Kim Son Restaurant

This place has closed.
The Fotrune Seafood restaurant is now located at this spot.
I did eat at Kim Son before they closed, I found the food good but very expensive.

I have only been to this Kim Son location once and it was for a formal. It was OK. Nothing special. Default 3 star kind of meal. That’s what Kim Son has become to me now. I grew up around the original Kim Son in Houston and I feel the bigger and more well known this place became the less they cared about the quality of their food. It’s still good but nothing to rave and crave about. It’s sad to say but Kim Son is becoming too much of a chain and I’d rather support some of the smaller business owners.

I like the Dim Sum here as they have a huge room and lots of carts. I am not a big fan of the dinner menu. It is not traditional Chinese or Korean or anything. It seems Pan Asia or Asian Fusion, but not as tasty as Mars or even PF Changs. I really like Dim Sum so I give it 3 stars, but to be honest I like the Dim Sum better at other places in town. for example Shanghai or T&S. But, it is right by the MT market, so after Dim Sum you can drop in and shop for groceries at the Asian supermarket.
Jan 10 update. it is closed down. Gone.

BY FAR THE WORST DIM SUM EVER. EXPENSIVE AND NOT GOOD AT ALL! THE SERVICE WAS HORRIBLE, the same cart kept coming around asking if we wanted food because there were a totaly of maybe 3 carts, and we went at 1 pm, which is dim sum lunch time. THE FOOD WAS NOT GOOD, shrimp balls were hard and not crunchy, we had a totaly of 5 dishes before we were fed up with the place and it cost $ 44 dollars, we went to a restaurant nearby and got 7 meals for $ 43 dollars. HIGHLY DO NOT RECOMMEND! STAY FAR AWAY.

Finally got to try the dim sum at Kim Son today. I was surprised at how empty is was the day after thanksgiving and that no carts were around. Nevertheless, we ordered off the dim sum menu and I have to say that it was pretty amazingly delicious. Easily the best dim sum we have had in Austin.
We were chatting with the dude in charge and were very sad to hear that the place is closing this month — I guess they just did not have enough business. I wish they would move south, where we have no real Chinese food to speak of. Its a drag to have to drive 45 minutes just for some decent food.
So, if you haven’t been here, go now or forever hold your peas.

I had dim sum for the first time this weekend, here at Kim Son, and I was not disappointed.
The main dining room is huge. Cavernous. Gargantuan. (You get the point). We were there during Saturday lunch rush, so the place was busy, but not unpleasantly so. Our servers were friendly and relatively prompt with clearing plates and getting us water refills.
We had numerous dishes, my favorite of which were probably the shanghai dumplings (pork & shrimp) and the BBQ pork buns. The sticky rice, coconut rolls, and other items we had were also delicious. Thinking back now, we probably could have gone for more variety than we did… lol.
After tax, we got out of there for about $ 12/​person, which I consider quite reasonable given how stuffed we were. My only complaints are that the food carts didn’t come by quite as often as I would have liked and the bread tray (with FIRE!) only came by once. :(

Dim sum under chandeliers in Fall
(a haiku)
Delicious dim sum
Pork buns and shanghai dumplings
GET IN MY BELLY.

There’s a glitch in the Matrix.
I walked in and it was like I was in a swank restaurant in LA… I was thinking, «Hey, this place is nice.»
Then that damn black cat walked by twice and suddenly I was seated in my grandma’s retirement home dining room in Baton Rouge (translation: Red Stick, biggest French practical joke of all time). It’s a room the size of Maine with huge 80s chandeliers hangin’ everywhere… clearly the love child of Lubys and the Astrodome.
So once I got over the compelling urge to steal sweet-​n-​low packets, order jello, and ask for a senior’s discount, I quickly realized twas a Saturday and therefore Dim Sum was ON.
Do I know anything about Dim Sum… no… I make crackers look like rye bread.
I just pointed, grunted, stomped my feet for how many, and we ended up with food. My favorite turned-​out to be the sesame balls, 2^nd was the noodles wrapped around some sort of bbq pork.
But eatin’ those noodle gadgets was like tryin to get my little brother off the crisco slip-​n-​slide usin’ only two small sticks. Not easy.
All in all, I think this place is probably pretty good… but next time I do Dim Sum I’ll make sure I bring a less white friend and my walker.

