Peony Bistro - Asian cuisine and bar — Restaurant in Ohio

Quality and authenticity I'd rate at 4.5 Portion size I'd rate at 4.0 Pricing I'd rate at 3.5. The quality is worth the price, It's just not as affordable as it used to be. Important: I ate here 8/9/16. The new owner (Peony Bistro) took over this place in May or June of 2016. I love authentic Asian food. I've seen and eaten the Asian food from the last 4 owners at this location. When I moved here in 2009, the place (name?) had bad food and a sterile feeling dinning room. They lasted about 3 years and sold the place to Ocean City. The food at O.C. was only a little better with zero ambience and they sold out after another 3 years. There was a big change when they sold out to The Chilli Pepper. The new owner Ming, was a very nice guy. He was my favorite thing about the new restaurant. The food took a big jump in taste and quality and authenticity from the previous owners who had set a very low bar. He spent some money to build-out the place and created a very comfortable dinning room including a fully stocked sit-down bar and a small sit-down sushi bar. He also added some elegance with understated decorations and linen table cloths and napkins. The pricing was kept low and overall it was a good value. The newest owner as of summer 2016 is the Peony Bistro. I ordered a take out so I only came in to pick up my food and only took a quick look around the place. The decor looks the same, that's a good thing. The Chinese cashier/hostess was very pleasant and professional...not a family member just going through the motions and drudgery of dealing with the public. She seems to be experienced and helpful and conversational. She said the cook is from main land China with 20 years experience and he is the owner. Since I was not familiar with their menu I ordered my take out based on two recent reviews here. I got the "spicy beef and scallops" and the "Red bean Tofu" (which is not on the menu but they did not skip a beat when I ordered it). I also ordered an extra pint of steamed white rice. Both dishes were excellent and authentic. I was a little disappointed when she told me the charge, $30.00 including tax. With the previous owners, the total would have been close to $20.00 total including tax. I'm getting frugal being on a fixed income so I do not like the higher prices...it means I'll be eating their less frequently than I did when it was The Chilli Pepper BUT, I do believe the higher quality food at the Peony is worth the extra cost. The menu covers all the basics plus some interesting items the previous menus did not have. I'm looking forward to trying all these interesting new things. I believe they also have a dedicated Sushi chef on site (that extra salary probably has something to do with the higher menu prices). The previous owner, Ming, and his wife handled both the Wok in the kitchen and the Sushi bar. If Peony Bistro does some targeted marketing to some of the more affluent neighborhoods near by and establishes a core of repeat customers, I think they have a good chance of breaking the 3 year life cycle of the...

We have been weekly returning customers for the past year, but tonight when I was going to pay the owner of the restaurant miscounted my money that included the tipand didn't give me any change back. Upon bringing this up she became argumentative and tried telling me I gave two 20 dollar bills when it was one 20 and six 5 dollar bills. She refused to return my money and we gave the server another tip so she didn't suffer. The time before when we came we could hear a server have a breakdown and loudly state she couldn't serve anyone she was to stressed. While we sat awkwardly until a new waitress came out. She is a great server, but the owner is completely unable to be wrong. I know how much money I paid, she came out of a back office looking like she just took a nap. Shoved my money on the drawer quick and tried telling me that she double counted it. ... hope that 10 dollars was worth it because I will never come back. Oh and the fried rice is terrible. I think it is made in a huge batch and is scooped up like left overs. If you enjoy fried rice I would try, royal Thai or Tokyo or Kanji, it is...

This was an online order to pick up. The first picture is the Beef Lo-mein, which was $11.99. There are no fresh veggies, just a little meat with fettuccine noodles. The next is sweet and sour chicken. I don't even think this is the right stuff because usually this dish comes with the chicken breaded a different way, and the sauce is usually served on the side. There was not one piece of pineapple. This is $12.99 plus $2. extra for fried rice. I also had crab ragoons and a shrimp tempura sushi roll. Those were ok. When I picked it up, I was barely acknowledged when I paid, even though I had already put in an 18% tip. So, these two items were $30. Probably, the worst Chinese food I've ever eaten. On the order, I specified vegetables only in fried rice, meaning I didn't want meat pork or chicken in the fried rice. That note wasn't meant to exclude vegetables from the whole meal, and if the restaurant didn't understand the note, they should've called and clarified what was asked of.

That doesn't explain why there wasn't any pineapple in the sweet & sour chicken because...