Canton Tea Garden — Restaurant in Norwood Park Township

Of the three Chinese restaurants in the area, this is the only one one I can recommend. Food is good, prices reasonable.

The only reason I won't give five stars is because of one of those incidents that make you lose faith in humanity. One day I was waiting for my order to be ready, when a woman came in to pick up an order she'd phoned in. The cashier said there had been no order. The woman thought that maybe she had come to the wrong restaurant, and asked if there were another Chinese restaurant in the area. The cashier said no. But China House is at most two blocks down the same street, which she had to have known. She obviously wanted the woman to re-order at Canton Tea Garden, not caring that the woman would be delayed and that China House wouldn't get paid for the already-prepared meal.

This didn't happen recently, so the cashier might not even still work there. But it's the kind of behavior I...

EDIT AS OF 10/2024: Canton Tea Garden has been different since the ownership changed. I got a decent House Beef and potstickers, but there was something different about it, it was missing whatever the Chinese equivalent of "je ne sais quoi" is, if that makes any sense.

When I went to pick up my order there was a long line the likes of which I hadn't seen here since perhaps the late 1990s, and not in a nostalgic way - disorganized in a way that disappointed me.

I have left my original review below, fully intact and unedited, in hopes that Canton Tea Garden will rise to the heights of its near-century reputation once again.

The best in town. The House Beef is a must try and the pot stickers have a good balance of meat and dough. The quality of the meat and vegetables seems to have taken a hit in recent years but this restaurant remains the standard to which I compare all other Chinese...

Hitting a local Chinese place when you're traveling is always hit or miss. We love Chinese takeout and have been to dozens of different places but In this case for us it was definitely a miss. Nothing was bad per se and we had no issue with the service, cleanliness, portions or prices but none of the food had any real flavor. Like I said it was not terrible but was just kind of bland and barely seasoned. We were at our hotel and were all very tired and hungry so everyone ate it but instead of putting the leftovers in the refrigerator it got tossed which is very out and of the ordiany for me, I love eating cold...