. I still prefer the noodles at HDL. According to my son, the beef belly and tilapia were fresh and delicious.

At the end of our meal, the sesame balls were out and I had to wait for a one time for them to bring out a new batch. The receipt only has Chinese text on it. Non-Chinese reader may not able to check if the items on the receipt were what they have ordered.

Overall, I would prefer HDL to this place. Soup is better there and more selection at the...

I discovered this place randomly at lunch on the weekend 2 weeks ago and I was so happy that I found this place. The wait for 2 people on a Sunday lunch was 15' which was not bad and all the servers can speak English very well and they were friendly and professional. As for myself during the pandemic, I became very sensitive to the cleansiness so whenever I eat out if I always observe how the tables are cleaned after each customer and this place did not disappoint me. I saw 2 waiters cleaning the table and chairs very carefully. Hopefully, they will be careful like this forever, not only when they just opened. The decorations are nice and very ancient in Chinese style. I've ordered 1/2 pork bone soup n 1/2 tomato soup and both of them were very tasty. The quality and quantity of food were amazing with reasonable prices. I got more food than I expected. Their sauce bar has so many kinds of sauces plus some additional crunchy things that I didn't know but it tasted good and they also have a few kinds of dessert for you to choose from. Overall I was very happy with this place, definitely will be back.

• Here is one thing I hope they can fix, the receipt should be include English for people who don't know Chinese. It would help people check whether an extra item was added or an item was missing before payin. I was struggling to check it with my little Chinese...