Guys, you won’t believe it! I’ve discovered the most AMAZING new diet. It was invented by the same people who came up with the Fatkins diet, Fatkins 2.0 (a.k.a. «The new Fatkins»), and the «just pour tomato juice into your nose» diet.
It’s called the ANDRE THE GIANT DIET. And it’s fucking spelled in ALL CAPITAL LETTERS.
Here’s how it works. (Its simplicity is its genius): Whenever you go to a restaurant, you order everything. When the server asks for your order, say: «Give me everything. Every single item you have. Bring them out, one by one, in the order that they appear on the menu.»
If your server is confused or tries to talk you out of it, just repeat: «I want everything. That is my order.» If they won’t let you order everything, immediately flying body slam them into the floor. Then repeat: «I want everything. That is my order.»
Anyway, Kim Son.
This is a good restaurant, quality-​wise about on a par with First Chinese BBQ. I can’t review all 117 items that I devoured here, Andre-​style, so this is just a selection…
Roasted Duck w/​Plum Sauce: Crispy texture, great sauce. Lovely.
Crab and Asparagus Soup: «A traditional Chinese wedding dish that represents innocence.»
Crispy Baked Calamari: Super fried; very satisfying.
Vietnamese Fajita: How do you trick Joe Six Pack into eating a tasty and authentically Vietnamese crêpe filled with beef, veggies, vermicelli, and fish sauce? A: By calling it a «fajita».
XO Scallops and Cuttlefish: XO is, apparently, a type of intensely sweet Asian liquor. Much of the flavor cooks off, leaving a subtle, tasty sauce.
Beef and Scallops: Good.
Imperial Chicken: Authentic. Served *cold*, with lots of skin, and a tasty garlic sauce. Ordinarily, I steer clear of the cold chicken dishes that those wacky Chinese Emperors eat, but I’m on the damn ANDRE DIET.
AND ANDRE DOES NOT BELIEVE IN DISCRIMINATION.

A lot of the reviews were talking about bad service here, well the minute I walked into the place, I knew exactly what everyone was complaining about. The place is probably the biggest Asian restaurant in Austin! We arrived at 11am and it was already 50% full. With so many tables, I was surprised there was only one set of dim sum carts going around. It was impossible for the staffs to serve everyone in a reasonable amount of time. One cart skipped us also, already expect lack of service, I right away called my waitress and asked her to bring the cart back for us (which she did very quickly).
Now the food. I am from north China, to me Kim Son dishes favor Vietnamese style, which is a little on the sweet side (like fish sauce kinda sweetness). It is still tasty compare to some local dim sum restaurants, but I prefer Shandhai near Highland mall. It is more Chinese dim sum with Chinese cook than Viet cook.

I was disappointed yesterday with the dim sums at Kim Son. Besides the fact that we arrived AFTER the lunch rush (1h30), the dim sums were just warm (not steamy and hot) and sometimes dry.
My mom is from HK and when I was living in Montréal, I would go to some dim sum at almost every weekend. Yes, I became picky… It doesn’t change the fact that the chicken feet were not juicy and tasty. Plus they were all coming from «two-​toe-​chicken-​ranch»!!!
The service was great though. Joey was very present and smiley. He was fast and polite.
I might go back to this place for a second chance when it’s going to be rush hour. But so far I will keep going to Shanghai Restaurant, my favorite one…

