China 88 & Pho Restaurant — Restaurant in Longmont

This review is long overdue. The options for asian food in Longmont are, frankly, terrible. China 88 changed that for me. They are, perhaps the best strip mall chinese restaurant to which I have ever been.

I admit they are rather inconsistent. The quality and character of their dishes varies greatly depending on the day and (I assume) the chef working. But when they are good, they are good enough that I keep coming back, knowing it's a gamble.

The dish that won me over roughly a year or more ago was their sauteed green beans. I have never cared much for green beans, but these were flavored so well- full of garlic and mushrooms and umami. Lately, the flavor has been lacking. It's clear they changed their recipe (to their detriment, in my opinion). I wish they would change it back. But I still order it hoping I will strike gold and get the old recipe, which is possible given the lack of consistency. I also loved their dish that was eggplant, potato, bell pepper, and onion in the most delicious brown sauce. Unfortunately, they removed it from the menu roughly a year ago and replaced it with an eggplant in garlic sauce that is not good at all (it's way too sweet and artificial).

But, around the time they made that change, they also added the crispy garlic vegetable dish to the menu, which is perhaps my favorite dish at any restaurant in the area. It's basically just deep fried vegetables (they vary. Usually potato, eggplant, and green bean, but recently I got zucchini instead of green bean, which was incredible and better than the green bean in my opinion) smothered in garlic, onions, jalapenos, and what I assume is MSG (usually when something tastes so good that you are instantly addicted and can't stop thinking about it, it's MSG). It is incredible. I will say there was a period of a few months that the dish was no longer deep fried and was basically just sauteed soggy and also lacked it's usual crack-like nature (aka MSG and garlic), which was massively disappointing, but I kept ordering it hoping to get another taste of the old way, and I am pleased to report that the last 4-5 times I ordered it, it has been extra crispy and full of flavor again. So, hopefully they just realized their experiment with a healthier way to make the dish was not working out and will not return to the non-breaded, less flavorful iteration. Seriously, guys, the crispy garlic vegetables will change your life (please stick to the original recipe, China 88. It is devastating to get a soggy and flavorless helping knowing what it could be).

I noticed someone else's review criticized their inability to take an order over the phone. I will admit that is true, as their English is lacking, but that doesn't bother me one bit. It is easier to order online anyway, and they are doing their best. This issue is not unique to them and is pervasive among immigrant-owned restaurants. That is the price you pay for authentic cuisine. Expecting everyone to cater to your reliance on the english language is an ignorant and outdated expectation. Just order online.

They also recently established their own delivery service, which is incredible, because I will never use doordash or grubhub or any of those other services that are little more than a leech on society. Their new service is ~$3.50-4.50 for delivery depending on location plus tip, which I feel is totally reasonable, and I am just glad they have a delivery option now. I completely disagree with the criticisms I see here about orders taking too long. I have never had that experience. Even delivery has been faster than expected. But when I used to order pick up, it was pretty consistently a 30 minute wait, which is standard. If it's any longer, it's just because they are busy, because the secret is out. Be happy for them and for the city of Longmont that people love their food and are patronizing a great restaurant. This isn't fast food.

In short, the food here is incredible. I wish they would improve on the consistency of the quality of their dishes, but I will continue to come...

This was the first time that we ordered China 88; and we did it through door dash.

We decided to order here because it was new to us and we like new!

My wife order a steak Vietnamese noodle bowl, dumplings and hot and sour soup. I ordered the happy plate with white rice and some steak skewers. We both ordered a couple Pepsi’s and we thought we were set!!

Door Dash did it’s job and got it here in a timely fashion and we were happy; however now I wish they had gotten lost.

My wife ended up with some raw steak Pho bowl with rotten basil on the side and frozen meat (little too raw). It wasn’t even what she ordered and she didn’t get her Pepsi. However, she did like the dumplings.

They did get my correct order, although it was slimy and undercooked. Then I noticed there was no rice. The steak skewers were good though; and I did get my Pepsi.

We are not picky eaters and we really tried to make the best of it. We are the type of people that rarely ever send food back. However, this was borderline inedible and had I been at the restaurant, I would have sent it back and possibly left.

We were bummed and realized we should have stuck to what we know. At least tasty Asia gets our order right and we know what to expect; it 5 stars, but better than 2. 2 is being generous!!

So order at your own risk. My advice to you, is stay on the...

Lemme first say I am no Karen I just want why I pay for and if paying for a service like food it better be eatable. This was NOT. I can’t give them no stars so the one star is for their driver. I just spent over a hundred dollars for cold food that I wouldn’t even give my dog. It was very rubbery and tasteless. The delivery driver was nice and that’s everything nice that I can say. Honestly I am very very disappointed. I won’t be ordering from here ever again. It’s extremely bad when the mall in Aurora has better Chinese food A MALL….. Yeah in the food court but did you hear me A MALL??? Don’t believe me go try it. China 88. I still have your food uneaten if you wanna come get it and give me my 130.00 back. Let the driver keep her tip. Come on that was the nastiest food I’ve ever eaten EVER. As I am typing this my husband is throwing up. Please everybody please if you like then great. If it’s your first time then maybe look a little harder. Everyone has an off day and I get that but every dish 🤢. Not good. Not even close to being something I might consider to be good. Wow. I just can not get over this. I wanted so bad for it just to be half way good. Nope it wasn’t. I’m keeping my receipt so I can show people that I’m not lying. And to let them know about my experience. If it was a good one I would...