Mister Jiu's — Restaurant in San Francisco

I didn’t expect much when we stumbled by happenstance on a narrow, windowless two-story house façade in Chinatown that turned out to be Mr. Jiu’s Chinese restaurant. I walked in expecting the typical Americanized Chinese fare I have come to dread. I walked out two hours later in total disbelief at what we had just experienced. Dining at Mr. Jiu’s is a true masterclass in atmosphere, food and drink, service, and innovation. From the outside, it doesn’t look like much. You walk through a narrow door and squeeze past an empty registration desk. Around the corner, the space opens up a bit and reveals a modern bar on the left and a narrow set of stairs on the right. As your eyes adjust to the dimly lit space and the backlit flares of the bar, an open corridor leads you past the bar into the dining space. Suddenly, you’re in the middle of a massive, demonstrative room with a wall of windows that overlooks Chinatown. Walnut tables and tufted chairs are paired with crisp white linens and golden lotus chandeliers. Despite its cavernous size, the sounds of the room are somehow muted and respectful. Waiters are seen and not heard as they glide by diners and each other with full serving trays. The sounds of silverware on plates clings faintly above the warm sound of conversation. The setting is “instantly, astoundingly iconic” (Borresso) but never stuffy or pretentious and makes feel you were just dropped into the thick of humanity to experience something extraordinary. If the setting is impressive, the food is superlative. At Mister Jiu’s, head chef Brandon Jew is “reinterpreting the Cantonese cuisine of his youth, with Northern California’s seasonal lushness as his guiding spirit” (Kamensky). We ordered the pig’s head roll first. Commissioned from Devil’s Gulch Ranch in nearby Marin, the meat has been cured for days and arrives in pretty slices infused with Sichuan spices and a garnish of quail eggs, steeped in tea aspic (Borreso). The sweet and sour soup was poured tableside in a bowl garnished with edible flowers, releasing a rush of clean, tart, but somehow creamy aroma. Wide, gelatinous, slippery Cantonese noodles are served with caviar and crab for an indulgence that pushes your taste buds to their limits. The sourdough-scallion pancake looks more like a funnel cake and is crispy on the top and gooey on the inside, topped with salty and nutty dabs of sea urchin. And finally, the squid dumplings. Rolled and boiled by hand, these exquisite beet-red pouches of heaven are served with sauteed squid, braised in a Moroccan spice mix and doused with black squid ink sauce. The squid is so spicy it will blow your socks straight off your feet, while the ink sauce coating the dumplings is so smooth it feels like you are eating silk. It’s very likely that your brain won’t know what to do with these sensations, there is no way of accurately describing the food microclimate you will experience. The food is not about to be outperformed by the drinks. Sure, you could order a typical aperitif or a glass of wine that has been attentively paired with some of the food offerings. But why would you, when drinks like “Tranquility”, “Luck”, “Fecundity”, “Eternity”, “Wealth”, “Temerity”, and “Harmony” are on offer? Artfully designed by bartender Danny Louis to complement the dining experience, these cocktails offer unique flavor profiles with unusual ingredients like Ahus Akhavit, Lapsang, Nocino, Benedictine, and Pluot (Lee). It puts “Shaken, not stirred” to shame. When done right, drinks complement food instead of overtaking it. The flavor is intense after each sip, then dissipates almost immediately to make room for the next bite of food. While you are being transported to food and drink paradise by what’s on the menu, the staff won’t get in the way. Service is attentive without being overbearing, knowledge and yet subdued and the general sense is that the staff is trained to be highly accessible and available but remain in the background as much...

My wife and I made the mistake of having our wedding reception at Mister Jiu's in November 2022. I'll keep this short and sweet since I'm exhausted from having to deal with this.

What started as a seemingly beautiful night took a quick turn for the worst.

The floor plan wasn't matched to what we had requested and agreed upon. We called this out to their staff but it wasn't addressed quickly enough so our coordinator took it upon herself to rearrange the furniture as best as she could. We worked hard with their coordinator landing on a final floor plan so it was disappointing to have to take that into our own hands.

We specifically called out a peanut allergy on our menu which was confirmed several times both with the venue coordinator and the culinary team. That night, the dish was still cooked in peanut oil. This was called out to their staff and in response, we received an undercooked piece of fish, which still contained some trace of peanuts because our guest broke out in hives. It's important to note she is DEATHLY allergic to peanuts. She was left too uncomfortable to eat anything all night after this.

