Liang’s Kitchen

Some of our Chinese friends took us to Liang’s Kitchen in Monterey Park for an inexpensive meal before they took us to a local Buddhist temple to celebrate Chinese Lunar New Year’s Eve on Sunday night.
The food was simple but tasty.
Our friends did the ordering and we did not photograph everything. So, I cannot tell you everything that we ate. However, I do remember that the the three sauce chicken with rice were pretty good, and my boyfriend really liked the beef roll. The beef intestines probably are an acquired taste, but they definitely were not my favorite.

Best place to eat Chinese noodles. Been there lots of times. Tastes are good but service is not that well. It depends on which waiter or waitress you come across.

Good stuff!
We came here for a mutual friend’s birthday. The noodles were fantastic. I like em chewy and with good texture. This place had them and they were handmade. We had a variety of dishes and all were pretty yummy. Also the price is really good if your on a budget. I’m aiming to come back here when I’m in the area.
Only issue I had was I didn’t speak the language as I believe they spoke Mandarin Chinese so I had to point at what I wanted. Luckily for us we had an interpreter for the table.
Give this place a try!

The food is very good, very authentic Northern Chinese food, I usually order the food to go as it’s close to where I live. The service is OK, charging 75 cents for credit card purchase is kind of bearable but would be best if they can remove it.

Food was pretty good, but the service was horrible. Our main waiter had a crappy attitude and clearly did not want to be there. We had to ask for water/​tea and utensils from other staff members because he just forgot about us. Would not have left a tip if it wasn’t Christmas Eve.

the franchise went belly up and the owners discarded the franchise menu and do what they do best, which is pretty frickin’ good.
some of the best hand made noodles in the SGV. up there with kam hong garden and heavy noodling II (in the JTYH plaza). seriously, they’re about a yard long.
the lamb noodle soup rocks. get it with the regular noodle or with the spatzle-​type noodle.
also recommend the cold spicy beef, the fried then steamed noodles, among other dishes.

Nice foooood! Good taste, love the small dishes.
Service is good, very friendly.
I like the noodles there. It reminds me of my home.

To understand Liang’s Kitchen is to understand Asian restaurant culture. Most low star reviews are focused on the service, or lack there of if you can not communicate in Chinese.
Local chinese/​taiwanese restaurants pride themselves on the mastery of their preparation of dishes. Often times service is put on the wayside or neglected all together. Western culture puts an emphasis on service as a integral part of the dining experience. One would ask, why don’t they hire better servers? I would ask, why would I work as a server if I could communicate fluently in both English and Mandarin?
In conclusion, depending on who you are and what you expect out of a restaurant, this is either a fantastic or disappointing place. Oh yeah, and about the food… just read the positive reviews. I believe everything that needs to be said has already been said. Liang’s kitchen is a better experience if you have a person who can speak mandarin and knows what to order.

Terrible service. If you want to be treated like crap, come here. Food is ok. The most memorable thing here is how rude the waiters and waitress are.

Best cold noodles I ever had! The peanut sauce on top makes it taste so good. And, I also had the fatty pork bun sandwich. Can’t wait to come back.

The Service: Family business. Owners are very friendly.
The Food: Very authentic Taiwanese food, definitely remind me what my parents used to cook at home.
One of my favorite is the cold sesame noodle. The dressing is light and noddle is cooked perfectly. They even give you chili oil in case you like a little bit spicy. Good portion too!
Love the way they prepare intestine dishes, very flavorful~
They have many delicious vegetarian dishes as well.
Definitely taste like homemade food!

Left last night with 70% of our dinner still sitting on the table. I asked the waiter if the mapo Tofu had any meat in it and he assured us it’s Tofu only. He then set our food on the table and left quickly and rest assured, chunks of minced pork are in it.
Also we ordered 2 dishes and after out mapo Tofu dish arrived, 20 mins later our second one arrived. Kind of awkward if you want to wait til everyone has their food to begin eating.

Ordered the lamb noodle soup, beef brisket/​tendon noodles, fried tofu, and beef sandwich. The lamb and beef brisket broth were so good!!! A little oily, but good. Tofu and beef sandwich were average. Above average service. That means real good for a Chinese restaurant. Will definitely come back.

I love this place. Thank god this one Is still around when all the other Liang’s restaurant closed. They have the best thick flat noodles (Lapain) in town. It has a very chewy texture that I love. The dry beef noodle & tomato/​minced pork dry noodle are a must have every time. Others you should try: stewed tofu, spicy beef cold dish, spicy wonton, and lamb skewers. Fyi, the lamb pieces on the skewer might be too big for certain people. Also for all the spicy dishes, it has the Chinese medicine like taste spiciness that numbs your mouth when consumed too much. It’s a love or hate it taste.
Plenty of parking. Takes credit card with 75cents fee. Real Chinese restaurant feeling like in China.

