China Cottage — Restaurant in Nashville-Davidson

China Cottage (Post-Ownership Change Takeout Review) Rating: 2 out of 5 Review by: The Flavor Chaser

China Cottage used to serve Mongolian Beef that was deep, sticky, rich, and kissed with fire. You could taste the flame in the rice and the pride in the wok.

But new ownership has changed all that — and not in a way worth defending.

What came in this takeout order was a pale imitation of what once was.

🥩 Mongolian Beef Flavor: 2/5 – Thin sauce, mild sweetness, missing depth Spice: 0/5 – No heat, despite request Doneness: 3/5 – Slightly chewy, not dry Portion: 3/5 – Fair, nothing generous

🍚 Fried Rice Flavor: 1/5 – Bland, soy-tinted rice Doneness: 2/5 – Light toss, not fried Portion: 2/5 – Skimpy for what it should be

🦀 Crab Rangoon Flavor: 2/5 – Cream cheese forward, hint of crab Doneness: 3/5 – Wrapper slightly thick but edible Portion: 3/5 – Standard

🧾 Final Verdict Once great. Now utterly forgettable. I won’t be returning unless something changes in that kitchen again — and fast.

Where to Go Instead ✔️ PF Chang’s (Downtown Nashville) – Still delivers Mongolian Beef with proper balance and body ✔️ Rice Box (Madison/Goodlettsville) – Now the better choice for anyone craving Chinese-American...

Girlfriend and I ordered house fried rice, teriyaki chicken and vegetables, spring rolls, teriyaki chicken sticks and a side of white rice.

House fried rice was okay, relatively bland but after 3 packets of soy sauce it was good yet had 2 single shrimps :( I’m nearly positive that the only vegetables were carrots and peas and they were the frozen/microwaved bag kind I get from Kroger. However, not bad after the sauce but I shouldn’t have to do that much self seasoning.

The chicken sticks were mediocre also, not jerky dry but definitely on the dryer side.

The girlfriend was iffy on her teriyaki chicken, I thought it was good. combined with the fried rice (after the soy sauce) would probably be on point.

I thought the spring rolls were lacking, just minimally seasoned cabbage, no carrots, with the overly bready kind of wrapper. Suspect it’s cheap and frozen spring rolls.

The kicker for me is that those four items totaled $41 after tax w/o tip. For that money it simply has to be better.

There was a sign on the door that they are hiring, hopefully for a cook. Holding out hope for that, maybe we’ll try it again some rainy day but we’ll keep looking for our...

My BF and I had lunch on a Sunday. I was very excited because I’ve always loved to eat there and that was pre pandemic. This day , the food was awful! The only food that was good was the hot sour soup, but the crisps for the soup were hard and stale. My friend ordered Gen. Chicken. - hers looked like hot sour chicken. It was heavily breaded and spongy , the red sauce was not good nor was it caramelized as it is suppose to be. I had walnut shrimp. Same thing , my shrimp were small and the spongy breading was 4xs bigger than shrimp . They used the same red sauce as used on my friends. The sauce was awful ! The walnuts were raw , not caramelized . The whole 2 meals were awful. I didn’t eat mine it was so spongy. My friend is from another country and it’s like a crime to leave food behind, so she will repurpose hers. I was so shocked and kept apologizing for choosing this for us. We told our waitress J, but the manager did not even come to see about the problem. I have given great references the past. I’m extremely dissatisfied and even more since customer service was not even recognized, only our money. The waitress got...