Max's Restaurant San Diego, Cuisine of the Philippines — Restaurant in San Diego

Max's Restaurant - Mira Mesa San Diego, California

It's a rare occasion that we eat my country's, Cuisine, Philippines, but today we decided to dine at a Filipino Restaurant. Most of the time you will see us dine and write about other Cuisines from Asia such as Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, etc.

Today, we decided to dine at a restaurant called Max's Restaurant, which is also a chain restaurant known in the Philippines. They are known for their fried chicken and other Filipino Dishes.

The restaurant is beautiful, decorated, and spacious and offers plenty of seating for their customers. The restaurant was clean.

The food was delicious and prepared properly. I've dined at most of the Filipino Restaurant in San Diego since I grew up here in San Diego. Food in the Philippines is regional, just like many other countries, and you really can't compare it. One region may have a different type of Pork Adobe, lumpia, or lechon than a different region has. So yes, you will get varying types of food. So overall the food at the restaurant was delicious and I had no problems with it. The pricing at the restaurant, like so many others have pointed out, is very high for what you get. Out of the many restaurants that we have dined at, this restaurant has one the highest price points for their dishes. Is it worth the price? Well, the food was delicious but not worth the price. You can get more at a smaller Filipino restaurant for your money.

The staff members were friendly and they were attentive but they could have been more enthusiastic. With so many restaurants opening, this restaurant really needs to improve on the guest service experience to compete with the others.

Overall, our experience was good, but they need to work on their pricing and guest service experience.

What we ordered:

Filipino Pork BBQ Skewers Pork slices marinated in a special tangy mildly sweet and spicy sauce and speared in a bamboo skewer and grilled to perfection.

Pinatuyong Pork Adobo (Marinated Braised Pork) Marinated pork chunks braised in vinegar and soy sauce reduction. Made flavorful with garlic, bay leaf, and whole peppercorn. Garnished with green onions and served with diced tomatoes and onions

Chicken Sisig (Sizzling Diced Chicken) Diced Max's Chicken and liver, well seasoned and tossed with celery, onions, and pepper.

Pancit Canton (Egg Noodles) Egg noodles sauteed with vegetables, pork, chicken, and shrimp.

Garlic Rice White rice deliciously stir-fried in golden garlic bits.

Halo-Halo Special A blend of refreshing tropical fruit preserves, beans, and milk in shaved ice. Topped with a delicious scoop of Ube (purple yam) ice cream, flan, and rice flakes. A classic Filipino dessert. Less

Calamansi Juice (Philippine Lime) Philippine lime juice served with shaved ice

Buko Juice (Coconut) Coconut juice with coconut meat served...

The ordering experience was seamless and hassle-free. I did my ordering through an option in Google Maps, through Menufy. There's also the restaurant website that is available, so i will probably try that next time.

I would say though most of the hiccups happened when I was about to pick up the order at Max's Restaurant. There seemed to be no organization of how customer service was going to be delivered. There were lines that were color-coded to help people line up at the proper section. Yellow meant that you are there to dine-in. Red meant that you have ordered through the phone, or ordered and paid online (prepaid online). I chose to order and prepay online. When an associate of the restaurant finally came out, his first question was, who was next? Not to blame that associate for anything; I'm pretty sure he was just following his orders. I would say the management could definitely do better here, and that person should've been roaming around and making sure the restaurant operations are running smoothly. Maybe I'm wrong. There was supposedly a birthday party happening inside as i lined up, along with the rest of the customers outside. Most of the customer service seemed to be centrally focused on the birthday party.

I hope this branch figures out how to work more efficiently, delegate tasks, and overall work as a team and iron out the kinks, because truly the Max's Fried Chicken Product Quality on this branch is as good as it is in the homeland of Manila . Yes, the fried chicken here is as good as it is back home. This and comparing the Jersey City branch in New Jersey, the high quality is unmistakably present here. Lots of flavor, maybe not as peppery, but that can be modified to taste, and the Jufran banana sauce brings out another layer of flavor. Lots of room for improvement. Please take more pride in running this restaurant as best...

My family was down from the bay area and most filipino restaurants were already closed by 4pm bedsides Max's. Thought we'd give it a try since the one in Vegas was good. We placed an order to go: crispy pata, sisig, beef kaldereta, fried chicken, and laising. The lady in the front said it would take about 20-25 mins so went to Target to kill time. We actually came back around 30 mins later and it was not ready. We asked the lady if she can check if our order was ready. She probably didn't go back until the 3rd time we asked, then she never came back. A guy came up front so we asked him, he came back maybe 5 mins later and said our order was ready. We got in the car and had a bad feeling so I checked the bag and we were missing a dish. I went back in and no one was at the front. Waited 5 minutes until I called their phone number. A guy answered and I asked if someone could come to the front of the restaurant. He said "Why? Are you placing a to-go order?" I said "No. I'm in your restaurant and no one is in the front. This is horrible service." Even after that no one came to the front. My mom came back inside to see what's taking so long. I said no one is literally working. So my mom stormed to the back of the restaurant and they finally helped. We waited almost an hour for 5 dishes, paid about $85. To top that off, there was a military guy who had a similar experience as us but he actually ordered before us and when we left, he was still waiting. NEVER AGAIN WILL I COME BACK....