Embassy Kitchen

What a special place. Our friend brought us here and ordered two dishes ahead of time. The fried chicken special has shrimp paste and tastes like it can’t possibly be cooked without MSG, but it isn’t. And the turbot, steamed. We also got some vegetable dishes — snow pea greens in garlic and mustard greens, the pork knuckle, and pork belly atop preserved greens. Everything was amazing. Everything. Would come back here in a heartbeat!

I’m a fan of this place. It’s not as big as your typical asian restaurant and this cozy atmosphere is reflected in their food. Everything here reminds me of a humble home cooked dinner.
I highly recommend their steamed pork with squid. This is as «home» styled cooking as you get! Loved the crunchy chestnuts with their chewy squid in this steamed pork. Really great contrasting textures and goes great with a bowl of steamed rice. I also really enjoy their deep fried chicken with soy sauce. The chicken is tender and the skin is fried but not oily.
Oddly this place doesn’t seem to be as busy as it used to be. That’s all right with me because I don’t need to wait in line anymore :)
Prices are super reasonable and I think it’s one of the better quality Chinese restaurants in the SGV.

I have been a regular customer at the Embassy Kitchen in San Gabriel for over 20 years. Embassy Kitchen is my favorite Chinese restaurant. We come to this restaurant for our family celebrations and friend’s gatherings. This restaurant has been consistently providing high qualities Chinese food. My favorites dishes are: Steamed Sole and Tofu, Filet Mignon with green beans, soy sauce chicken, Chestnut and chicken in clay pot, Imitation Shark Fin with egg white, Steamed egg plants, etc. In addition, This restaurant hired the best chef, outstanding waiters and waitresses. They are professional, friendly and helpful. The restaurant environment is warm and welcoming. I would highly recommend this restaurant to any one who desires good food and great services.

Went with friends to discover if the ratings were real. The restaurant was smaller than I had expected, but it’s usually the smaller places that does things right, concentrating their [owners] limited resources to quality dishes and service rather than size or palatial décor. However, their fish tank DEFINITELY needed A LOT of work; at least the fishes were healthy.
We had several dishes, the garlic chicken and deep fried oysters were the highlights of my evening. The garlic chicken was crispy, not too salty, moist, and packed full of flavor. The DEEP FRIED OYSTERS were large, plump and juicy specimens. The batter was light and didn’t tasted oily.
Just one thing stood out against this restaurant. THEY CHARGE EXTRA FOR RICE — BY THE HEAD! Thankfully, it was unlimited refills (an assumption since I didn’t see the bill) because they offered to place a steaming hot container of rice on the table for refills for whoever wanted it.
Other than the rice ordeal, I’m a fan and Embassy Kitchen have earned a place in my belly.

I really like this spot, but only 3 stars today — waited about an hour for the first dish to arrive. The food is really great for this style of Cantonese cuisine (see pics: Ginger & scallion lobster, HK style chow mein, garlic pea shoots, egg plant with minced pork, pork’s feet, pork chops, and fried oysters). For a real deal hole-​in-​the-​wall Chinese spot, this is the place. I did notice a lot of amazing dishes coming out for others (eg. roasted duck & pressed chicken), but soon learned that you have to order them at least a day in advance. Highly recommended to dine here with your Cantonese speaking friends and family for the best experience.

I used to come here quite often few years back, their food were good and the line usually long. The owner’s wife (the hostess) used to be very rude and that was one of the reasons i stopped coming. Well, we went there last night with reservation for a table of 10. There was no line and the owner’s wife was much nicer. We ordered the food that we used to like. It was a disappointment except the soy sauce chicken, price went up like 20%. No wonder there is no line and the owner’s wife attitude was friendlier. I would not come again!

A hidden gem next to the billiard club in the same lot as Tasty Choice. They have cheap and good lunch specials. We came for dinner, and there were many groups having banquet style dinner. They also have a handful of tables for smaller parties of 2 – 5 people.
There were fancy dishes such as soup served in a big melon and lobster fried rice in tin foil. The portions are big so it’s perfect for sharing family style. The clay pot dishes are good and made fresh. I like the beef tendons with radish. The chicken of three cups chicken was nice and tender. The Cantonese style seafood crispy noodles was very yummy too.
Overall, good inexpensive lunch specials and tasty food.

Review is for dinner service.
Ambient 2.5 stars. Typical Chinese restaurant with dated décor.
Service 3 stars. Typical. Take your order, bring your food, don’t check in you.
Food 4 stars. Pretty good food quality & quantity.
Bad — damn tea pot drip whenever you try pouring tea.

I know Chinese restaurants is notorious for no service but this is way worse than that. We called a waitress over to take our order and she chose to set a table instead of taking our order. It took her 10 minutes after setting a table before slowly making her way over to take our order. Bad service.

