Hi Pie Shau May Restaurant

Why would I eat Panda Express when you can eat bomb and cheap Chinese fast food.
I always come here when I got nothing to eat at home, 6 bucks fill me up like nothing. I always cannot finish my food when I come here.

Man I feel like I was back home eating from the side street vendor’s food cart again. 3 item combo filled me up for good before going to AX 2015. Their kungpao chicken has a kaarage-​like flavor profile which was surprisingly good.

They sure are stingy with portions. The server only gave me one scoop of each item I ordered off the steam table. Other places, like Rolling Wok, will stuff the styrofoam until it bursts. Hi Pie barely fills each well. As long as you eat your meal in the restaurant, you can have all the rice, porridge and soup you want. They put pots of it against the wall of the dining area. The porridge is actually quite good.
Caution: Do not come here after 9PM! They tend to run out of porridge.

I went to Hi Pie only because I read they make good pies, so I haven’t tried their combos, shaved ice, or other dishes. Some of the pictures look appetizing, especially the pork chop with rice.
As for the pies I should warn you that they are served at like 300 degrees, dangerously hot. When you stick your fork in the pie squirts out liquid so far that it could hit you in the eyes. The pies are good, but could cause severe skin burns. I wasn’t expecting them to be that hot. They should let them cool down before serving them to you.

This place had been here for a long time and I believe was the first place people flocked to for shaved ice back in the mid 90’s before the guppy houses, class302, and other commercialized shaved ice places came about. They don’t have many toppings compared to others, but their shaved ice are still good!
They are also known for their a la cart items for lunch and dinner. They have a lot of variety, very convenient, and fast for people on the go. My favorites are usually the pot belly, eggplant, salmon head.
I strongly believe this place is better than panda express, but I do understand that these two places cater to two different audiences… Panda more for the Americanized and this one for the asian audience. Compared to panda, this place doesn’t have fried rice and chow mein in their combos.
Their combinations usually come with white rice and a small soup. If you dine in, you can eat as much rice and soup you want. The soups that you can choose from are usually either dry seaweed or sprout soup.
Location: Located on the corner of Valley and S. Gladys st.
Service: Not much service here besides ordering your food.
Would I recommend this place? Most definitely.

Unpretentious best describes Hi Pie. Square little hut-​like building, long line of Taiwanese food selections, and tables to eat it. On my Hi Pie day, I had rice, tofu, and kung pao chicken all collected into a large mass of food in a styro food tray. More interesting than good, but very interesting.
For the money, $ 5.99, you get a full belly, Chinese TV broadcast, friendly staff, and tea with a handsome Chinese movie star printed on the plastic cover. I didn’t see anything saying AYCE rice and soup, and not sure I could do that. Based on the volume of food I was given, it’s de facto AYCE.
I would come back, but only if very hungry and I had only $ 6 in my pocket. Otherwise, I am glad to say I tried it.

Great, quick, and inexpensive meal combos! It comes with rice and soup. We got two full 3-​item combos for under $ 15! I was craving a taste of Formosa and got it — yummy! Parking was convenient, servers were nice, and the serving size was large (to-​go box was fully packed). We didn’t get to try the shaved ice, but it looked promising! Next time

Best shaved ice ever. None of that modern shaved snow shit. Get glutinous rice ball, taro, and almond jelly, condensed milk and brown sugar is a must.

I LOVE this place. I’ve been coming here for about 5 years so I feel obligated to write a review. Understand first that this place is kind of a hole in the wall. BUT that’s what I like. THIS IS NOT A TYPICAL SIT DOWN RESTAURANT. It’s a cafeteria style restaurant. You walk in, tell them how many dishes you want, 1,2,3, or 4. Then you look through the glass partitions and point/​say what you want. You’ll spend about 7 bucks at this place and come out full. The Chinese staff are really friendly and the owner is from Kaohsiung, Taiwan– therefore, she know what authentic tastes like. This is as close as you can get to «street food» in Taiwan that I’ve come across in SGV. No, they don’t have the traditional steamed goodies like bao zi or cong yong bing, but that’s not what this place is about. They have really really good home-​cooked dishes. Each meal comes with unlimited rice and soup. They have 2 soups to choose from. The Seaweed/​egg white one is really good. Is the food a little salty? as my mom always said, if its too salty. just add more rice! haha. But no, it’s not *that salty. Every single dish is good here. I’m no exaggerating. I agree with Roy H.‘s review that the later you go, the less the «pretty the food looks» but it still tastes really really good. Their bubble tea there surprisingly is also really good. CHEAP. $ 1.50 or so for a cup. They also have shave ice there. A LOT of people come in a get it. I haven’t had it before, so I can’t comment on it but everyone seems to enjoy it.

We saw a cockroach while in the restaurant… will not be coming back.

