Sika Deer Chinese Cuisine

Wow, I don’t know if we were hungry, or if the caliber of food in Scarborough is just that much more superior than Mississauga, but this was one heck of a meal and I’ll definitely be back. Here’s what we had:
Twice Cooked Pork (⁵⁄₅) — Suuuuper tasty! Thinly sliced pork stir fried with cabbage in this oh-​my-​godly sauce… Gone in seconds.
Stir-​fried Rice Cake (3.5÷5) — While this tasted good, it felt wholly underwhelming following the pork.
Xiao Long Bao (⁴⁄₅) — Great dumplings! The skin was thin, the soup was tasty, and it didn’t break when I went to pick it up.
Shanghai Flavoured Cooked Streaky Meat with Bamboo Shoot in Casserole (⁴⁄₅) — I thought the broth was really fragrant and very delicious. Others at the table felt they’ve had better.
Simmered Tofu with Mustard Leaf (⁵⁄₅) — I absolutely loved this dish. The tofu was soft and silky, and the greens left a really smooth and pleasant flavour.
Cooked White Gourd with Fragrant Sauce (³⁄₅) — The gourd had a really nice texture, but I thought the dish itself had too strong of a dried shrimp flavour which was a little off-​putting.
Sweet and Sour Fish (⁵⁄₅) — I don’t usually like this dish anywhere else, but I felt like they figured out how to do it right. Thefish was not over cooked, it wasn’t over battered, and the balance between salty and sweet was just right.
Guotie (Pan Fried Dumpling) (3.5÷5) — Good, but not particularly special.
Noodle Soup with Brown Beef (⁴⁄₅) — Great! The noodles had really absorbed the taste of the soup, and the beef was tender and delicious.
Really recommend this place. Give it a try!

Update from 10 minutes ago: There was a dead mouse (alive, until my uncle stomped on it) under the table.
Needless to say, we didn’t order food and we just left.
Truly: SICK!

Everyone is claiming that Sika Deer Chinese Cuisine is Northern Chinese food, but I wouldn’t really call Shanghai «northern» China. The chinese name for the restaurant literally translates to «remember river south» and the river is a reference to the YangTze River (changjiang river), and it’s southern side essentially encompasses the greater shanghai region (including hangzhou and suzhou).
I realize anyone checking out the Unilocal page for this restaurant is not here for a history/​geography lesson, but I thought I should point out that the food here isn’t supposed to be Northern Cuisine, but Shanghainese cuisine, and its Chinese name is of a famous chinese poem.
I have no idea what the English name comes from.
Anyhow, their xiao long bao, or little soup dumplings (typical shanghainese dish) are pretty legit. The skin is perfectly thin and does not break when you pick it up with a chopstick from the top. Their stir fried rice cake was pretty good so their shanghainese cuisine is overall really good.
They have a lot of other shanghainese essentials, but also some non-​shanghainese dishes, which might be the cause of confusion. For example, we had their excellent twice-​cooked pork but it’s actually a szechuan dish. I’m not sure what area of cuisine is their fried duck (rather than roast) served with gua bao, but my aunt and my mom seemed to love it.
I keep changing my review as i’m writing it between three and four stars because the food is pretty good, but the portions are small for their prices. The restaurant tries really hard to mimic the highish end restaurant in Shanghai of similar names, and the interior certain suggests they’re doing a decent job. However, their exterior begs to differ. The bright yellow sign with red characters is a pretty tacky.
You know what, I think I’m going to go with four star. I’m going to come back and try their vegetable rice, one of my favourite shanghainese dish growing up. It is one of the few good Shanghainese restaurants i know in toronto, and the ratings might change should I find better.

