Mayflower Seafood Restaurant

It’s open under a different name.
BIG PROBLEM — instead of pre-​preparing the dim sum and walking around, they specially prepare each one per order. Bad part? — takes up to 15 minutes per thing. As opposed to instantly taking whatever the waiters walk around with like traditional dim sum, the real dim sum experience. They probably feed half as many people, and have twice the wait time under the new system. no wonder they have problems. What idiot changed the system?

Oh NOOOOOOO!!!
Wanted dim sum, all prepared to go to Mayflower and eat to my hearts content, then OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
What do you mean CLOSED!!!
All those zillions of patrons waiting for a table on weekend mornings not enough to keep you in business???
Wow. Tragic.

RESTAURANT UPDATE***
On Wednesday, one of the restaurant staff told me that they are closing within the week, likely at the end of the month (meaning tomorrow?!). Unlike those old school closings (Sam Wo and Caesar’s), this former shining gem in the Richmond District will close its doors forever at its original location. With the fanfare of those historic destinations, this probably doesn’t qualify for that status except for longtime Richmond District Hong Kong connoisseurs of Chinese food.
I remember when this was THE dining spot for both Hong Kong style dim sum and seafood cuisine, as the carousel of chefs included one that opened another prominent business in the South Bay, Seafood Harbor in Millbrae, that also is now closed. It seems that this style of cooking is almost exclusively found in Millbrae these days with the exception of Hong Kong Lounge down the street; unless you are willing to brave those roped lines (is this a restaurant or a club?), you need to drive south.
In the past year, I’ve dined here a few times and noticed the lack of focus in the cooking and the laissez faire service. Was this because the demise was imminent? Only they know. The word is that another restaurant will take over this location though it’s unknown to me whether it will be a major revamp or just a «let’s ride on their coat tails» place.

Came here for dim sum on a Sunday with a bunch of friends, we had about 7 people. There was a little wait but we got seated within a reasonable amount of time. The place is kinda small so there is no room for them to push the carts around. They give you a sheet with the menu and you mark down what you want. They also charge $ 1 per person for tea.
We ordered a bunch of delicious dim sum food and 2 orders of each since we had a lot of hungry people. We even ordered a sizzling chicken dish on the side and white rice. After our meal, the bill came and we were surprised at how low the amount was. I believe that their menu prices (for dim sum at least) are more than fair and the quality of the food is very good for what you pay. Definitely would go back.

ZERO Stars — Have u ever been to a restaurant and asked a waiter for assistance… and they tell you to ask another waiter? Well, that’s what u get here — this so-​called high-​class dim sum restaurant. If our table was indeed assigned to a waiter, then that waiter should have introduced themselves to us and manage his table better. All of the waiters pretended to be busy at the beginning, then towards the end, they hover around to see if u were ready to pay! Just plain RUDE and awful service! Asked 3 different waiters before I actually got my ice water… WOW!!!
Not worth going and would not recommend this restaurant… what a waste of my $$$ and embarrassment!

This will be short sweet and direct. We got there when they were getting ready to close so needless to say many of the dim sum dishes were unavailable; very disappointed we missed out on the claypot dishes. It was just average although their shrimp and scallop dumpling wad delicious. We ordered gai lon and Ev said it tasted a bit like dirt as he thinks it was not properly washed. A little bummed out because I wanted to see the regular menu and order a crab dish but like I mentioned they were just trying to get us out already. Probably won’t be coming back unless push comes to shove. Because it was in Richmond district, parking was a bit annoying.

It’s great for family dining! I went here for dinner and to save yourself the time, DEFINITELY MAKE RESERVATIONS! It is crowded and especially for special holidays, such as mother’s day which was the day I went for dinner, the place was packed inside! (It seemed as if people were loitering in the cold outside!)
It was not spacious in the restaurant and it was a bit hard to move around to get to the restroom or to the exit. The round tables seemed as if it was positioned literally right next to each other so that they can fit the maximum of people in the restaurant!
The décor and service was average. Waiters were bilingual and décor was of a typical Chinese dining décor.
The food is above average in terms of Chinese cuisine family dining restaurants in SF. Since they named their restaurant with «seafood,» my family ordered seafood for most of the dishes.
Pa-​boiled Giant Surf Clam —
The most unique dish that I tried was their Pa-​boiled Giant Surf Clam! It served as a great opening appetizer because of its refreshing seafood taste topped with green onions, cilantro, and soaked in soy sauce!
Fried Crab —
Then came the fried crab which reminded me of a downgrade or a copy of another Chinese cuisine restaurant also based in SF called R&G. Somewhat disappointing for me because R&G has set the bar for the best flavor of fried crab!
Garlic Stir-​Fried Lobster —
The garlic stir-​fried lobster tasted delicious, but did not stand out as unique for the most part.
Honey Baked Black Cod —
The honey baked black cod was very good, but again, it reminded me of a remake of R&G because it was baked with a crispy texture on top and sweetened. It was so oily, but with rich omega-​3 that does your body good!
Fried Rice —
I am not a big fan of fried rice because I can cook that myself, but their fried rice was made differently. They put the fried rice in a banana tea leaf bowl, which added to the aroma and made the fried rice all the more flavorful! I definitely recommend ordering this because the taste, specialty and presentation is all there!

