Sichuan Delight

Unfortunately this place CLOSED. They sold to a new family.
I liked their food. It wasn’t the best but consistently good, and affordable.
I have not tried the new place yet – but Sichuan is GONE! Oh well.

They’ve changed their menu, so many of the things that appear on the online menu aren’t available. No fried won tons, green onion pancakes, general chicken, or sizzling chicken with black pepper. But the guy taking our order suggested reasonable alternatives for all of them, which was nice.
Delivery was quick, and free for order over $ 30.
They forgot our rice, and the food wasn’t impressive. Sichuan chicken was mostly bones but was decently spicy. Lemon chicken was dry and flavorless, and they had included a soup-​container full of lemon sauce for a single order.
As soon as we finished eating both of us got mild stomach cramps that lasted for several hours. Don’t think it was food poisoning, but something did not sit well.

We came here one night because my mom was in DIRE NEED of CHINESE FOOD. She was tired of eating pizza and sandwiches, while my sister was more than tired of eating at Saffron (my mom and I are always pulling for that).
After Unilocaling for Vegetarian in the area, this restaurant came up. We arrived to an empty restaurant and a waitress with a BAD attitude from the get go. (You would THINK she’d be happy to see her first customer of the night). Anyways. She sat us and even after we sat in our seats, she placed my plate to an empty seat. WHAT?! We were still pretty excited to try their food though, so we eagerly ordered and told them we didn’t want any onions and garlic in our food… it makes our tummy queezy.
We ordered Singapore Chow Mi Fun, Tofu with ‘Pork’ and Black Bean Sauce and the Chef Special Sesame Tofu Beef.
First to arrive was the Singapore Chow Mi Fun and it was SMOTHERED in ONIONS. We reminded her that we requested ‘no onion and no garlic’… so she took the plate and muttered just loud enough ‘Zhen Ma Fan’… which roughly translates to, ‘What a Pain’ or ‘How Annoying’… My mom said, if it’s such a problem let’s just go and went to the kitchen and personally asked the chef in a nice tone, «Big Chef, is this too much work?» The chef kindly responded, ‘Not at all. Not at all. Sorry, my fault.” So my mom sat back down and we waited patiently.
Our food came as ordered and I’ll admit it, it was pretty good for a random find and an empty restaurant. The Singapore Chow Mi Fun didn’t hold its usual NEON GREEN like does else where, but the flavor is really good. SPICEY. Tofu and Pork was pretty good too. I’m okay with ‘simple dishes’, but some people would think it’s not anything special. The Chef Special Sesame Tofu Beef is simliar to Sesame Chicken. ‘Deep Fried’ veggie mutton sauteed in sesame sauce. That was my sis’ fave, while mine was the tofu and mama the noodles.
So I give the food a star and the good chef another, but service is a big deal to me. BIG DEAL. Especially if there are no other customers. No excuse. I’d rather eat White Rice and Soy Sauce with good service than have 10 course ‘high class food’ with really bad service. Oh, to top it off, while she was giving us ‘the EYE’ the whole time we there, there was one Caucasian lady who came in to order to go and this same waitress was super nice and welcoming to her. I would hate to think she is racist against her own kind.
Would I go back? Maybe To-​Go. But the chances of me ordering Chinese Food to Go is HIGHLY UNLIKELY. So if I’m craving Chinese food in the area, I’ll go back to Chef Chen’s where they’re nice and can make me my off the menu Tofu Chow Fun with a SMILE.

There are random restaurants all around Redwood City — some good, some bad, and some ugly. Sichuan Delight isn’t fancy (in the shopping complex with Payless and Marshalls) but it’s def. good and it’ll do the trick if you are feening for some authentic Chinese food.
Get the sizzling rice soup and the Sichuan chicken! The lunch specials are pretty reasonable… under $ 8 and you get soup and a egg-​roll. Solid.

I thought based on the reviews for this restaurant that this would be a great Chinese restaurant. We went on a Thursday at 5:00pm and by the time we left at 6:30pm, we were still the only ones eating there.
I was concerned about how fresh the food was when I saw some staff bringing in through the front door a box of frozen eggrolls.
The lemon chicken seems to be also frozen. On a postive note, the fried rice was good, and while the sichuan beef tasted ok, there was a huge pile of grease at the bottom of the dish as it got eaten.