Taste was okay but the dishes were very greasy. We got noodles with black bean sauce, soup dumplings, and fried rice with salted meat. Idk if there was a different chef tonight but it seemed like they cheaped out on ingredients. The noodles had no black bean sauce in it. The fried rice had only a couple pieces of meat and the rest was pieces of fat. I wish I was exaggerating but rather than meat, it was all pieces of chopped up fat posing as meat… The only successful dish was the soup dumplings

This was my favourite Northern Chinese Cuisine, until we’ve made the mistake of going back. I had a pleasant food memory at Sika Deer Chinese Cuisine until our last visit.
Xiao Lung Bao was over steamed. The wrap did not hold the soup in well. The buns were reheated instead of freshly pan fried.
As other reviewers had mentioned, the restaurant uses big plates for small portions. Majority of the dishes did not tasted fresh.
Perhaps it is my luck, perhaps they are getting sloppy. Hopefully they will shake it up! Part of me still hope this appalling experience is a one time deal.

Big plates for small portions.
The food was alright. Nothing special. But the price was pretty expensive for a few buns and dumplings. The only good thing is that the dishes weren’t too oily. Everything was considerably «healthier» and not drenched in sauce or vegetable oil. But the con is that it also made some dishes lacking in flavour.

My favourite restaurant so far in Scarborough.
Dishes here are never too salty, too sweet or too spicy.
Now, forgetting about price, the food is fantastic. If you enjoy dumplings, and a variety of northern Chinese cuisine you will not be disappointed with the taste.
My top 3 dishes to try:
Inside out fish (deep fried sweet n sour crispy fish) — incredibly tasty, with great crisp and generous portion size.
If u like sweet n sour pork or general Tao chicken, this is better than both AMYWHERE.
Soup filled dumplings — larger than most places, with more meat and soup, but the flavours are unmatched anywhere else! I challenge you to find better dumplings.
Dessert dish: sweet glutinous soup thingy (dunno name but it has goji berries, egg, rice and mochi I think)
Reason for the 4 stars: everything is fantastic, great location with two entrances one onto midland and one onto finch, but some dishes are overpriced.
The inside out fish is $ 37 for a plate… which hurts, but u definitely should try this dish at least once. We still order it everytime we go because it’s that good, but don’t think it warrants the price of a succulent steak at top end steak joints.
Also a bit small on space so I recommend reserving ahead of time and going with at least 5 people to share the bill and try more dishes!

AH-​MAZING!!!
The restaurant itself is pretty small, but they have two party rooms that you can book, away from the crowd. This is what we did as we were celebrating my brother’s and mine’s birthday.
The food is representative of northern china and one of the best restaurants in toronto, in my opinion for this type of food. For people that are used to southern style food (HK and Guangdong), this will be a good change!
We ordered a variety of things such as the inside out fish (amazing, my fave), duck and buns (very tender, had bones so we had to take it out to put into the buns), steamed chicken with sticky rice in banana leave (very tender and not overly salty), lobster (fried in garlic and onion, but i feel like they steamed it first or did something to make the texture silky), jellyfish, pork, mushroom soup (my second fave — so light), veggies with mushroom, eel (spicy, but delicious), sui long bai (very flavourful! one of the best i’ve had), shanghai noodles, and tofu noodles (very unique. long strips of tofu noodles — kind of reminded me of this chinese ingredient, but don’t know how to say it in English), You can make all the dishes spicy or not (for weaksauces like myself). They plated the food nicely with these wax figures from china. It was pretty cute.
For our birthdays, we got a choice of noodles or their sweet soup for free. We choose the sweet soup with pieces of sticky rice, egg, and glutinous balls in it. It was really good.
It was so good that I devoured the food and forgot to take pics of each dish.
I recommend coming here with a large group of people so that you can try everything. They do have an English menu for people that cannot read chinese (like myself). I give this place a 4 out of 5 because the service wasn’t the best. We had to keep asking for refills on tea. However, they were very busy and probably forgot about us since we were in the party room.

This is my favourite chinese restaurant in Toronto. My friend took me there during my first visit to Toronto. Love the food so much, every time i am in Toronto it is a must go place for me. I also asked my friends who comes to visit me from Toronto to bring me some of the take out from that place. Really like their steamed dumpling and the bun. Their stir fried eel is also on my favourite top dish list.
Can’t wait to go back to Toronto and have another great meal here!!!