I’ve been here twice now. The first time, I had planned a lunar new year banquet here for a professional organization I belong to. Probably not the best idea to plan a banquet at a restaurant where you’ve never eaten, but hey — I’m a crazy gal! You can decide whether that means fun-​crazy or crazy-​crazy. Anyway, I lucked out, because the food was terrific and the service was excellent.
They worked extensively with me on the menu, suggesting dishes they thought would be appropriate for the occasion and which would work well in a big group. We ended up working out a terrific ten-​course meal that came out to something like $ 14 per person (not including tax, gratuity or drinks). It was a steal at that price — I don’t think there was a single dish that I didn’t like, and they were all nice banquet dishes involving expensive ingredients like seafood (including crab, NOT krab) and duck. We brought in our own wine, and they let us use their glasses and charged us a $ 5 corking fee per bottle. We also brought in our own cake, and even though they cut it up and served it on their plates, they did not charge us for doing so.
The banquet room is HUGE — I have no idea what the capacity of it is, but it’s got to be one of the largest banquet rooms of any restaurant in Austin (excluding hotels). It’s certainly the largest of any Asian restaurant in Austin. However, if you’ve got a smaller group, as we did, they can partition part of it off so it feels more cozy. The space itself is pretty simple, save for the gigantic, crystal chandeliers on the ceiling. The restaurant proper is a bit more lavishly decorated.
I was very pleased with the way the banquet turned out, and heard many others commenting on how delicious the food was and what a great experience it turned out to be.
My second visit to Kim Son was for dim sum with a group of about 12. Tien Hong was just closing its doors, so it finally motivated us to go out to sample our other options. I was pleasantly surprised. While the dim sum isn’t the best I’ve ever had (you really need to go to the west coast for that), it was definitely better than Din Ho’s, and while I didn’t do an item-​by-​item price comparison, the overall price per person ended up being less than our normal tab at Tien Hong. My only complaint here would be that the selection seemed a little smaller than I’m used to. I didn’t see any curried squid, for example, which is one of my favorites. Still, it was probably as good as any dim sum I’ve had in Austin, so I’ll be back for sure.
Definitely a good impression of this place on my first two outings. I’m looking forward to delving a little deeper into Kim Son’s offerings!

My family came here for Dim Sum over the weekend at rush hour (noon). It really wasn’t that crowded… maybe a little over half full. So I was really suprised that it took awhile to get drinks, menus, etc. The carts were a little slow to come around and scanty. Never did see any «special» dishes until we were done eating at the end. Even chinese broccoli was scarce. We ended up ordering food from the menu to supplement.
Now the food. The Siu Mai dumpling were pretty tasty morsels of pork and shrimp. It was juicy and a nice firm texture. The Shrimp Dumplings were equally nice. Large pieces of shrimp and a hint of garlic. The Shrimp crepes were also well done. I didn’t eat the chicken feet, but my family liked it a lot. Taro cakes were ok, they were a cold. I prefer mine w/​a little bit of crispiness to the edge. We also had some of the rice porridge, fried shrimp balls, sticky rice w/​chicken, pork riblets, etc. Overall the dim sum has some good and not so good moments. It’s above average, but certainly nothing like the other dim sum places in Houston.
We did order some chow fun beef noodles and black bean clams. The noodles were good overall, but the beef a little too salty for our taste. The clams however, were very juicy and delicious!
We’ll have to try this place again to see if it is consistant or not. But it’s a nice place to go to ambiance wise. It’s clean looking… we’ll see how it does.

