Rangoon Ruby Burmese Cuisine — Restaurant in San Francisco

It was good, nothing amazing, nothing extraordinary, but a solid good.

Came here on a Sunday evening around 6pm with my parents. The place was absolutely empty, aside from one other table, we were the only customers. We perused the menu and chose some dishes to share:

Samosas: 4-stars. The filling was not dissimilar from your standard mimosa, a mix of potatoes, peas, and spices. The outside, though, was quite thin and crispy, more similar to phyllo dough than the usual mimosa. There were four to the serving and they were accompanied by a sweet chili sauce.

Tea leaf salad: 3-stars. The presentation was on point, with each ingredient in the salad segregated on the plate. The server asked if we had eaten tea leaf salad before, and because my parents hadn't, she explained each ingredient before mixing it up for us. My parents really enjoyed the salad, but I found it to be too basic. It seemed to be lacking a few of the normal ingredients that truly create that depth of flavor that's so unique. Nowhere close to the majestic glory of Burma Superstar's tea leaf salad, or even other Burmese places I've tried.

Pork pumpkin stew: 2-stars. Incredibly bland and completely lacking flavor, very one dimensional. The pork was quite nice, thick chunks of tender meat that were not a bit over cooked, and there was no shortage of squash, but those seemed to be the only two ingredients. A little garlic, pepper, or literally anything else would have gone a long way towards enhancing this dish.

Chicken & shrimp biryani: 4-stars. Virtually the same as your standard Indian biryani, well spiced and flavorful with a spotlight on the curry flavors. The chicken was served bone-in, which I LOVE, and the shrimp were lightly fried, which was unexpected but gave them a really nice texture and tenderness. The biryani was rounded out with peas, cashews, and cilantro, and my biggest complain was that there wasn't more stuff to go with the rice... more chicken, more shrimp, more everything.

Overall, it's nice to know this place is here, but I won't be...

Good, not great. I thought the food tasted pretty good - the coconut rice was good (3.5/5), the pad thai with chicken (spicy was not that spicy) was decent (3/5), the spicy chicken was better (4/5), and the lettuce wraps were probably the best (4/5).

The wine is 2X retail price, which is reasonable. I thought that they overcharged for a lot of other items, so expect to dish out some money.

What dinged them to 2 stars was the delay in food. For a party of 10, 8 people got their food rather quickly, but 2 people didn't. They stated that it would take another 5 minutes, which means that it was never placed. Also, the waiter was a bit new and young, but did a superb job with our massive party (he panicked quite a bit and forgot to do a few things).

Overall, I don't think I would return here. I might grab some takeout from time to time, but the overall...

Every single person that works here is Filipino, it would be difficult for most people to detect the illusion when Filipinos and Burmese look alike. Food wise, every dish recipe is soysauce, sugar, basil and garlic. Basil Chicken, Basil, eggplant, Basil Beef, Basil pork, Basil Vegetarian, Basil Basil, Basil water, lol. I jokingly commented on that issue and the owner claimed the cook is Burmese and ask me whether I want to meet them. Once I said yes, she spoke to him in Tagalog. What...