Tong's Tiki Hut — Restaurant in Villa Park

If we could leave no stars for service and food, we would. The ⭐️ star is for the (1) kitchen staff, for working hard. Producing a multi-course dinner is not an easy feat, doesn’t matter the size of the group. It’s unfortunate that the majority of the cooked food was not good. (2) the appetizer egg rolls & steak/beef were good. That’s it.

First, we had called ahead to mark sure they could accommodate us. They said yes. We know a large group is tough on kitchens. Second, the menu is standard. Third, the initial decision to use this restaurant for our annual holiday dinner was based on the online reviews & 2nd hand accounts from non-Asian people. Fourth, there are 4 people who worked in 2 separate successful family Chinese restaurants (suburban & in Chicago), totaling over 90 yrs between them. All retired & having sold their restaurants pre-COVID.

Post COVID, other than the standard Minghin or going to Chicago Chinatown, it’s hard to find a Chinese restaurant that can accommodate a large group of 20+ & is located between the many Chicago area suburbs, so we took a gamble.

The reviews during & immediately after the restaurant visit were bad. A day later, the aunties and shushumen still are both livid & insulted. The patriarch, with over 30 years of experience in a successful Chinese restaurant in downtown Chicago (retired over 12 yrs): “ [I am ] insulted by the restaurant owner & staff interpretation of chop suey style. It was poor quality of food & horrible service. The food was bad with paste-heavy chop suey style, making it tasteless. …You could taste that the shrimp were frozen. The steak was like leather and was not Hong Kong style. I know what Hong Kong is supposed to be, and that was not correct. They should be embarrassed. They should not serve their food. It gives the wrong ideas of chop suey style.”

Besides the horrible food— It was a red flag that the surrounding tables were not bussed after we placed our family style order for over 20 people— piles of dirty dishes & abandoned tables. But, it was too late to cancel our family style dinner order to the kitchen. We had to beg for water refills, and we had pitchers in the table. Waited 20+ minutes for any drink order that was not water — even the traditional tea. We constantly had to look for any server for anything— correct # of plates, water, tea…chopsticks were not even an option (red flag). White rice was extra & we decided to not even bother to ask for bowls, because we weren’t sure we’d get our tea or water— decision was not not delay the real necessities. Some of the adults did not bother eating & decided to drink instead, even with the extensive waiting. The alcoholic drinks were reminiscent of college “jungle juice”, so heavy on the alcohol & syrups.

We expected to be automatically charged gratuity because we had a large group. But, we were charged gratuity on the incorrect amount. Instead of being correctly charged gratuity on the (food + drink total), we were charged on the [(food + drink total) + tax] total. So, we were charged an extra 9.5% for horrible service. And when I say horrible, I’d say we were ready to go to the kitchen to beg for tea & water.

I’m not looking forward to being reminded of this bad choice (by another family member) for an entire year. 1 Star ⭐️ overall, because the appetizer beef was good & the rest of the appetizer was ok. And the kitchen staff worked hard and tried, albeit without success.

Conclusion: Do not...

ONE AND DONE: This is long, so hold on... My family used to go to Tongs back when it was in Bloomingdale, but that closed years ago.. I assume it's the same place just moved to a different location because there's only one Tongs Tiki Hut I've ever known of. I was curious and asked one of the servers and he seemed offended that I asked and made it clear that this was a different one, so guess I was wrong, but just the energy coming off this person was tense and uncomfortable.

Anyways, I wanted to bring the kiddos and relive the memories I had cause it was always so cutely decorated inside and the drinks came in cool tiki cups. Well, it's still cutely decorated, but the kids drinks didn't have the cute tiki cups so that was a bummer, but did have the umbrella and cherry/pineapple slice, so yay for festiveness.

I don't know if they're short staffed, but only 2 servers were available and they seemed pretty impatient and stressed out, including the tense man mentioned earlier. During our order when I was deciding on what to drink and order for a meal, our server, the tense one, stepped away, not once, but twice while we were ordering, to quickly go manage something else before coming back to our table. Clearly, he was in a hurry the whole time, and wasn't very patient, it just made our whole experience uncomfortable. It was a Thursday evening, so there were quite a few families there, but the wait was pretty long for everything, drinks, appetizers, and meal. They need to update their online menu to reflect the prices and choices of what is available now. The Pina colada is showing $5 from 2019 and now is like $8 or $9. Overall, the prices aren't bad, they just need to update the menu. I asked for Spring rolls - they didn't have them. I asked for red wine - they didn't have it. For God's sake, I asked for sushi - and they didn't even have that!! Mind you, all these items are on the menu, makes me wonder what else they didn't have.... I was soooo looking forward to having sushi and pretty bummed when they didn't have any, so we ordered mostly all the regular American Asian dishes you find at most Chinese takeout places. Ya know, the ones overly loaded with sauce, salt and msg. I wasn't a fan of my shrimp drenched in gelatinous lobster sauce. My husband ordered a duck dish and that was encrusted with a thick layer of fried dough you'd find on sweet and sour chicken. All that Americanized crap is just so awful and dated. I will say the egg rolls and fried rice was fine, what you would expect from American Asian takeout.

Oh and to kick it off, the drinks are weak. So, enter at...

We’ve been languishing, unable to find a Chinese restaurant that checks our boxes since we moved out this way - then along comes Tong’sTiki Hut. Not only did it check all of the boxes that we have on our list, but it also reached way in and checked boxes that have been empty since China Garden in Lake Charles LA closed in the 90s. It’s the Chinese-American-Polenisian cuisine of our childhoods and I honestly could’ve cried I was so happy. Perfection has been attained. Stop looking. Looking for a sit down, lovely restaurant (with take out options of course?) ✔️ Want other guests who had grown up here to recommending dishes?✔️ Do you like an origin story that includes waitresses pooling their money to buy the restaurant from a retiring owner way back when and who run it today?✔️ Do you want your iced tea in a tiki glass??✔️ Chinese zodiac placemats? ✔️ Cocktails? ✔️ WATER FEATURE???? ✔️ We started with tea and a Scorpion and crab Rangoon. Also got the meatless fried wonton knowing I’d be getting egg drop soup (which I did and it was delicious.) At this point we realized how big the portions were and decided to share the sizzling shrimp with golden rice. Perfection from start to finish. Recommend EVERYTHING. We brought home leftovers and a whole new order of soup and will eat like kings for the rest of our days. GO HERE. Next time we’re after the egg foo young, Singapore rice noodles, hot and sour soup, Mongolian beef - pretty much the rest of the menu. It’s worth the drive from Chicago. It’s also worth the drive from Iowa (agreeing with the woman in the booth...