This place was SUPER crowded on a Monday morning. Luckily my friends and I got a table right before the wave of chinese families hit the place (I heard they are left over from the big crowd at the Hong Kong Lounge)
Anyways, parking was easy to find, cause I have a tiny car. Woo hoo!
The only table we got was like RIGHT next to the entrance. And there really isn’t a waiting area, so people were literally standing next to our table while they waited for their table. It was uncomfortable, cause people really could listen to our convo.
So, I can legitly speak cantonese at a level of around 4 year old (simple short sentences). And I was with my loi-pung-yao’s (girl friends) and I was like, you know what? I’m gonna order our stuff in chinese and tell the waitress. So we were all giggling and stuff, the waitress comes over, and I start with «yat goh haa cherng» (1 order of shrimp wrapped in the thick noodle) «lerng go haa gow» (2 orders of shrimp dumpling) and uh… uh… I started tripping on my words and the waitress starts waving her hands and says «…uh stop, its all written down, you don’t have to say anything» (more or less says this in cantonese) snatches the paper we wrote our orders on and quickly walked away.
Wow, I have never felt so moded. My friends and I started giggling like crazy.
The food was alright, BUT it felt overpriced (I think I’m used to chinatown prices?), and WTF WHY are you charging me for tea? We did NOT leave any tip. Don’t think I’ll be coming back, unless someone else is paying the bill and parking.

I grew up having many dinners here. Never had my family and I tried having dim sum here until recently…
… Now we know why!
GOOD LORD IT’S TERRIBLE.
First, the hostess screwed up my wait. We were a party of 5. She gave me a ticket with the #58 and told me to wait. Okay, fine. It’s dim sum on a Sunday mornoon, I expected a wait. She called out a few numbers and they were in the early 40’s range. Next thing I know she’s calling out #48, party of 5 repeatedly. We told her we were a party of 5 but she said we’re #58 so we have to wait.
Guess what? She gave me the wrong freaking ticket. Good job genius! My family was actually #48. Is it really that hard to give out a ticket? Whatever, I’ll let it pass but she wasn’t too apologetic. This did not please me either. If you screw up, make amends. Just apologize, even if you don’t mean it. I have my 80 something year old grandmother with me and there are NO CHAIRS in the waiting area. It isn’t even a real waiting area btw.
Now on to the food.
lo mai gai — IT CAME OUT COLD. we complained about it and they didn’t take it off the bill or offer to reheat. What the hell, how dare you serve cold dim sum!
foong jow — we had 2 orders of chicken feet thinking it would be good but even my 20 year old brother who knows NOTHING about food said «this is NASTY. it tastes like it has been sitting out all night» he was right. there was nothing gelatinous about it.
shark fin dumpling in supreme broth — this was decent, had a good amount of shark fin but I didn’t like how it came out without a lid on it. my soup was lukewarm
ja lerng — the yao tiew inside was chewy. WHAT. THE. HECK. Deep fried food should never be chewy.
spareribs in black bean sauce — okay. decent amount of meat and fat. my dad couldn’t understand why we wanted it in the first place but thank goodness my other brother wanted it. it was one of the only edible dishes.
hom sui gok — chewy and barely any filling.
tripe was yellow. that kind of scared me, but I still ate it and I’m alive writing this review so. yeah.
Flavors were definitely off. Even my grandmother was using hot sauce.

Dim sum at Mayflower was absolutely horrible this morning. After waiting half an hour, we were finally seated. We wanted to order some additional dishes after we submitted our first sheet so we were given a second ordering sheet. We were rebuked by three different waiters, including one manager when we tried to turn that in. The fourth waitress who came by snapped at us and scolded us for «wasting their paper.» I know you’re Asian and all, but seriously? The waiters here were rude and ill-​tempered. On top of that, they decided to dust off an adjacent table, sending a cloud of dust to settle on top of our food.
The food itself was hit or miss. Terrible dishes included the xiao long bao (no soup), fried pumpkin (battered weird), green onion pancake (sweet), and turnip cake (mushy). I did enjoy the fried squid and the potstickers. Everything else was mediocre and unmemorable.
At the end of the meal, we were so displeased by the service and the meal that we just wanted to leave. We tipped one waiter who cleared our plates, paid the balance, and left without tipping anyone else. As we crossed the street, out comes running the manager who is now screaming at us about the lack of a tip. We gave him a flip of the finger and carried on with our day.