Yikes, a bit of a fall from grace. I went here on Saturday for some veg chow mein, kung pao shrimp, veggie egg rolls, and general chicken (for my carnivore other half). After I placed the order at the restaurant for take out the bf spots the health inspection paper hanging behind a big plant (maybe to hide it??). As we leave to walk around for a few minutes as they make the order he drops a bombshell: this place has the *SECOND LOWEST HEALTH RATING* before being shut down!
As someone who has worked in catering and behind a bar/​food I know how absolutely critical it is to have a clean work space and kitchen in order to make *clean*, quality food. The fact this place had a horrible review for their kitchen made me super queasy, especially since we just paid for our food. For those that are like «c’mon now, it can’t be that bad» blah blah, think of it this way: would you want to have surgery on a dirty operating table? or go to the spa and see the massage table with bits of hair from the previous customer’s «who know’s what just got waxed» sesh? NO, you wouldn’t, and the same goes with cleanliness in the kitchen.
As for the food this time, it was at best, ok. The chow mein seemed extra greasy, the kung pao shrimp and general chicken sent someone running to the bathroom not too long later, and the eggrolls tasted old.
Damn, I really hate to knock on Sichuan Delight, but until they get better ratings for their kitchen, I’m washing my hands of this place.

It’s been a little while since I’ve been here, so forgive me if things have changed.
However, we used to eat here all the time and it was SMACK YOU IN THE FACE SPICY GOOD.
The dry-​fried pork intestines w/​the numbing spice still make me weep like a little girl when I have them. I could eat an entire order of intestines (does that equal one whole pig?) in a single sitting.
Also in that vein is the Chong Qing chicken which is basically a little bit of chicken inside a GIANT basket of chilis. Yum.
Also good: pickled pepper fish, husband and wife beef, and the spicy cold noodles.

Okay, I realize I haven’t Unilocaled in ages, so it’s time to change that! That’s what happens when you are suddenly gainfully employed and can’t spend your time updating Unilocal from work! I am glad to be working at a great job but I am also going to try and Unilocal regularly again, after work of course. I have been visiting too many good restaurants and too many good foodie havens to not share them with all y’all.
So Sichuan Delight is one of the places that inspired me to start Unilocaling again! I came in recently on a weeknight to grab some dinner when I wasn’t feeling well, and I was immediately struck by a few things:
1. The menu was impressive. Right away I was reassured by the list of truly authentic offerings AND by the large selection of vegetarian dishes made using traditional Chinese mock meats.
2. The piss-​poor location. I’m not a delicate flower, so I didn’t care that the restaurant is tucked into an easy-​to-​miss corner of a Target shopping center in the less glamorous portion of Redwood City, but I did feel bad for the restaurant that their location sucks. A place with their sort of menu should be facing El Camino Real and drawing crowds and putting frauds like Su Hong in Menlo Park out of business. Instead, I was the only person in the restaurant that night. Granted, it was a little early for dinner and a weeknight, but still.
2a. The prices are higher than what I’m used to paying for Chinese food. I found out once I dug into my food that it is definitely worth the price, but again, with the restaurant’s location I can’t help but wonder if the prices might be hindering their attempts to bring in customers.
3. I was very pleased to see that none of the burners were turned on until I placed my order, and that once I did the kitchen was suddenly ON and my stuff was being prepared freshly, and at full tilt.
My order? I decided to be unadventurous for my first outing and I mainly just wanted to see what they could do with the mock meats, so I got the vegetarian version of kung pao chicken. It was perfect: The sauce was savory, dark, and rich without being overly salty or oily. Very very spicy, and the mock meats were cooked just enough to be nice and succulent to the tooth, not tough or mealy.
Overall, this place is a home run. I will definitely be back.
How’s that for a return to Unilocal

Ehhh…

Delish and spicy food here!
We had this clay pot of fish fillets in chili that was spectacular.
A smaller bowl of noodles with secret spices.
Dry fried string beans with pork nuggets.
There is one extra fab dish: it’s chicken that has been deep fried or stir fried? in chili oil; it is freakin’ spicy hot !! your lips will be smokin’ and smilin’ =) yummy! the enormous plate has about fifteen 2 inch square pieces of deep fried goodness, and about 50 pieces of those long skinny sichuan dried peppers.
Pork with bell peppers, onions. Sorry, can’t remember exactly how it was prepared, only that everything was spicy and good!
Rice was good too.
Everything was tastey!
Décor: clean and quiet; large windows for sunny effect.
On my Go-​To places.
Sichuan Delight rocks with spices.

