Little Chef Chinese Fast Food — Restaurant in San Jose

For those of us in the know this place originally was Taco Bell way back in the day. Little Chef has been going strong now for 19 years now, honestly I can’t believe I have never stopped in as I drive by nearly everyday. The interior is clean and still has what looks like the original Taco Bell tables “so cool” As I walked in there’s a menu board over your head. I got the 3 item special “comes with you choice of fried rice, steamed rice or chow mein. Then you pick two mains of your choice “I picked the Orange chicken, the beef and broccoli. And a drink, all for $10 They have a great variety of pickens, as well as packets of sweet and sour, sides of chili sauce and soy sauce on the tables. When the nice lady was putting the food in my box, I was in shock as to how much she was putting in there. seriously I thought, she thought I ordered a double by mistake. Now for the quality and flavor. The fried rice was in my opinion a little bland but after I put the sweet and sour with some soy sauce it was quite good. The beef and broccoli was cooked well and the broccoli was perfectly Al dente. The orange chicken was really good also. For a place where you can get good food “and a lot of it” for not a lot of money, this place is aces in my book. I highly recommend them and yes “I’ll be back c:” Side note they do...

Decent food, large portions. I definitely DO recommend their Mushroom Chicken and the Broccoli Beef, both are very good. I do NOT recommend their Orange Chicken anymore. It used to be very good but the quality has sunk over the last year or so. Now it is usually very dry, tough and gristly-like. It's over cooked, I think. Their fried rice is great if you can catch it when it first comes out of the kitchen. If they have a lull in customers and it sits under the heat lamps too long it'll be dry and kinda crunchy. The Chow Mein or even steamed white rice are a better bet over their fried rice (unless it's fresh).

Most of their stir-fry type entrees are good. The dishes that are breaded and fried and have sauce on them aren't very good anymore (see above example [Orange Chicken]), which is sad because it was my favorite.

One last nit pick, they used to have large MEAT filled egg rolls (6" x 2") and VEGGIE spring rolls (4" x 1"). Now they only have the veggie spring rolls but they call them "Egg Rolls" (which they're not) and they sell those tiny rolls for more than what the larger egg rolls used to cost. A total misrepresentation and a rip-off, to boot! It's it so hard to just...

I have a problem— I’ve been coming here two times a week for the past month because I can’t stop eating this food.

You would think for the price (cheap) and the portion sizes (gargantuous) that the food wouldn’t be good quality, but that is where you would be wrong. The battered chicken dishes (orange chicken, five flavors, schezhuan, etc) have legitimate chicken breast inside, unlike the strange mystery nugget meat that you find at a lot of other Chinese food places.

The flavors have been amazing in everything I’ve tried, but I really can’t stay away from the Five Flavors and Schezhuan chicken.

Beware, they give you a comic amount of Chow Mein. I thought it was an accident the first time, but it’s totally standard. If you want to be ‘healthy’ you can get chicken salad as your side instead of Chow Mein or Rice.

They are super nice people too. With how often I’ve been going, I believe that I’ll be on a first-name-basis with everyone pretty soon. We’ll see.

Little Chef—...