Penang Malaysian Cuisine — Restaurant in Philadelphia

Avoid at all costs - owner has zero care in the world for other human beings and only cares about her bottom line.

I have a severe peanut allergy. I did not bring this up with the server because I thought that since certain items on the menu were clearly labeled that it had peanuts, that I could trust other items with no mention of peanuts would not have peanuts in the dish.

I ordered the Nasi Lemak. No mention of peanuts in this dish on the menu.

I was halfway through my dish until my friend flagged another server to ask about the curry in the nasi lemak, as it looked like it had peanuts. The server said he does not think the curry has peanuts. My friend asked to check.

When the server came back, he said actually the chutney in the nasi lemak has peanuts. I would not have ordered this if I had known it had peanuts. Again, the menu didn't state that.

I then hurried to the bathroom to try to throw up as much as I could for 10-15 min to prevent my reaction from getting severe as my throat was already getting itchy.

When I left the bathroom, one of the servers asked if I was okay. I was very upset and shaking from throwing up so much. I asked why they wouldn't label that it had peanuts on the menu and that they could have sent me to the hospital.

I asked what they can do for me and he said he'd talk to the owner.

A little bit later, another staff comes up to me to ask if I was open to speaking with the owner and I said yes. She handed me the phone and the owner asked how I was doing and what happened.

Basically the phone call went down like since I didn't inform them of my peanut allergy beforehand, the owner was fixating on they're not responsible for cross contamination.

I had to repeatedly state it was not cross contamination I had an issue with. I understand that's difficult to avoid. My issue is that many things on the menu were clearly labeled as having peanuts. I thought I could trust that if other items didn't say it had peanuts in the menu, then it wouldn't have peanuts when I eat it.

The owner thanked me for my input, took the nasi lemak off our bill and left everything else on.

I fortunately didn't need to be hospitalized nor use my EpiPen. But there was still some of that food lingering in my system, so I had to deal with bad digestive issues, nausea, dizziness, fatigue, and lightheadedness for the rest of the day. On top of a sore throat and tongue from throwing up so hard.

I'm disappointed and upset with the owner for handling it from a business perspective rather than empathizing with me as a human being.

On top of that, it's beyond negligent that they didn't label that it had peanuts on the menu. I don't know what might have happened to me if my friend hadn't stopped me and it's scary to think of that possibility.

I'm worried at how many people before me might have had this same experience and if their complaints fell on deaf ears. If this doesn't get them to stay on top of updating their menu, then I don't know what will.

Shouldn't support a business anyways that treats its customers like this.

The only silver lining out of this god awful mess, is the very, very sweet server that handed me the phone.

She came up to me a bit after the phone call ended and expressed so much empathy for me. Reassured me in how scary having a severe allergy is and that she wish she could do more for me than the outcome I got. Felt so heard and left me in tears.

I didn't get her name (I wish I did). But she showed me so much more compassion in the 2 minutes she talked to me than the owner did in her trying to save her business and bottom line on the phone with me for 20 minutes.

If you're reading this, person that handed me the phone, I hope you have a...

Waited 2 hours for food and 1 hour just to see a waitress at our table. I’ll give it that they were busy in the beginning but we were still waiting when the restaurant was half empty at that point. They couldn’t even refill the tea we left at the side of the table. Poor service and poor quality of food. The best part was looking behind me to see other angry customers who waited with us. The worst part was being ignore by the rude waitresses and wondering where the cooks were at. There was one waitress I will commend though as she was extremely nice to us and I just felt bad for her as she was starting out but she was just so good to us despite all that happened.

Update: We only got our dumplings and not even our entrees after 3 hours as we been here since 8. We were 1 of 4 tables left.

Update 2: we finally got our entrees after 3.5 hours and we only stayed out of spite and the logic that if others got food, ours would come out soon but only regret remained.

Update 3: We got our food after 3.5 hours after complaining and they told us that our ticket had fell behind the counter, which was why we had waited. They never came to check up on us and saw we were sitting for a while with just empty glasses of water. We asked for some kind of compensation or discount for the wait, and they said they couldn't give one. I only tipped because the waitress was new and she was also stressed out. Never going again and will happily discourage my friends from going to this enterprise from now on as well.

Update 4: A couple years later decided to give another shot as my friend wanted to try something new. They did not improve at all. Go anywhere else as my friends and I sat at a mostly empty restaurant from 2 hours before closing to actual closing, when we got our food 15 minutes before then. I saw the owner also replied and to that, from what I remembered it was not busy as you claimed, and it should be noticeable when a table is just sitting there for hours without food for some reason and no waiters/waitress decides to check to see why they are there? I understand being short staff as someone who worked in a restaurant for years during and before Covid, but even then I know as a waiter I should check up on guests who obviously had not got their food yet or even bother to ask, “can I refill...

I brought friends to this restaurant, eager for them to experience the fantastic food I had previously enjoyed. However, I have never felt more embarrassed than I did that night, not because of the cuisine but because of the appallingly poor service. It was difficult to shake the feeling that we were treated differently, perhaps due to the misguided stereotype that certain Asians don’t tip or simply because we weren’t the “right” kind of customers in our server’s eyes.

Customer Service: We didn’t expect constant smiles or excessive attentiveness, just the basic necessities of a dining experience: utensils, the opportunity to place our order, and the ability to pay our bill without feeling like an inconvenience.

I understand that servers can be busy, which is why I sincerely appreciated the kindness of another staff member who, despite managing larger tables, took the time to bring us utensils so we could start eating. I even felt the need to apologize to him for troubling him again when we had to ask for our rice, by then our meat was already getting cold.

We had initially waited for our assigned server to return so we could ask for the rice we had ordered, but he was nowhere to be found. In any Asian restaurant, rice is an essential component of the meal, being served our food without it felt as incomplete as eating a pizza crust first or biting into a taco sideways.

Oddly enough, our server spared us the usual mid meal check-ins, no “How’s everything?” or “Do you need anything?” which I normally find awkward. But in this case, I would have preferred even the smallest acknowledgment of our presence.

Not wanting to burden the other server further, we chose to wait for our own to reappear so we could finally request the check. Meanwhile, the dining area grew more crowded, and the table next to us, after waiting far too long to even place an order got up and left. Our own server seemed equally indifferent to whether we stayed or walked out without paying, so rather than waiting any longer, I took it upon myself to go to the cashier and settle the bill.

The food remains excellent, and I would still recommend it, but be warned that your experience may heavily depend on which server you get. If you visit, I sincerely hope you don’t end up with the one...