We celebrated my husbands birthday on Sunday with the family. My mom and sister love this restaurant and it’s always our «go to» place when having family gatherings of 8 or more.
Because my sister is a regular, the owner and the hostess knows us well. They made a 6pm reservations for us and was ready when the entire party arrived. The food is always hot and tasty. We ordered Mayo Shrimp, a whole roasted chicken, fried rice, chow mein, an eggplant and vegetarian dish, fried fish, and a Mongolian beef. Everything is great as always and the waiters will come back periodically to ask if everything is good.
Our teapot was always full, but we had to continuously ask for water. Dessert was red bean and we brought a cake in which they lit and brought out for us. Service for a Chinese restaurant is a 5… but I think that’s because they know us.
Overall, we had a great dinner and everyone left happy and content.

Delicious and authentic. Intimate restaurant, still good for groups. We ordered more of the healthy dishes… I love the crispy noodle!

I don’t know what MSG-​laced crack some of the low raters below were smoking when they wrote their reviews of Embassy Kitchen, but not only did Wife and I find all the dishes uniformly nuanced and excellent, but the service was sweet, funny and even witty. Which by Chinese restaurant standards puts Embassy Kitchen in a galactic sector all its own.
We loved our meal. The «sweet-​sour pork» (Not the white folks version, but the Chinese one on the Chinese language menu) was a bubbling cauldron of chewy pig parts that lasted into the next three meals at home. The Loofah with tofu skin was silk and crunch all at once. The tofu seafood soup had crab eggs in it, a touch which introduced the scent of the ocean to the dish. The beef tongue special was unlike any Chinese dish I’ve ever had. It was marvelous.
Anyway, we loved this place. I hope you will too!

I came here for a family dinner. My uncle seems to really dig this place. Whenever he plans a gathering for an occasion, he usually chooses this location. It’s your typical Cantonese cuisine restaurant. Nothing really spectacular. There are just simply way too many Cantonese restaurants in the region. It makes it really hard to give one more than 3 – 4 stars unless they’re really able to «WOW» your taste buds. And this one wasn’t able to give me the «WOW» factor.
We ordered around 8 dishes and most of them were alright. The worst was the vegetable dish. Bamboo shoots/​skin and dou miao (pea shoots) came out really bland. The chef must’ve forgotten to add salt. The oyster dish didn’t have a lot of flavor. The fried dishes were probably the best. Why does everything taste so delicious when it’s fried??? Yet it’s so unhealthy…
It’s worth coming to try. You might find it matching your taste buds.

We wanted to throw a surprise anniversary party for my parents, and we thought to call Embassy. Mrs. Yu Tai was very accommodating to everything we asked for. My cantonese is poor and she went out of her comfort zone to speak English to us. I really appreciated that. Unfortunately, the banquet menu is entirely in Chinese, but we were able to find friends to help us translate, although Mrs. Yu Tai offered to help us translate. Once we figured out which menu we wanted, she was very accommodating to substitute items (like my favorite crispy fried chicken stuffed with shrimp).
When we got there 30 mintues before we were supposed to, our area was already set up. They closed the area off with plants and even provided an extra table to put the cake. Even more impressive was that we were able to drop the cake off early and they were able to store it for us.
In terms of the food, my favorite chicken and stuffed shrimp was delicious. The lobster, steamed fish, and sticky rice fried rice were also exceptionally tasty.
I find it very unfortunate that the Unilocal ratings for this restaurant are as low as they are. My family loves coming here!

Unassuming exterior and décor, but stupendous dishes cooked up with much creativity, expertise, presentation and especially — TASTE.
We came here upon a relative’s recommendation for a family dinner, and our expectations were easily exceeded. The service was terrific too, especially for a Chinese restaurant. Friendly waiters and servers. We will definitely be back.

We used to come here for the food. However, after yesterday’s experience, we will not be returning.
We showed up there was a bit of a wait — which we’re fine with. A party of four was in front of us and we were next. A party of two entered right after us and the lady in front sat them down before us. My dad casually asked us, «Didn’t we come here first?» to which the owner replied in Chinese, «Yeah, yeah. Fine. If you came first, you came first. Can you relax?!» Oh my, how polite of you. We get seated and place our order with our waiter. My parents are both obviously upset with the service at this point.
After 20 minutes, our food still hasn’t come out so my dad asked the waiter if he could check on our food. He comes back to apologize and say that the owner «forgot» to put in the order. We told him it wouldn’t be necessary and we walked out.
Like a lot of other reviews say, you’re in SGV. There are plenty of other choices in the area with better service.

