China Garden — Restaurant in Pinellas Park

Absolutely Do Love This Chinese. Food is always accurate. In 20 years of ordering they have NEVER, NOT ONCE, Forgotten OR Messed up a Single Order. ALWAYS PERFECTLY MADE AND ACCURATE, EVEN WHEN I GIVE A COMPLICATED ORDER. NOT ONCE AN ERROR. Absolutely Amazing Taste, Every Single Item, Every Single Time. Always quickly prepared within approximately 10 minutes at the most. Inhumanely Flawless Preparation, Every Single Time. Truly Impressive. That being said, only a few months ago a new hire taking phone orders has honestly complicated the process of making orders. As I said, 20 years of ordering, I have always placed the orders by referring to Honey chicken lunch special as exactly that. The lady will ask if I am referring to the wings and I will say no. Just honey chicken. Yet, she will ask ten times over if I am referring to the wings. I will say no, that it is the #27 Meal and yet she will continue to ask if I mean the wings. Ten times. Literally. That's a little frustrating, especially because I am usually placing the lunch order short before 3 o clock when I take my lunch. Today, I managed to get past the Honey Chicken meal only to get the same question when ordering My garlic chicken lunch special. I could not remember the lunch special by its meal number, so I had to resort to ordering online. Although that was much easier, the time i was made to waste left me placing my large order at ten minutes to 3 o clock only to learn that they expected to be given nearly a half an hour to 3 o clock to make the order in order to qualify for the "lunch special" meaning that the "lunch special" pricing is really only available for orders placed between 11am to 2:300PM. NOT 11AM TO 3PM. In 20 years, I have ALWAYS Left Huge Tips, even though I pick my order up 99.999% of the time. I think I have gotten delivery less than 5 times, and for those I tip double. In ALL 20 YEARS, I HAVE NEVER HAD A SINGLE COMPLAINT, Until now. I have never had a single frustration or difficulty placing my lunch orders, until the new phone worker, but honestly, even she is not my real aggravation. I understand that because she is new, she could not possibly be familiar with me and my usual order, and that she is trying to be extremely careful to get my order right. I am grateful and respect her dedication to maintaining their Flawless accuracy. Truly, if i had not had difficulty placing my order by phone, I NEVER WOULD HAVE LEARNED THAT IN ORDER TO RECEIVE THE LUNCH SPECIAL THAT IT IS ACTUALLY ONLY TRULY AVAILABLE BETWEEN 11AM AND 2:30 PM. As much as I have always been a completely contented and impressed customer, this has aggravated me enough to cancel my order for the second time. Admittedly, BOTH times were over just how aggravating it was trying to place my usual lunch order with the new phone worker. I am unfortunately going to remember this, from here, going forward. lt is likely going diminish my desire to place many orders in the future. I have loved this Restaurant Completely for 20 years and have always been happy to tip enormously for how incredible i have also found the food, and the employees, as well as the company in total, but it is the feeling of being nickle and dimed by this same company that I always, for so many years, given so much additional praise and tip so profusely for. This very specific frustration has left me feeling very annoyed and slighted for the very first and the very last time. Still, it remains a 5 star establishment. I simply had no other way to voice my frustration and be certain that it was taken for how unnerved it made...

Got a house special lo mein, shrimp fried rice, egg rolls, and crab rangoon. The establishment is small (seats maybe 10 people?) so we just got it to go. The value is great for the price ($~13 for a large, near pound of lo mein noodles). The kitchen is right behind the counter so you can see everything going on.

The quality of the food...I'm still conflicted. The shrimp fried rice and lo mein both had a decent amount of other ingredients compared to the carbs, but I would recommend supplementing with more protein. Same with crab rangoon - piping hot sweet cream cheese, but maybe 1% crab and other ingredients. The egg roll was crispy but average. The food was hot and the noodles were not too saucy - just the right amount of sauciness and flavor without being too salty. However, they were a bit too soft, like they were boiled too long. Primarily, it's the flavors that I am conflicted about. While good in general, there were some bites that didn't quite taste right. Some pieces of pork tasted a bit like freezer burn or that it had been prepped a while ago. Some onion pieces and parts of the rice/noodles just tasted off - like the oil was going bad or rancid. Of course, these being dishes that use oil, eating a lot could cause discomfort, but these "bad bites" make me think something else is going on. But I also don't eat this type of Chinese food often, so maybe it's normal.

As an aside, when I was ordering, the owner kindly informed me that chow mein in China refers to crispy noodles, but chow mein in the US (or at least here) refers to a napa cabbage-based dish. So he guided me to getting the lo mein instead if I wanted noodles. Good to know and thanks to the owner!

If you want classic American-Chinese food and you're on a budget, this might be a good place to go for its balance between flavor, portion, and comfort (nothing too original...

Very disappointed very disappointing. I’ve been buying from this location for several years and it’s just been lately that the quality of the food has been doing a downward spiral. I’ll order a wide variety of appetizers and just basic fried rice and lo mein. There was no vegetables or any onions in any one of the fried rice or lo mein product. Usually you’ll see carrots and peas and onions fried up and if you ordered pork or chicken then that was what it was. but it was pasty for lack of better words …it had no moisture.

I ordered fried shrimp fried scallops chicken wings all of the rolls an eggroll a shrimp roll a vegetable roll this is so processed now than what I used to buy I was shocked.

My order came to $38 I bought extra because I wanted to have leftovers to watch football on Sunday. I’m gonna have to fix this rice and this lo mein myself by adding my own vegetables and my own seasoning. I am going to put myself out there and say do not buy anything from this location. Maybe they’ll see this review maybe they’ll do some changes in the cooking process and buy less processed frozen Chinese products. I’m so sorry, china garden but this is the truth you have also messed up my order twice. Today was one of a messed up order. I don’t know what you gave me but it wasn’t fried shrimp. They took it back. . I had to physically cut off all of the batter off of my shrimp and scallops. So I actually could taste the seafood. I’m just shocked I’ve never had Chinese food so bad as I did today. Sorry folks this...