The food is typical chinese home cooked dishes, unlike other places however they do have various fish dishes. The food are well seasoned but if you go at later times obviously the food will not look as good as they do dehydrate under the heated lamps. A plus is the rice and porridge and soups are all you can drink /​eat though I cannot imagine why anyone would want extra soup or rice since everyone watches their weight. Also you cannot share the soup /​rice unless you want to pay extra… understandable.
One final tip…
The servers that put food on your platters are biased. If you go during lunch time or in the early afternoon, the younger servers give you ¹⁄₃^rd less than the older servers do at night even though the prices are the same. So if you want to eat here, go at night.

The icee/​slushee is good. The food is cheaply priced. Service is iffy. Food is very oily and sits there until it is sold out. the good thing about this restaurant is their bau bing.

tip cash only joint
2 item combo for $ 5.45 which is a tad bit more expensive than other chinese fast food joints in the area (oriental express, for example). also have a few kitchen items like pork chop rice. the items out of display just don’t as appetizing as other fast food chinese places.

This is a very cheap Chinese food, not cheap in the bad way but in the good way :)
So many variety and most of them are delicious. This place always crowded (I guess because the food are so cheap).
I don’t know where you can get this kind of Chinese food any cheaper than this !
Parking is terrible though.

Stopped by on the way home and picked 2 of the 3 entrée’s bento.
It is about $ 5.99 each, fair price.
The cold dishes/​mix veggies on the far left counter are yummy and refreshing.
The pork chop and Tofu dishes are on the salty side, I wonder if they cooked it that way for people to mix with white rice? We don’t eat rice so those entrees tasted super salty ;(
Unlimited rice and soup if you dine in. The restaurant is very clean and the staff are all friendly with a big smile on their faces.

What in the world is up with this bizarre English name? Let’s just call it Xiao Mei and not get people confused, mmkay?
I came here with a friend to get shaved ice to split. With barley, taro, boba and condensed milk on top, this big bowl of ice and toppings came out to about $ 5. If you’re looking for this newfangled «shaved snow» stuff that’s popping up all around town, this is not the place to get it. Xiao Mei’s shaved ice is rough like a snow cone and brought me back to the shaved ice joints in back alleys that I frequented in Taipei. Yummy and cheap, but definitely not fancy or particularly clean…

Shaved Ice Review.
They have your typical Taiwanese food here that is inexpensive.
The shaved ice here is pretty standard, 3 flavors for ~$ 4. It comes with your choice of the traditional sweet beans, jellies & fruit. It’s all topped with brown sugar syrup & condensed milk. However, there aren’t as many toppings to chose from as regular places.
This place is good for hot summer afternoons or desserts because of the short lines & isn’t normally packed.

I think I got the worst watermelon juice from there.
I usually get watermelon juice from Shau May restaurant in Monterey Park. Not sure if this place is related to Shau May but it has the same logo.
Got my watermelon juice for double the price of the other location and it tasted like H2O. Red H2O. not even Red 40. The price was more and the taste was less. I will pass next time.
1 star!
Hi Pie is not yummylicious!

(This place apparently has several names: Shau May or May Restaraunt, and Hi Pei)
I happened to be passing by east of the San Gabriel blvd and Valley intersection and saw this place which looked decently crowded. May Restaraunt is a cafeteria style place where you tell them how many items and pick out what you want. Seating is pretty open where you may be sitting next to strangers in which there are a huge variety of customers ranging from day laborers to office types of different races. They greeted me in mandarin but it didn’t take them long to switch to english as I started asking what different entrees were.
They have a pretty good variety of what I think is Taiwanese or Chinese food, ranging from vegetarian stuff with tofu and veggies in different sauces to fried fish, beef w/​bittermelon, chicken tofu etc. The price was outstanding about $ 6 for a 3 combo tray with rice and self serve soup, and the portions were overly generous. The quality of food was great too, not heavy, very tasty and felt clean. The seaweed soup that you spoon in yourself was light and refreshing. They also serve desserts like shave ice and boba drinks and have a big catering menu.
I believe they open at 10am and close at 11pm, so its a nice place for a late meal. The ladies behind the counter didnt look miserable and were helpful in answering some questions, they look like they care about the quality of food and service. Don’t be afraid of the C food rating… well at least i’ve eaten at plenty of good places with C ratings and havent gotten sick.
This place turned out to be one of my new favorites that I’d definitely check out whenever im visiting SGV. But do remember, theres not much privacy and it feels like your eating in a small but clean cafeteria. dont forget to throw your trash and leave your tray outside :)
Sorry for the short and not very thorough review, but hopefully this will encourage more Unilocalers to chime in.

The first time I ever seen combo with pig ears and intestines. Wow! I’m speechless! The pig ears and intestines were great. I ordered just 2 items of the pig ears and it’s only a bit over $ 4. Not too bad. I’m sure I will order more if I can eat more. LOL I couldn’t eat it all so I brought it home for my brother to eat. The first thing he asked is «what am I eating?» He couldn’t believe it’s pig ears. He’s not disgusted at all but took over my plate and finish it all. I guess he likes it more than I do. =)
I will definitely come back and try other exotic menus.