I have to say we’ve been going here for a few years now… it’s really yummy!
We have a family of 4 and get the dinner special for 2 people plus a noodle dish and pot stickers and that’s just enough. The Bill usually comes to around $ 40, which is decent for chinese.
One thing to note on the weekends they have chinese donughts and sweet soy milk!!! They also have a green onion pan cake that is yummy!!!
Great place to take kids, there is a huge fish tank and my kids love to go up and see all the fish. It seems to be family run and the staff is super friendly!!!

Sichuan Delight is A-​OK.
Had the lunch special. I was so hungry I had 2 of them — eggplant and ma bo tofu (see the pic).
GOOD
— food came fast
— the tofu is particularly spicy with the unusual alien red color (see the pic
— eggplant tasted OK. not great. not bad. just OK. a bit undercooked for my liking.
— no better/​no worse than half the other chinese places ive eaten at
— decent prices
— calm, soothing atmosphere; and clean (they need new carpet though)
BAD
— probably has some crazy MSG in the food cuz i keep going back.
— them eggrolls, while tasty are gonna give u a heart attack. they contain loads of oil
— don’t take yo momma here if u wanna impress

First, you have to set your expectation level. To say «there is no authentic chinese in america» is just flat out wrong — the real question is *how* authentic it is. For example, Kung Pao chicken is found all over china, and all over America. It’s a little different, but not a lot.
So. Sichuan Delight. This place has many of the chinese-​american war horses. I avoided them. It’s got quite a few of what we now understand as actual sichuan dishes, like 1000 chili chicken and changsha chicken and boiled beef and such, but it doesn’t have dishes that are truly unusual (like you’d find at China Village in Albany, CA).
If your idea of chinese is egg rolls, the menu will be exciting. If your idea of chinese is li river snails, the menu is merely interesting.
I did not have any dishes that blew me away (yet, I’ll be back) like some reviewers mentioned. Nothing was really numbing or tasty, although everything was tolerably good. Nice wok char, good technique, but I wasn’t really blown away.
The place has a very authentic chinese feel, with cheap but functional and clean furnishings. The price was neither cheap nor expensive — I think I had a hearty lunch for about $ 15.
I consider it a step down from Trend in Mountain View and China Village in Albany, but it’s nice to have a place making actual Sichuan dishes closer to home.

I have only been in the area for a month and have already eaten here twice. It is so tasty that I can’t seem to stay away.
I have ordered the mu-​shi vegetables both times I’ve been. This dish is awesome.
The cashier was friendly and they prepared my food quickly. FYI there is a fifteen dollar minimum for using credit. One entrée came to about eight dollars. So, unless you are planning to order multiple items you may want to bring cash.

Service: ugh! We had a table reserved for 11 in there, but when we got there – it was sit wherever you want. We sat down at the biggest table, but there were only enough plates, utensils and chairs for 8. It took them forever to notice, and we had to tell them twice before we got everything.
Food: Basically everything seems like have the same sauce in it – same spicy and salty sauce. I ordered a lunch special of Kung Pao Chicken. It came with an egg roll, a sweet & sour soup, and a plate with the chicken and big pile or rice next to it. The amount of meat in there is actually pretty decent, but yea, just very salty overall.
Maybe because it’s a Chinese restaurant or something, all 11 lunch specials (we ordered) came out at different time. So yea, there is a large time gap between the first plate that came out and the last one that came out. Before we knew it, those plates of food was luke warm by the time the last plate came out.
But yeah, it’s one of the better Chinese restaurant around town. Go there if you want the lunch special or feel like eating a lot of rice with the salty entrée.