Came here with a group of 20. they were nice to set up 2 tables next to each other for us. Service was good! We ordered pretty much the whole menu and everything was good, it wasn’t greasy!!! And with all the items we ordered, the prices were decent too.
We also ordered the lobster chow mein special. I wouldn’t order that again, the noodles were very bland…

I’ve been to Mayflower tons of times because it’s one of my parent’s favorite restaurants for dim sum. It’s crowded on weekends for dim sum, so be prepared to wait. Parking can be challenging sometimes, so drop off somebody to put your name on the wait list.
I like a bunch of things there, especially the sticky rice in leaf and the small pastry with pork inside.
If you haven’t been to Mayflower yet, then you should check it out!

My go to dim sum place in the Richmond. Mayflower is one of the most consistent dim sum places in the area. They don’t do the carts, but they give you a paper to order from. I like that they have the tripe dish I love so much. This place definitely fulfills my dim sum cravings!

It doesn’t help my relatives have absolutely no taste when it comes to ordering food… I went here for my aunt’s birthday for dinner. I think they like this place because the waiters and host are pretty chatty with my relatives… I could care less about that.
We had some kind of set menu dinner, it ended up being like $ 30 a person… and all the food was destroyed (which is never typical for a Chinese banquet with my family… no leftovers?)
The food felt rather bland when we went. Obviously the price too is a total turn off for me.
There are 1,000 other Chinese restaurants in San Francisco and dozens in the same vicinity in Richmond district… go somewhere else. Trust me.

Pretty good dim sum. Lots of choices, they’ll have pretty much everything you love and made well, not super oily. Love that they have silken tofu dessert in syrup! My fave dessert.
Last Saturday was weird — no carts (my friend’s been there several times where you can order off trays they carry around, but not this time for some reason). You have to order of a large and badly translated menu, which takes a while for your table to figure out. But once your order goes in the items come out pretty fast.
This was HORRIBLE for vegetarians. We got several dishes that had «no meat» (and we specifically asked a server) but contained shrimp, or was cooked in animal oil.
Got a little bit of attitude from the mgr/​servers too. e.g. «does this dish come with sauce?», «sauce?» (with a snort and a dirty look). «Do you have vegetarian dishes?», «vegetarian??» (with a dirty look).
At least the wait was fairly short — just about 15 min at 11am on a Saturday. And they were ok with our group of 5 somehow turning into 8 people.

Sharkfin soup = evil.
But I was with family friends who are so traditional in their Chinese ways that I couldn’t say «don’t order the sharkfin soup.» They insisted even though I strongly suggested we go with the Peking Duck family style option. I told them all about how SF is pushing to ban the soup here in the bay area. Yao Ming is a strong advocate to ban the soup, and I’m a Yao Ming fan.
But damn, they bake their sharkfin soup inside a whole papaya, and its served in the papaya!!! its amazingly delicious, and even tho the sharkfin has no taste the broth and fruit make a great combination. I would recommend that they replace the sharkfin with duck or chicken or something because it really does no good to have tasteless cartilage (sharkfin) in there.
Other than that, try the surfclam, thats excellent too.

Recently came here for grandpa’s 95^th birthday. This is the 4^th Mayflower I’ve been to. The only one I haven’t been to is the Union City one. :P
Parking here sucks. Only street parking in residential areas so it’s very inconvenient, but I guess that’s how it is everywhere in SF. Restaurant is pretty small and feels overly crowded. Not the cleanest one either. Best to come in groups so you can order a bunch of different dishes. Service is pretty attentive.
Food-​wise, everything tasted good. Everything came out nice and hot. We had shark fin soup inside a squash, which I’ve never seen before. Burned my tongue though because it was so hot. I also liked the clam and scallops with sauce on a clamshell. Since it was grandpa’s bday, we got a bunch of the «butts» (peach buns). My favorite! Not a big fan of the other desserts. Good meal with family is always a plus!