Our tables were set up with incorrect linens from the night before. It was not until this was called out for the correct linens to be brought out.

Guests were able to order drinks that were NOT on our approved menu that cost $110 each (approved drink caps were $15). We were charged the full amount and offered ZERO refund. I even showed the line item from their receipt!

LAST BUT MOST CERTAINLY NOT LEAST....

A verbal altercation between Anna (Brandon Jew's wife) and 2 of our guests. We're not sure what had happened years ago between MJ and our guests but quite frankly, we didn't care and it should not have happened on our special night. It was a huge disrespect to us on our biggest and what should be the happiest day of your lives! A day of celebration not a day to cause a scene to escalate things. I felt terrible having to talk with our tearful guest and Anna. What a selfish and inconsiderate move this was.

We requested a 10% compensation which was then replied with a $500 gift certificate to their restaurant. Our emails then went unanswered and we were ghosted for nearly 2 years. Up until June 2024, they finally deposited our check (not sure how it was even still good to cash, we blame First Republic Bank) and the FULL amount was taken. Were we expecting a free wedding? Absolutely not. Were we expecting more than $500 for all the damages I listed above? Absolutely. Let me try one more time I thought.

I emailed again and asked for a follow up on our request. Their events manager Audrey upped the offer to $590, what a joke!!! I then followed up with my 10% refund request which... you guessed it... went unanswered.

So I write this, as my final attempt at moving on with our lives to take what happy memories we have left from this night. Good luck to anyone considering having DINNER at this MICHELIN STAR, JAMES BEARD AWARD WINNING RESTAURANT. I gotta commend their consistency for zero accountability...

This review is for the food, and excludes any drinks/beverages. 2.5 stars for the food, with great service bringing it to a solid 3 stars. The food is unremarkable, and I can not say that I highly recommend any of the dishes we had ordered.

1. chilled tendon: a cold dish staple, it is sliced too thinly in a mildly tangy, spicy sauce that it could not be more plain. While I assume there is a myriad exotic ingredients in the sauce, I can say that it doesn't taste any different than what you can get at a standard Chinese restaurant.
2. orange chicken: the chicken, fried well in thin coat of batter, is generously coated in asticky sweet. Delicious, but of average fare.
3. sea urchin cheong fan: quite literally, room temperature cheong fan with sea urchin on top. I understand the need for it to be room temperature - if it's steamy hot, it would warm the raw sea urchin. The cheong fan itself is nothing special. However the lack of creativity and the awkward addition of the sea urchin made it my least favorite dish.
4. salt baked McFarlane trout: my favorite among what we ordered. The salt crust and lotus leaves allow the trout to gently steam in it's own moisture, giving it a tender flaky texture. The trout itself is not salted, which is where the scallion sauce comes in. The sauce is also very standard. The trout roe helped to add salt to the fish, but again it felt like an odd addition.
5. Napa cabbage: tremendously underwhelming. Despite the artful arrangement, the cabbage leaves almost seemed overcooked and absolutely devoid of any flavor.
6. tendrils, greens and stems: the blanched (?) tendrils, had a good bite but were underwhelming in flavor. 7)steak fried rice: arguably one of the better items, it is undeniably good. But I hesitate to say that it is great. Wagyu pieces are diced and cooked with the rice, giving the rice a slight glossy mouthfeel. However it's unfortunate that the wagyu was reduced to miniscule pieces, rather than in medium slices to allow the diner to properly savor the wagyu.
7. Liberty farm roast duck - roasted to absolute perfection, with the centers still a shade of pink. The meat fat ratio is on point, but I wish the meat had a bit more salt/brined to bring out the flavor of the duck. The duck itself is very bland, and required a good slathering of hoisin (?) sauce. However the thin pancake and garnishment worked very well with the duck
8. pickled cabbage: simple, crunchy, tangy, and very satisfying. Great accompaniment to the wagyu fried rice.
9. carrot ma Jiang mian: cold noodles tossed in a mild peanut sauce. The texture of the noodles lends well with the sauce, but certainly did not taste any bergamot. I have very neutral feelings for this dish - not bad, but not good either.

There are no novel flavors, textures, or sensations at Mr Jius. I left confused, as the dishes seem to be interesting but I realized are simple iterations of familiar Chinese cuisine. The ambiance and service is commendable but the food falls short of what I would have expected from...