I’ve been coming here for a long time for their cold noodle dish.
It’s the best cold noodle dish you can get anywhere but they have some business flaws that is the reason I am only giving 3 stars. The dish itself has cucumbers, peanuts, chicken, egg, and a peanut sauce. However, the restaurant is very inconsistent in that the dish sometimes has bean sprouts instead of egg and cucumbers and other replacements which are not as good. The noodles are always well cooked and the dish is well priced.
One of the main flaws is the service. Don’t try to call in an order if you don’t speak mandarin because they absolutely will not be able to help you out. I’ve tried multiple times and have only gotten frustrated as they passed the phone off from one person to another and never understood my order. Furthermore, don’t expect friendly service when you are there. Otherwise, cold noodle dish is great!

Service: I asked for additional napkins, the waiter brought me exact napkin per customer. The napkins are small and thin. For the credit card services, this is a down side of it. They do charge 75 cents per transaction regardless how much you spent.
Food: fairly good size. I think they got a new chef. I ordered a cold noddles, big plate chicken, and lamb noodle soup. I’m not quite satisfied with the cold noddles and the chicken. The noodle is not chewy as it supposed to be, and the way it looks very differed to the original. The chicken is pretty large, taste wise not standard, the chickens over cooked, and rate lower than many other restaurants that offer big plate chicken.

Wonderful Monterey Park version of Shaanxi Bistro. Super authentic and tasty esp. if you like spicy food!
Recommend: lamb soup, Oil Spread Thick Noodle and pork buns

This place is a joke. Seriously. Let me start with the service. Horrible. No one greeted us when my gf and I walked in. Finally, we made eye contact with a young tall guy behind the counter, who just stood there, hesitant and just looking at us as if we were trespassing. Expressionless, he gave us a slight nod as we pointed to a table and sat ourselves. No words out of his mouth. The server goes back behind the counter and proceeds to stare at us. Weird, considering we didn’t even get our menus. It wasn’t even like they were busy that day – only about 20% occupied on a Thursday afternoon. After a good 2 – 3 minutes and waving to the server a third time, he finally brought us our menus.
After placing our order, I got up to use the restroom, only to discover that there was no restroom. We had to get up and use the public restroom outside the restaurant around the corner of the plaza. The restroom was dark and stunk like a horse’s piss. There was no soap, toilet paper, or paper towels – not even a hand dryer.
When I came back, I saw another server (an older lady) arguing with a table of four that sat next to us, and the young server just stood behind the counter with a smirk on his face. Seriously?
Anyways, the food tasted horrible. We ordered a cold appetizer plate (pig’s ear, bean curd, peanuts), spicy red oil wonton, beef tendon noodle soup, and three flavor chicken with rice. The chicken was tough and the accompanying ginger w/​green onion sauce was just a sad lump of grease with no flavor. The appetizer plate was greasy and not fresh. In fact, everything we had didn’t taste fresh at all. The cold appetizer plate, wonton, and noodle soup all had this bitter and fermented aftertaste, like leftover food that was kept in the fridge for too long. I thought it was just me, but my girlfriend confirmed the same thing.
As we were waiting for our check, I couldn’t believe the circus act that was unfolding in front of us. After cleaning a table, the young server walked over to another employee and playfully fondled with the guy’s hair using the dirty rag that he had just used to clean the table, all the while the employee was already sitting down, bent over and working his gloved hands through raw meat. That’s right folks, he was prepping food! And right next to him were a few large bowls of cooked food and veggies. What a major health code violation! And as if it couldn’t get any worse, a little girl appears from the kitchen holding a dog and they all start playing with it. wtf?
On my drive home, my stomach started to hurt. Then my girlfriend had diarrhea (she ate more than me).
I will never come back. I have never been so dissatisfied or seen a restaurant that is so unprofessional. It’s too bad this place used to be good (according to my gf, who used to frequent this place). It seems like everything has gone downhill after the change in management.

I don’t understand the mediocre review but I love this place! From several years ago, their food has definitely upped the ante. All their spicy foods are gastronomical! Perhaps better than Szechuan style spicy!
Lamb cumin sandwich — spectacular
Lamb soup — very homie and «clear» tasting
Big spicy chicken plate — perfectly spicy, I usually don’t like potatoes but their potatoes mixed with their spicy sauce is delicious! Mouthwatering Lapian (handmade noodles) drenched in spicy sauce… mmmm
Lamb skewers — the spicy cumin Szechuan style, simply amazing and tender! I just don’t like how some pieces are just FAT.
Tomato pork noodles — this dish was better at the San Gabriel location (now closed). I wish it was more saucy and tomatoey.
To try:
Boiled beef belly
Steam cold noodle (with slices of handmade transparent noodles)
Beef/​chicken sandwich
A tub of their spicy sauce

Here’s a tip for the waiters:
Please look at my face when I order, and not my boobs. It was downright obvious.
Beef noodle soup was good. But the gawking was unnecessary.