Empress M — Restaurant in Napa

I would give this place 4-5 for the food, which was a really welcome treat in Napa. Dim Sum was great (although potstickers cold), calamari awesome, spicy fish, mapo tofu, yum, I’ll go back for the food. But the service and experience is weird, like the owner is not around.

Our actual waiter was great, but the rest of staff has no idea what they are doing. Weirdly, they don’t set the tables and we were served dim sum potstickers like two seconds after we ordered (preprepared?) with no chopsticks or dipping sauce, just sitting there. Server (not our waiter) just dropped it. How do we eat it?! And it was not hot.

Then they showed up with an entree (mapo tofu) before we had been served our other dim sum and appetizers! And no plates. Just dump and run.

And also weird was the room. It’s a very nice sit down tablecloth dining room, they clearly put in effort and money, but they had Amazon boxes piled on one table and the table next to us had a box of take out containers sitting next to them on the floor. Very sloppy. And the take out window is in the middle of the dining room. So take out flying by and outside all the time.

They put a lot of effort into this dining room, it’s very nice and great crowd, but then why have tables not set and boxes everywhere? Where is the owner seeing he is wasting that effort and money if he does not follow through? It’s like they are still in COVID take out mode and not ready for a formal sit down crowd.

I will go back. It’s the best Asian food I have had in Napa. But I really hope they work on service and get the room ready. They need Gordon...

This place is great!! The food is top notch Chinese which I hadn't realized I really missed until the first order arrived at the table. my dad grew up eating Chinese food a lot and EmpressM is more authentic than any Chinese food we have had in Los Angeles in the last 5 years. The portions are incredibly generous and the food is full of flavor. The staff was wonderful, they are all such team players, having each other's backs as they all make an effort to cover for each other while they are understaffed due to the pandemic. This place will be packed once they are fully staffed (in case anyone doesn't realize, hiring is really slow right now as no one wants to go back to work so not for lack of trying) but they have all come together to try to make it as much as a wonderful experience as they can (Amin especially) and they do! My parents and I were just looking for a low key night and had such a wonderful evening by surprise. This place is charming, delicious, the staff is great and it was one of the best meals we have had in a long time. Thank you Empress M for all the hard work and wonderful food! We are only way too happy to support a small business that works that hard to create a wonderful & delicious family dinner for us.

Things we got and highly recommend: -Lettuce Cups -Har Gow Dumplings -Siu Mai Dumplings -Fried Shrimp -Beef Chow...

I'm planning on dining at Empress M this evening with friends and am looking forward to it. I'll post my thoughts afterwards. When I am planning to visit a Napa restaurant, I always like to visit their website and review their offerings in the quiet of my home rather that the busy restaurant with a waiter standing by. Empress M had a good menu online but no mention at all about any alcohol. Four diners mentioned beer in passing but that is all I can find. Do they have a full bar? Beer? Wine? Chinese treats? Like many diners, wine or other libation with or before my meal is almost required. Wish I knew. Anyway. We'll find out .. I'm excited. (Five stars for now. We'll see)

Edit: Post visit review .... I like the place. The people were friendly. It seems they are struggling with Covid and I'm sure all will improve with time and a return to normalcy. The food was good but I found it bland in general. The "Lanzhou Spicy Beef" wasn't spicy at at all. It needed some seasoning (as did most of the dishes) which wasn't provided. The plan is to return for Happy Hour Dim Sum and try a wider variety of dishes with the Din Sum offerings. I'm not giving up. PS. They did have a limited but satisfying wine list...