Want to be ignored, get rolling eyes, have to ask 4 DIFFERENT waiters multiple times for something, get attitude form disgruntled employees or simply like self torture? Well Mayflower is the perfect place to come then!
My gfs and I decided to come to Mayflower yesterday for lunch since we had an appt for foot massages next door at Wonderfoot. We arrived at 1 PM and it took about 5 minutes or so to be seated.
This is the second time I’ve been here and I’ve tried the following:
*Shrimp Dumplings: It’s ok. The wrapper is thin and flimsy which ends up clinging to the wax paper and tearing apart. The shrimp filling is standard, however, it’s missing the crunch of the bamboo shoots and hint of ginger flavor.
*Pork Dumplings: Good! The fatty pork is moist, tender, and flavorful. It’s topped with a bay shrimp and fish eggs.
*Spare Ribs w/​Black Bean Sauce: Good! The pork riblets are quite fatty, so it’s very tender. The black bean sauce is just enough to add some flavor w/​o being overpowering.
*Steam Beef Balls: The beef is very tender, moist, and flavorful. However, they don’t serve it with the black vinegar sauce like other dim sum places do.
*Chicken Feet in Black Bean Sauce: Good! The chicken feet is tender, glutinous, and flavorful from the black bean and jalepeno pieces.
*Deep-​Fried Minced Meat Dumplings: It’s ok. It’s fried to a light goldern brown leaving a very crisp crust and a very glutinous center; however there’s barely any meat filling but a couple of tidbits.
*Shanghai Dumplings (XLB): Not good. What place serves XLB w/​NO soup filling? The wrapper is very thick and the pork filling is dry since there’s no broth.
*Beef Rice Noodles: Good! The rice noodles are soft and tender and the beef melts in your mouth. The sweet soy adds a salty sweetness which complements the noodles well.
*Fried Chinese Bread Noodles: It’s ok. The fried bread is wrapped with the rice noodles and served with sweet soy, hoisin sauce, and peanut sauce. The bread is little overfried causing it to be dry, however, the noodles are nice and soft. The sweet soy is the best one to use since it’s watery and will soften up the bread.
*Fried Taro Dumplings: It’s ok. The taro is very creamy and the meat fillings is nice and savory, however the other crust is not fried properly; it’s dense as opposed to nice and airy.
*Steamed Stuffed Tofu: Bleh! They basically reused their OLD fried tofu and stuffed it with shrimp balls and slather runny egg white sauce on top. The shrimp balls were good, but the tofu was inedible.
*Shark Fin Dumpling Soup: YUMMY! The huge dumplings is filled with pork and mushrooms that’s very flavorful. The broth is rich and savory. There’s about 3 real pieces of shark fin that had the texture of very tender cartilage.
PRICES:
*Tea: $ 1/​person
*Dim Sum: $ 2.60 — Small, $ 3.20 Medium, $ 3.80 Large, $ 4.50 X-​Large, and $ 5.50 for Specials
*Jook: $ 7
*Noodles/​Rice dishes: $ 12-​$ 14.50
SERVICE:
ABSOULTELY HORRENDOUS which is inexcusable for a dim sum place that is suppose to be a little upscale. When we were seated, we asked the waiter for the paper dim sum list which he said they didn’t have one. Bullshit; they had lists sitting at the hostess table. We had to ask 2 other waiters before getting one.
We had to ask 4 different waiters for our 7-​Up which is served in a glass filled w/​ice so you’re basically paying for half a can of 7-​up.
BEWARE of the PMSing lady with burgundy hair and blue/​grey tattooed eyebrows. When I asked to order another one; she just looked at me and my other friend asked her in Mandarin and she said w/​FOOD IN HER MOUTH: «NO REFILLS». B*tch, we’re asking to «order» another one, NOT for a «FREE» refill.
After our last dim sum dish arrived, we were still waiting for the last one. We asked the lady on her rag, the status of it and she said, «It’s coming, coming, coming…» 15 minutes later and NOTHING. So, we told her we didn’t want it anymore and just to give us the bill. She proceeded to ROLL her eyes at us and mumbled in Canto, «You don’t want it? You don’t want it? FINE, it’s your problem then!» WTF??? It’s obviously that she hasn’t get laid in awhile, so maybe she should take her tips to get a Happy Ending in TL.
AMBIANCE/​DÉCOR:
Typical Chinese Restaurant décor; white linen tables, dark cherry wood chairs, Asian paintings, fish, lobster, and crab tanks. This place is A LOT smaller it actually appears from the outside. It’s gets pretty loud when it’s crowded as well.
PARKING:
Semi-​difficult parking. So, unless you get lucky, expect to be circling several times. If you park at the meter, make sure to have ample change and time yourself b/​c they have a lot of meter maids cruising around.
Mayflower’s food doesn’t even nearly make up for it’s SHITTY service, so GO elsewhere! However, unless you feel a lack of BS from your nagging family, significant other, boss, etc, then I say come to Mayflower and knock yourself out!