FYI: This is a weekend Dim Sum review.
Let’s start with the positives. The food (that we ate) was in general, «okay.»
Now the negatives. First of all, we called ahead last Saturday and asked what time they closed for Dim Sum. We were told 3:00. We arrived at 2:35 and were told that they were no longer serving Dim Sum. This frustrated us for obvious reasons, but has no relevance on the rating.
Then, on Sunday, we returned to Kim Son, ready to enjoy our Dim Sum experience with their establishment. We were seated (after a 10 minute wait) in their GIANT ballroom (it looked like 100 tables) in the corner-​most table. After about 10 minutes, the «fried» cart came by. It was at this point when we realized that we had not been given given plates, chopsticks, or napkins. We picked 1 dish, but then, we did not see our waiter for 5 minutes with utensils to eat our dish, so we ate with our fingers with no napkins.
Fast forward 15 looooong minutes until another cart actually served our table. One cart (with rice sheets) never even came by. Our waiter finally came by and told us he would send over the steamed cart — and she stopped at several tables along the way as we sat and stared at her and her cart. Eventually, we were able to eat, but they were OUT of the BBQ Pork buns — the main reason for our trip to Dim Sum. Very disappointing. We will be returning to our favorite T&S Seafood for our next Dim Sum brunch… where the service is friendly and immediate, and carts swarm your table.
Oh! And apparently, there is a buffet in the middle of the restaurant during Dim Sum. We only asked about it when we noticed people going up with plates. They serve bigger dishes that won’t fit in the cart. Went up there to look and decided to pass on the dishes. BUT it would have been nice to have been told that the buffet was an option.
To sum up:
— don’t let the waiter seat you in a corner
— make sure they give you chopsticks, plates, & napkins
— the carts don’t circulate well, at ALL, and are too big and too few in number (I think 3 – 4 total for a HUGE room)
— carts get refilled while they are out on the floor (so, the dishes on the bottom have been there for a few hours) — this also means that carts don’t make their way around the room because they never have to go back to the kitchen
Very, very disappointing experience. The food was not bad, though. If the food were also bad, then it would not deserve it’s 2 stars.

A group of friends and I went on a late, late Sunday (2 p.m.). It was pretty empty so service was pretty quick and attentive. The carts also came by fairly quick and if there was a particular dish we wanted, we just gave the request to a waiter and out it would come.
However, the dim sum here isn’t really anything extraordinary. Some of the dishes were good (har gow), but most were average. Overall, this is just probably a place to come to if you want to hang out with a bigger group and sample a little bit of everything. Eating family style at Din Ho may be a better choice for that though.

The place looks nice and is pretty big. That’s about the only thing I can say after my one and only visit to this place. I went for dim sum on a Saturday at around noon. The place was pretty busy, but we were seated promptly.
The waitress barely visited us during the whole hour we were there — to get our drinks and to give us our check. There were a total of 3 carts going around (a restaurant of this size should have more), so carts would take at least 25 minutes before making it around to you — if it didn’t run out first, and the food was not up to par with the other dim sum restaurants in the area.
Our waitress did say they were having a bad day, but I do not plan on coming back.

I was never a huge fan of the Houston locations either, but with the paucity of quality Asian food in Austin, I decided to give it a try. Stopped in yesterday around noon. The ballroom previous reviewers mentioned was about ¹⁄₃ full when we arrived. To service that many patrons, there looked to be about 8 carts running– leading to long lulls between service. An annoying development was that the carts would be stopped as soon as they left the kitchen by staff who were running to fill the orders of distant tables– this tripled the length of my lunch stall. On top of that, the fare was mediocre. Ha cao is my usual benchmark by which to judge dim sum, and the ones here are definitely substandard. The wrappers had the thick, chewy texture that they usually take on after sitting in the steamer too long.
Truly, based on the dim sum alone, Kim Son would warrant 2 stars. But it seems unfair to compare them to dim sum in other cities. Rather, it warrants 3 stars for being a fair option when I’m craving dim sum in Austin.

I’m still debating about this place since I only ate dim sum here. I grew up with this restaurant in Houston, and they grew and grew and grew… Now, they are in Austin.
My boyfriend and I ventured to Kim Son on a Sunday morning after church. We arrived arround 1130 hoping to beat any crowded rush (try getting a table at T&S on a Sunday morning — so outta luck). The front area looks like a bar out of 4^th street. We were seated immediately in this ginormous ballroom with chandeliers.
I was impressed by the interior since most chinese restaurants aren’t so pretty (with the exception of Fung’s Kitchen in H-​town with their palacial ballroom). Our waitress was very nice and service was very helpful and attentive.
We had hot & sour soup, sharkfin dumplings, shumai, chicken feet, gailan, congee, tripe — the normal staples of our usual dim sum experience. The food tasted great and the wait staff kept the carts moving as fast as they can be. There were very helpful when my boyfriend wanted to eat a specific type of dumplings. Since the waiter ran out of them on his cart, he went back to the kitchen and brought us 4 servings.
My only issue is the price. It was definitely pricier than T&S.
For a franchise that I grew up on, I am very happy they are here.

