Grant Place Restaurant — Restaurant in San Francisco

I went here 3 months ago for a late dinner with my guy friend when we were visiting San Francisco for a day. When we were walking around we were harassed by the older asian woman outside who was shoving paper fliers for this restaurant at people trying to lure them into her restaurant. There was another Chinese asian woman outside who was in competition with the first Chinese old lady we saw and we were bombarded by the 2 of Chinese ladies bombarding us with fliers to eat at their restaurant. Usually in the past as a kid when visiting China town, my parents would be annoyed of this and would tell me to ignore the peddlers. I was ignoring the two Chinese ladies but my guy friend ended to taking the flier and then with force and persistence, the old Chinese lady at this restaurant led out outside to the front of the restaurant to show my guy friend and I the menu. She stated the food was great and that they got good reviews on yelp. My guy friend and I decided to keep walking to check out the other restaurants before we came up to a decision and told her we would come back if we decide to eat there. We ended up walking around and didn't find anything else that looked great so we ended up just going back to Grant restaurant to have dinner. We hoped the food would be great, we walked back to the restaurant and the same Chinese old lady standing outside her restaurant was there waiting for us. I told her we decided to come back and she mumbled something rude in Chinese I didn't hear but I ignored it but it sounded like I told you so that you should of eaten here. My guy friend and I should of walked away then and there and gone anywhere else but this older but we hungry. So the old Chinese led us immediately inside the restaurant and sat us down with menus. The old Chinese asian man was working that night and also a young Chinese guy as well. Let me tell you guys the service was horrible. The clientele in this restaurant are mostly old Chinese men watching their favorite Chinese television shows. That was kinda cool to watch and unique lol. Anyways onto the food, I ordered 3 items: pork bao appetizers, wonton egg noodle soup, and chicken congee rice soup. My guy friend ordered beef chow mein and was going to try and order something else but the old Chinese waiter was rude and legit told him he had enough food since I had ordered a lot and that we didn't need anything else. That shocked me and was rude and my guy friend was offended. So besides the terrible service guys, now onto the food guys, it was TERRIBLE as well! Not good! The pork bao appetizer was dry and so tiny for the price, the taste was alright. The chicken egg porridge with the really old preserved egg was weird AF! The preserved egg tasted like an avocado and looked green and just looked and tasted weird! lol I just wanted regular chicken congee but they sadly didn't have that here. Their old preserved egg congee was weird and the favor was mediocre. My last dish was the wonton egg noodle soup with char sui pork. This was the worst of my dishes! The broth was disgusting and legit tasted like nothing guys, it was the blandest broth I've ever had and I've had a lot of wonton egg noodle soups in my day. The char sui pork wasn't flavorful at all and the idiots working there forgot to add this main ingredient into my soup so I had to wait 7 minutes to get my soup back with the char sui pork. The wait wasn't even worth it and the char sui pork didn't even help with the flavor of the already bland soup. If a restaurant can't get its broth right, it just kills the soup. The old Chinese man waiter and the younger Chinese waiter guy never came to give us waters so we had to ask the old Chinese guy waiter who ended up bringing out water in little plastic cups. My guy friend told me his beef chow mein was mediocre too and wasn't anything special. So after a $44 bill and the old rude Chinese waiter man telling us we had to tip, we used the nasty grimey ghetto bathroom and left. Don't go here if you want to waste your money! Avoid this...

ATTENTION: This restaurant is the PIRATE OF CHINATOWN. They rob customers and serve yucky food. Run away as fast as you can.

I asked “How much is a whole roasted duck to go?” The waiter responded “18 dollars.”

“Okay! Let me have a whole roasted duck to go, and I also would like to eat something here while waiting for the duck.” While I was drinking the rice porridge I ordered, the waiter brought me a half-full to go box of chopped duck. I questioned the waiter why the amount of meat looked much less than a whole duck should be. He insisted it’s a whole duck. I didn’t argue, thinking the duck might be very small.

Since the duck meat was available on the table, I picked a few pieces to go with the porridge. When the bill came, I was charged $24 rather than $18 for the duck, taxed for both the duck and porridge, plus charged for a mandate $5 for gratuity. I demanded the reason for charging me $6 more than the price I was told for the duck and the gratuity for one person. The waiter responded that I ate the duck in the restaurant regardless the amount and regardless the food was in to go box or plate, it must be charged for eat in price. As to the gratuity, it’s the restaurant’s policy. I didn’t pay the gratuity after an unpleasant “talk.”

After returning to the hotel, my roommate found there’s only one half of a duck packed in the box, as everything is one or a half, i.e. one leg, one wing, half neck, half breast. The waiter got me one way or the other. By the way, the food...

Went here after the CNY parade celebration around 8:30pm and it was 40 min wait for indoor dinning. Once seated, I had to retrieve menus upfront & flag down staff to take our order. This was understandable given that the staff was slammed and hustling the best they could.

We ordered steamed shrimp dumplings, fried rice, and sweet & sour chicken. Shrimp dumplings was served semi-raw. My Irish friend already ate a piece when I noticed the wrapper wasn’t translucent in color. The shrimp was still gray in color (not pink) when I cut up the dumpling to show the waiter. He later brought out perfectly cooked ones. Nobody got food poisoning.

Sweet & sour chicken was excellent in meat and breading ratio, and crunchiness. Fried rice had a few hard bits in it, likely dried rice and some undissolved salt, but otherwise flavor was fine but there was a strand of hair on the bottom of the plate buried under the rice. YUCK!

Compared to other similar restaurants in Chinatown, Grant Place, has the cleanest bathroom, less dusty walls/wall trim, & least amount of vermin excrement on the floor. Their bathroom is cleaner that R&G lounge.

Grant Place used to be Grand Palace on Grant Ave which took over the famous Kuo Wah Cafe. Same Chinese name, different English name.

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