China Delight — Restaurant in Monterey

I ordered through a delivery service, so my view comes from that point. I haven't been to the location, but I feel that shouldn't matter for a good Chinese restaurant.

First off, I don't know if it was busy within the restaurant tonight (with the quality of food I doubt it), but it took quite a while to make 3 simple dishes. Sesame chicken, beef chow mien and pot stickers. I waited an hour and a half for the food to be delivered to me. I expected perhaps an hour from the distance.

Sesame chicken - it was apparent after the first bite that this chicken is overcooked. Tough, hard to chew, little flavor. All of the flavor came from the very thick, very heavy sauce, and not a very appealing flavor at that. After the first later of chicken in the take out box, none of the chicken had sesame on them. The hell? This wasn't completed and then boxed? Lazy.

Beef chow mien - after the sesame chicken, I didn't know what to expect. The beef was also tough and stringy. The noodles lacked any sort of flavoring. Only after adding a generous amount of soy sauce did any flavor come through. All in all, disappointing. I had to force myself to keep eating because I had no other dinner options at the time.

Pot stickers - premade, frozen. Nasty. Upon biting into it, a tablespoon of meaty water comes pouring out onto my lap and napkin. Lesson learned, I ate over the takeout box afterwards. I established that the chunk of meat thrown into the center of this was less of a food item and more analogous to an amalgamation of miscellaneous food bits and grit. I don't know how I ate three.

At least I got the 筷子 I asked for.

In the end, paying $34 for what I ate felt like a slap to the face. I could get the same calories eating at McDonald's for $10, and yet get five times the flavor and enjoyment. I don't know how this passes for food. I gave it one star for making my food, and another star for being open when other places weren't. It probably deserves one, but Pepsi is making me feel generous.

If you can't make such simple dishes well, I cannot expect any better in other, more complicated dishes. Please, save your taste buds the trouble, and...

A group of us decided that we wanted to have Chinese cuisine after a very long day of attending a medical conference. We decided on China Delight at the Crossroads shopping complex in Carmel. The waitress who took care of us had a huge chip on her shoulder. She was not very friendly and was somewhat disgruntled and not very attentive. Everyone ordered an array of various traditional Chinese dishes but upon their arrival we were greatly disappointed. The fried rice was just that rice that was fried with a little bit of eggs. There was no other ingredients. The chicken curry was lacking any hint of curry and was flavourless. The Chow Mein had a rubbery texture and just wasn't edible. The Mongolian beef was tough and lacked flavour. What really angered us was not just the bad food and poor customer service but that they tried inflating their tip believing it would go unnoticed. The utter nerve of this business to assume they deserved a tip of 30% is appalling. Most of the food remained untouched and nobody wanted to take it with them. We just wanted to get out of there and ended up at the Lodge for after dinner drinks. I have also been reading the numerous reviews about this restaurant and all the people who have written a one star or two star review receive a nasty reply from the owner who definitely needs to seek professional help for her...

I erroneously ordered twice what I wanted which would have been ok had the food been better. We ate what we could but had to toss the rest. Donated to local business but would not recommend. UPDATE: Five months later the owners replied with the nasty rant below. If the food didn't turn me off their response certainly did. (I was not angry!) I take full responsibility for the double order. I had placed the order on the app then got kicked out of the app. I reordered not realizing that the app kept my original order. I should have reviewed the quantity box and be alarmed at the pricey total, but I did not. Lesson learned! However I don't take responsibility for the quality and taste of the food. In my opinion it was the worse Chinese food we have ever had (and, yes, I do frequent restaurants but never felt compelled to write a review before.) Because of the $$$ spent we tried to consume it but just could not and threw it away. So Mr. China Delight glad you survived 40 years and the pandemic. With your strong customer base (or maybe lack of competition in the area??) losing one customer is probably...