Columbine Gardens — Restaurant in Woodmoor

Ordered takeout. We live less than 10 minutes from this place. The quality of food has been dropping like a rock for the past 3 years - so I don't know WHAT possessed us to try it again. Pot stickers, hot/sour soup for 1, egg drop soup for 1, sesame chicken, muu-shu pork, fried rice. The gal says 'ready in 10 minutes'. Uh-oh. No way you could prep all that AND serve people in your restaurant in 10 minutes. I'm thinking - she's wrong - but I head down there - arrive in exactly 10 minutes. It's ready and bagged - $30+. It's about 6:35 p.m. on a weekday and NO ONE is in there - I mean the place is EMPTY. I'm like "Oh no! This does not bode well!". I drive home - less than 10 minutes. Open the bag - things are sort of warm - but look pre-packaged - like microwave dinners that have just been microwaved. The pot stickers are AWFUL. They are OLD - the wrapper is dried out and tastes stale - there is no taste - just blandness - lots of cabbage. The egg drop soup? No flavor - not hot - just kind of slimy-ness. I had three spoonfuls and called it quits. The hot/sour soup? My husband said it was not hot at all - just sweet and not even heat-hot, much less not spicy-hot. He said it had a cloying sweetness. He did not even eat half of it. The sesame chicken and muu-shu filling were in those weird microwave containers - the sesame chicken - the chicken pieces were kind of floating in a syrupy sweet gelantinous kind of mess at the bottom of the container. Back in the day - when Columbine Gardens was a decent Chinese restaurant, the sesame chickden was to die for - freshly wok-fried pieces of tender chicken on top of crisp noodles with a sweet/hot sauce over all - not a liquidy, sugar sweet mess. I ate about 6 pieces of chicken - tasted like reheated fried chicken nuggets (you know - tough around the edges - dry) and WAY too sweet - and just stopped. The muu-shu had not been microwaved enough - no flavor - no spices - just lots of limp cabbage and scant thin pieces of pork. My husband rolled one 'pancake' muu-shu - ate half of it and quit. The 'fried rice' - white rice (not even HOT) that had been rolled around in grease - no veggies in there - no egg - no flavor - nothing. Not fried. We threw the leftovers of EVERYTHING OUT! Do not waste your time or money on this place. We are convinced they have pre-packaged the items on their menu - and just pull it from a fridge and microwave or steam it. Dead giveaway - you cannot smell anything cooking as you approach the restaurant. At 6:30 p.m., the place should have been BUSY. NO ONE was in there! Now we know why. That's it for Columbine Gardens - not going there again! Threw $30 in the...

Came for lunch and we were not disappointed. The food here is great, and the lunch is very fast - it arrived within 5 minutes of us ordering. The food is typical American Chinese, but their menu has many more options than other similar restaurants. We had Combination Kung Pao and Orange Chicken, which were both very good. The Combination had lots of shrimp as well. All lunches are served with an egg roll, choice of soup, a cheese rangoon, and hot tea (ask for it). The portions are big. The staff is friendly and working quickly all over the restaurant. The decor is not the reason to come, but the food and quick service are. There were lots of locals eating there, at the restaurant was at about 80% capacity - which made the quick service even more surprising. ...

Getting take-out during a pandemic is always an experience, but this was the first time I felt like a restaurant had done EVERYTHING they possibly could to minimize the spread. We went to the store and ordered, the lady behind the desk was SO nice and told us our food would be ready 10 minutes later. We come back in 10 minutes later, it's already packed and ready for us. She even lets us know to be careful, because the bag is heavy. Full stars across the board for customer-service. The food tasted AMAZING and I can't believe how much of it there was. We have leftovers for at least 2 days and my husband tells me the food is still great then. Can't believe I haven't come here before and absolutely will be...