Second time: Went back for dim sum again. The dim sum dinning room is pretty big, reminds me of Houston Jumbo.
I don’t know if they noticed my previous review about the empty tea pot. This time the manager and waiter purposely came to my table to check the tea pot for several times, even I didn’t remove the lid. It’s good they tried to improve the service.
The dim sum is as good as others, and I feel their chicken feet is better than others. Very juicy and full of flavor. And they didn’t charge me the tea. I don’t know if they don’t or they forgot it.
I had much better dim sum experience than dinner.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — -
First time: Terrible service. I almost wanted to give two stars.
Can the owner really train their newbie waiters before open the restaurant? It’s hard to get my waiter’s attention. Every time I have to waive my hand in the air for a while, finally someone will show up. My hot tea pot is empty, I removed the lid. If it’s in Din Ho, someone will refill the hot tea right away. But here the waiter came twice and took the dirty plates away and ignored the empty tea pot. Finally I called him back for the hot tea. He took the tea pot away and disappeared for half an hour.
I asked another waitress for dish recommendations. The waitress stood there giggling, but no answer. Did they really study their own menu?
$ 11 roast duck is no better than Din Ho’s $ 8 roast duck.
We ordered 9 dishes and I only like two of them, fish in clay pot and gai lan beef. Fish has strong soy sauce flavor. And they put rice noodle pan cake under the gai lan beef. Rest of them taste more like Cantonese dish, less spicy and vegetables are very bland. My boyfriend likes their curry beef, but I felt it’s just OK and not spicy at all.

If there are any Asians from Houston here, I’m sure you’ve been to Kim Son at least 20 times. It’s perhaps the most well known Asian restaurant franchise in Texas.
My first experience at Kim Son Austin was weird. I was meeting my GF for dinner and walked into what I thought was the main dining hall… Well it turned out to be a wedding reception (i probably should’ve figured that out when i saw people singing inside) Feeling awkward as the recipient of 100 simultaneous stares, I was eventually rescued and find out that there is another entrance on the outside to the more «restauranty» part.
This half of Kim Son has a definite contemporary/​metro décor compared to many Asian restaurants where they resemble more like banquet rooms (the room with the wedding reception) Menus were huge, although with less offerings compared to Din Ho. It was comforting to see the usual spelling and grammatical errors in the menu… (I don’t trust the authenticity of Asian restaurants that show proficiency in English)
The waiter got several things wrong and it was obvious they weren’t yet comfortable in their new jobs and menus. (Again, somewhat forgivable for an Asian establishment). There were also some items that weren’t available (like ALL desserts) since the place is new.
Food was good to great, but not exceptional. Highlights are the vietnamese eggrolls (best in Austin I think, comparable to imperial rolls at Sunflower) and the the Mekong spicy and sour soup. The Bo Luc Lac was good, but there were some tendony parts of the Beef that should’ve been discarded. Singapore noodles were good, I still like the one from Din Ho more, but this one isn’t as greasy. Black Pepper Scallops were a surprise, they were good but it was more like Onions and scallops than anything.
Dim Sum overall is great, much better than everything else in Austin, but then again I don’t think that’s saying much. Alot of Dim Sum in Austin has gone real downhill in the past coupla years. Price was reasonable as well and I would heartily recommend it over places like T&S and Marco Polo.
And of course if you want a traditional Asian wedding reception, there’s no better place in Austin to do it than here right now.