Great restaurant!!! This is actually a back up dining place for my friends and I. Each time we can’t decide what to eat, we will just come here. We know we will have decent meal here.
My favourite dishes here are the stream dumplings, the fish with little tower on the side, the sweet lotus root, and the sweet sour short ribs.
Going there tonight to have dinner again. Will try a few more dishes. Lol
Btw, this place changed its chinese name a long time ago… But the new owner decided to keep the same English name… I guess that is where those 1 and 2 stars are from…
Updated review: went there last night and tried a new dish. Can’t remember what it is called but it is a layer of spicy green chilly on top of the fish fillets. Very spicy and it taste great! The rest of the dishes are what i expected. Lol. Planning to go there for a holiday dinner with relatives.

I don’t think I’ll come back again. The dishes are too oily, not authentic South Eastern Chinese cuisine.

Came back again on a sunday night with friends in their private room and pre-​ordered a bunch of dishes, including the top notch chicken (which was so-​so). We also had appetizer dish with 5 items, xiao long bao, lotus root dish, whole fish sweet n sour deep fried, soup with sharks fin and sea cucumber, crab with dough coins, braised pork hock, on and on. Overall food was not nearly as good as our last meal, something seemed a bit off. Might try them one more time for a final verdict. Service was still top notch and the owner came by a few times to make sure we were all happy.

Ok so with a smorgasboard of rediculous options to eat, its hard to get it TOTALLY bang on right the first time you go to a place like this with ambitions to try so much that you don’t even know. Always is good to have someone in the know give ya a bit of guidance, and I did, so it was helpful. From lotus root, to fancy chicken, to pork belly, preserved duck egg over tofu, scrambled egg whites with caviar on top and shrimp underneath there was way more hits then misses here. A nice 10 top table in a separate adjoining dining room, super cheap pitchers of beer, and great company. Honestly would hit 4 stars if next time I picked out the specific things I liked from this first visit. Very good though regardless!

Went here with a few Unilocal friends on a search for a unique Chinese cuisine experience. To that end it was a success. Several dishes I had not experienced, thanks in part to the selection of my Unilocaler friends.
We preordered a type of beggars chicken. Traditionally this would be covered with a type of clay and then buried in a hole in the ground over top of hot rocks. This version was simply wrapped in banana leaf and then cooked in an oven. For a preordered and presumably slow cooked dish, I would expect a more moist and tender chicken, not the case here.
We had many other dishes that were enjoyable. Of note was the scrambled egg white with shrimp, which had an added crunch of fish roe on top and after adding a few drops of vinegar, was a dish full of matching flavours and textures.
Despite some miss dishes, it was a welcoming experience amongst new friends and a restaurant I will try at lest once again.

The «New» Sika Deer Chinese Cuisine is a great improvement. A new Chinese name, A new menu, A new management and A complete makeover of the interior.
Grand Opening special $ 3.99 for Beef Noodle in Soup 招牌红燒牛肉面 which regularly goes for $ 8.25 was not bad. But I doubt I would pay the regular price for that.
Surprisingly 蒜泥温拌茄子($ 3.50) Blended Eggplant with Mashed Garlic was really good. The flavour was really delicate but order it only if you are a fan of garlic.
Price seems to be quite reasonable and I will be back to try out other dishes!

Extremely bad service. My friend and I went there yesterday. We sat down and waited for five minutes. Nobody came to serve us. No water or tea. Nobody even came to ask us what we wanted. Meanwhile, a waiter standing next to our table kept talking to a customer he knew. He talked about five minutes, from the moment when we sat down. He even didn’t bother to bring us water or ask us what we needed.

They have this sign at the front entrance in chinese «test run, we apologize for the service» … We were there 2 weeks ago, it took forever for the kitchen to cook and serve the food…
The only thing we will recommend is the Sea Food pot-​stickers. Amazing taste.
Cash only so far, price is at mid-​range…