They have a fantastic lunch special deal! All the lunch special dishes are $ 5.25 or $ 6.25, and they’re all very generous in portion and taste delicious.
My personal favorites are the steamed minced pork with squid, the fried fish fillet with sweet & sour sauce, the beef with spinach in black pepper sauce, and the chicken with ginger & green onion.
If you get takeout, they still give you the soup! And it’s legit soup too, not just some pot wash soup. (It doesn’t translate well from Chinese, 洗鍋水)

This place feels smaller than most family gettogether type chinese restaurants and the tables feel cramped together making it hard to navigate through.
Food is alright, as for the portions, the plates seem a little on the small side. My family of 10 I think, we all ordered a separate dish and then some and shared and usually when this happens we have leftovers for days but this time we literally ate every last bit of food and I actually still felt hungry. Kind of pricy too, was like $ 4.00 for a drink! Not worth it.
Then, we had ordered a crab and fried rice and it was taking a really long time so we asked where it was and they assured us it would be out soon, waited longer then asked again… they then tell us it’s going to be another 30 minutes! Why? Because someone else had taken our crab. So we tell them to cancel it, we’re not waiting an extra 30 minutes when we’ve already finished all the other food. There was no apology or anything, just told to us as a matter of fact statement.
With a plethora of Chinese eateries in the area, I’d opt for those over Embassy any day.

More of a 3.5
I have been coming here since I was a kid for big family reunions. They have been pretty consistent with their food standards. Never had a disappointing meal although the service can be better.
If you don’t know what to order, try my all time favorites:
Fake Shark fin with Egg white — Vegetarian dish that makes you ask for more. Not as bland as it looks. Very good texture. A MUST TRY!
Pan Fried Sea Bass — Really flavorful and addicting. Pan fried to perfection. Such a great deal since Sea bass at the market for this size is already around $ 10 – 12 bucks. They only charge around $ 16 for this.
Fried Sticky Rice — LOVE LOVE LOVE This. If you love rice or the texture of sticky rice, you will be in love. Sticky rice fried with Chinese sausage. So Delish.
Definitely will continue coming back for the great food. If there is room for dessert, try the coconut taro or their mochi. It’ll be a pleasant surprirse.
check out my pictures :)

I came to this place for a family birthday lunch last weekend. I was actually surprised because everything was so good! I couldn’t stop eating! That’s spells trouble already! I had to apologize to the gym gods because I said I was going to go, but my fullness/​laziness caused me to umm… well… not go.
FOOD — 4.5 Stars: Here is the feast that we ordered:
Minced Beef Soup (
): This soup was almost like egg drop soup with minced beef. It was really good. The beef gave it that extra pow to keep my stomach wanting more.
Deep Fried Chicken (
): This was amazing. It was a whole chicken cut up. The skin was nice and crispy and had a mouth watering sauce to go with it. It was so good. I could’ve just had this and been content with my meal.
Fried Sweet & Sour Fish (
): The fish was lightly fried with some batter and drenched in sweet sour sauce. I chose to order a fish dish and this was a good choice to balance all the other fried foods. Haha.
Maggie Beef with Green Beans (
): This was a surprise hit. I didn’t expect this dish to be so damn good! I wanted us to order three of these. The beef was tender and not fatty, which always the best, and yes, I hate my green veggies like a good boy.
Young Fried Rice: I’m a sucker for fried rice and this was so good. It had egg, beef, and shrimp. Yes, all the good stuff!
Beef with Spinach (
): This was really good. The beef was just like the maggie beef, but had different sauce with the spinach.
Hot Pot Flat Noodles (
): I don’t know the actual name of this, but I just used something self-​explanatory. By the time we got this, we were so full. I wanted to stop eating, but it was so good that I couldn’t help myself. The flatness of the noodles were reminiscent of a Thai dish.
Rice Balls (
): These were a nice dessert to have especially when they are fresh out of the oven. Just pop them in your mouth and chew… very easy to eat and tasty.
Taro Tapioca Coconut (
): This was awesome! I loved the tapioca and taro in here with the coconut milk. Then, you just keep scrapping the sides to get more coconut off. This was the best way to finish off our meal.
SERVICE — 5 Stars: The service here was really good. The waitress was very attentive (yes, even for a Chinese restaurant). She was quick to take our order and get us what we needed and make sure that we had enough drinks and utensils. The owner even sang Happy Birthday to me. Hahaha.
ATMOSPHERE — 3 Stars: This place is not the best looking place, but the best food doesn’t have to come from the newest and most modern place.
RECOMMENDATION: I love this place! It was my first time coming here and it will definitely not be my last. The food here is so delicious and I can’t wait to come here again… I’m dreaming about the food already! Anyone want to go?! Hahaha.