Clientele here were extremely pushy… I am not used to being in big crowds like this since I had moved to the suburbs over 10 years ago, but this restaurant was located in my old stomping grounds and I had never been to this location for dim sum (only dinner). This place is not that big, and it is extremely popular. Every inch of real estate is used here to pack everyone in like sardines. Definitely a big contrast from their Milpitas location.
Dim sum here was fresh, tasty, and yummy… Yummy enough to come back again, but I would probably avoid coming here in prime time, and try an earlier time to avoid the big crowds.

Mayflower was one of the first Chinese restaurants in the Richmond area that I was introduced to; back in October 2007, I remember how my relatives, their friends, and I tried to come to Mayflower on a Saturday night. Bad idea; the place was super-​packed and the wait was long. So instead, we dined at Kirin down the street that night…
…but ever since that night, Mayflower was stuck in my mind. Every time I pass by Mayflower while on the Geary bus, the restaurant always looks packed. A big factor that lures me to the crowds is that the place is usually packed with Chinese/​Chinese-​Americans, so that’s a big sign that the place may be pretty good. My curiosity was heightened for so long, and finally, yesterday, I got a chance to check out Mayflower.
Mellie P. and I arrived at Mayflower right when they opened, 11am. We were the first customers to head in; we kind of sat ourselves down since the servers/​workers still seemed busy with opening preparations. Upon first entering the empty restaurant, there was a strange smell in the air that made me feel a little grossed out but also strangely nostalgic… it was the smell of a typical Chinese restaurant to me. After awhile, when the restaurant filled up (very quickly!) for lunch dim sum, the smell went away as it was overtaken by the smell of dim sum being served to each table.
We had gone to Mayflower expecting regular Chinese restaurant lunch fare, but we were pleasantly surprised to see that they were serving dim sum. It was my first time ordering dim sum via a checklist menu; most of the time when I do dim sum (without the help of my family or family friends), I either go to the fast-​food dim sum places or go to the pushcart restaurants to make it easier for myself and choose whatever I want. If I had been to a checklist menu place before, it was with family, and they did the ordering for me.
So, there we were, sitting there and staring at the checklist rather blankly; I couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed with the English names of many of the dim sum dishes I’m familiar with, since they all sound so strange to me in English. Then again, unfortunately I am an ABC with no Chinese reading skills (sigh), so I can never read the actual Chinese names of the dishes. After about five or ten minutes of thoroughly looking through the menu, Mellie P. and I decided on a few dishes: Chinese broccoli (guylan) with oyster sauce, steamed BBQ pork buns, Fried Taro balls, Steamed Pork Dumplings, Claypot rice with Chinese sausage, and Fried Sesame Balls.
The atmosphere was buzzing within the first thirty minutes of the restaurant’s opening; a lot of Chinese clientele, as usual. I saw maybe only two non-​Chinese/​non-​Asian tables there; it definitely felt like we were in China. The service was so-​so; dishes were brought out a little slowly, but then again, the place was super busy. The servers talked to us in Cantonese, which drew blank stares from the two of us from time to time (and then, after awhile, I guessed what the servers were saying with my minimal Cantonese comprehension and I guessed right, luckily.).
Despite the slow service, the food was delightful; authentic dim sum with flavor that didn’t overwhelm. The steamed dishes were perfectly steamed; the fried dishes were fried to the right degree. The portions were decent for a «nicer» dim sum setting; we definitely didn’t leave feeling like we were deprived of our money’s worth. The guylan especially was a good deal with ample oyster sauce. The steamed dumplings were on the smaller side, though.
Prices for dim sum ranged from $ 2.15 for the small dishes to $ 5.35 (approximately; I don’t quite remember) for specialty/​rice dishes. The grand total we left with was $ 21.59, which really isn’t a bad deal. I highly recommend going to Mayflower right when they open to take advantage of the first-​come, first-​serve benefit. Dim sum on a weekday is also highly recommended, as I’m sure the weekends fill up very quickly (I wouldn’t doubt that people line up way before opening time to make sure they get to be seated first for weekend dim sum).
So, in the end, was the longtime wait to try Mayflower worth it for me? Oh, perhaps. This place seems hyped up by the Chinese crowds, but with good reason. Perhaps not *THE* best place for dim sum (for me at least), but it’s one of the better options on this side of town. Mellie P. also gave her stamp of approval, so that’s a good sign. Enjoy the Mayflower!