The lunch specials are about $ 7 — $ 7.50 and the regular menu looks pretty standard. However, I was pleased to see that they have several mock meat dishes like vegetarian spicy sauteed fish, some kidney and intestine dishes, and a special weekend brunch menu (a very small one) with soy milk, chive pancakes, Chinese donuts and dumplings. No MSG is a plus.
I had the House Special Beef Stew Noodle Soup ($ 7.25) for lunch. It’s huge! It wasn’t bad and it actually tasted better a couple of hours later because the broth seemed to have picked up more beef flavor. The beef chunks were on the dry side because they didn’t include much tendon (which Chinese people tend to like). The thick noodles were quite soft. The broth was quite spicy but lacked in complexity and depth (until a few hours later). I like how the dish was topped with cilantro. I also had the cold Sichuan noodles (this was on another occasion) — ramen like, thinner, soft noodles topped with ground pork, cucumbers, and a salty, spicy sauce. They skimped on the pork and cucumbers. The spicy sauce lacked complexity just like the soup broth.
I heard some of the other dishes were too salty. For the combination lunch specials, they give you lots of fried rice but not much meat. The egg rolls are very small with little filling. In my book it’s a lukewarm 3 — not a 3.5.
It looks nicer on the inside than it does on the outside. The fish in the tanks aren’t meant to be eaten which is a nice change. I also like the open kitchen and I could see that the two cooks are Chinese. They do give fortune cookies!
Free delivery within Redwood City. Easy parking.

This is a fabulous chinese restaurant. The food is just great. We had hot and sour soup which was delicious. And then the fried wont tons, zomg you HAVE to order these if you go there. They are fried and stuffed with cream cheese and REAL crab meat. Amazing. With the sweet and sour sauce its just like heaven.
We also had pork chow mein, pork fried rice and sweet and sour chicken. They have a really cool fish tank and the service is great. Price is afordable. All around great place!

i was very surprised with this restaurant, that given the demographics of where it is, it deserves such high praise. Remember, this is in Redwood City/​Menlo Park, which means there’s ZERO decent authentic Chinese food around. Sichuan Delight changes that fact.
I went here for lunch over the weekend and the thing that really caught my eye was how a lot of the stuff was made fresh right there as soon as you order it. The green onion pancakes, the dumplings, the xiao long bao, were all made as soon as our order was put in.
This really gave everything a ‘fresh’ feel and taste to it. The menu is loaded with traditional dishes along with some specialty dishes as well that you don’t see in many Chinese restaurants unless you ask them for a custom dish (i.e. curry chicken Singapore noodles).
What’s also great about here is how they make the traditional dipping sauces for the dumplings that I’m so used to having at home. It’s not his standard ‘Just Soy Sauce’ or ‘vinegar’ stuff, but rather soy sauce, with chile oil, sesame oil, etc. Yummy!
There are quite a few tables and everything is very clean. The owner is very hospitable and I can imagine it can be tough on him and his staff if the place got really full. I got to talk to the owner and everything he told me made sense in his preparation for food and his customers needs. There’s a lot of things he’d like to make and prep (i.e. Xiao bing), but he’d prepare them for the day and no one would order them, and it’d go to waste. With his overhead and other costs, he can’t afford to do it, which makes sense. He can however make anything you want if you call ahead and give him some lead time and tell him what you want.
They do deliver as well, minimum $ 30.

Was a bit concerned because of the mixed Unilocal reviews, but got take out ma po tofu and kung pao chicken and they both were pretty good. The ma po tofu was one of the best I had — silky tofu chunks with a perfectly spicy hot sauce… not too wimpy and not too spicy that burns off all my taste buds. See picture. The kung pao chicken was very decent although no one can touch my fave kung pao chicken at Chef Chu’s in Palo Alto/​Los Altos.
The place is pretty nice inside despite being in a strip mall with Marshalls and Target. But it makes parking easy.
Bottom line: Not sure about the other dishes but I’d highly recommend the ma po tofu, esp if you are craving a spicy dish. And the kung pao chicken is decent.

After running away from US Chinese (fast food/​buffet) across El Camino, we decided to give this place a try. This place is actually rather nice looking for a strip maill Chinese place. The décor isn’t all run down and 70’s looking and the décor is minimal and well done.
We opted for the full menu getting scallion pancakes, pot stickers, curry chicken and spicy cumin lamb. All the flavors were good but the meat is a bit less tender than I had hoped. The service is nice but also on the slow side. They do have an extensice menu so a few more outings may or may not reveal some hidden gems of the cuisine. 3.5 stars