Empire Szechuan Noodle House

Auch wenn dies nicht in die allgemeine hier geäusserte (wirklich negative) Stimmung passt und wenn auch ‘unser geschultes Personal’ eher abschreckend wirkt: Ich habe im letzten Jahr hier wirklich sehr oft gegessen und war immer zufrieden.
Der Mittagstisch (Suppe, Hauptgericht, Beilage) ist vom Preis-​Leistungsverhältnis mit seinen knapp 8 Dollar kaum zuschlagen, und mir schmeckt es. Nie hatte ich körperliche Probleme, der Tee ist umsonst, und Chinesen sind eben eher unfreundlich. Das weiß man und darauf kann man sich einstellen.
Also wer mal in der Nähe (CUMC) ist, keine Scheu !

So I’m all excited to eat on my break and then I open up my food. I ordered fried fish with shrimp fried rice. It looked as if they sent me someone’s leftovers. Picture to follow. I can’t believe this shit!!!

I was skeptical about getting sushi. I got the avocado salmon roll and the shrimp tempura roll. Glad I did, the sushi is pretty good and for the price you can’t go wrong. I get sushi pretty often from here in actually ordering again right now lol. Quick and reliable, Solid 4 stars.

My stomach is turning after eating
deep fried breaded salmon trying to pass for salmon crunch roll. I only ate three pieces of the 6 that it came with. Friend ordered the pad Thai, ate two bites and didn’t eat anymore. Partner ordered the dragon roll and could only eat half. Partner ordered without reading the reviews on here because the most recent ones are spot on. Whatever this place may have been it is definitely the worst I’ve had in the 8 years in this neighborhood.
**after contacting the restaurant they have offered to replace our food. Jessica was exceptional in her receptiveness to hear about out concerns. For that the place gets two more stars. I’m happy to increase again if the food is good.

So the woman taking my payment added my orders wrong and charged me $ 2 extra, and she was trying to work so fast so that I wouldn’t notice. So I repeatedly asked her «did you add the orders correctly?» She didn’t offer me a refund, but offered me a water bottle, and so I asked «is this small water bottle $ 2?» Then she gave me 2 small water bottles. She probably thought I was stupid, but I’m not.
Needless to say, I will NEVER be eating here again.
Last time I ate there, they DEMANDED a tip by pointing to the tip section on the receipt, but I thought the waitress did not deserve a tip because the waitress couldn’t care less about us when we were seated.
I really hate this place, because I experienced the following:
POOR SERVICE
POOR ATTITUDE
POOR FOOD QUALITY
AGGRESSIVELY ASKING FOR A TIP
ADDING $ 2 EXTRA TO MY ORDER AND THINKING THAT I WOULD NOT NOTICE

Located near Columbia Medical & Presbyterian Hospital. A good variety of different offerings (Chinese food & sushi). Well priced and good portions for the lunch menu items which comes with soup. Came here for lunch with two of my co-​workers. Don’t think they had the heat on in the dining room in the middle of winter. I had the eggplant in garlic sauce which had good flavor. We also ordered Szechuan fish which was not spicy at all. It’s a decent place to grab lunch, food comes fast and great prices.

I used to get take-​out here all the time when I lived nearby. Now that I live outside DC, I still try to make it in when I’m in the Heights. The vegetarian menu is surprisingly delicious.

Awful service the food was received cold and not to mention they forgot my rice then tried to tell me that I received a extra amount of meat so that’s why they forgot the rice. (Yeah Right)
It’s been a hour since I called and still no rice. To add the soup tasted awful I threw it away. Never again
I ordered boneless ribs with chicken fried rice and a soup.
I’m sorry if you can’t get that right. U shouldn’t be in business.

I’m giving these guys a 4 because they’re bringing good Chinese food, easy and accessible to the heights! They were super responsible ask quick with my order. I ordered 3 orders of dumplings, miso soup and a salmon sashimi and it was still under 20! Can you believe that? Their dumplings are on point — both the shrimp dumplings and the veggie. The salmon was pretty dam good. I think I’ll try the eel today. I definitely recommend them for ordering and you won’t be disappointed.

Probably the worst Chienes foof I have ever had, and it was expensive, so bad I couldn’t finish it and i threw it out… thats when you know it’s bad.

Worst service I’ve ever experienced. No matter what you order, it always takes twice as long to receive as they claim. When you call to check on the order, they lie and claim the delivery person is out with your order, and then another hour passes with nothing. DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME OR MONEY!

Meat was bad last time. Which is not acceptable, at all, ever. You guys knew it, and thought you would get away with it… and you lost a regular customer. Good job.
Good job getting more expensive, tasting worse, starting to charge for white rice, and no longer providing utensils… good job. When the food now takes an hour and is rotten tasting that’s that.

Years ago this was my go to Chinese food restaurant. My favorite dish was the general tso chicken. This visit I went with the spicy garlic shrimp, mild. It was very good.
The service is still horrible. The women lack charm but if you don’t expect it, it feels like a passive aggressive dinner at home. I would stay away from the egg roll included in the lunch special. Mine was greasy enough to be squeezed with a napkin, and change the napkins color… maybe I just got unlucky?

This is an update from my previous review. I was very disappointed tonight that there were no scallions in my scallion pancake. At most, there was half of a scallion. Check out the pictures. Call me crazy, but I thought it was called a scallion pancake because there were scallions in it.
Frankly, there are plenty of grocery stores open late in NYC. Surely if you own a business that sells items labeled «scallion», you can manage to keep scallions in stock. It’s not an item that’s especially difficult to find. Flavorless fried dough by itself is not very exciting, and I’m a little bit upset that I paid 450 for it.

Bad customer service! Server is arguing with me about an order that I didn’t realize was mostly cucumber and was refusing to replace it saying that I should know what I ordered and walked away. She did come with the bill with the food I did not eat on it and when I took it the main counter to dispute it. The server followed and started to argue more with me and the cashier saying that «he knew he knew and not to change it» The cashier did remove it but this is definitely the worst customer service I have had and the food was only okay.

Usually not a bad place for sushi if you don’t mind waiting «75 – 90 minutes», which is accurate.
Bad experience time: Ordered sushi, egg roll, and can of soda. 75 mins later, food’s not here, call them up and they say «it’s on the way». Shows up 15 mins later. Clearly they just quickly made the rolls and threw everything in there in a rush. Delivery guy shows up, no can of soda.
I call them up and the lady says he can give me credit next time. First thought: I didn’t get what I ordered, you should be fixing that. So I tell her I would like my soda, out of principle, of course. She proceeds to tell me that it will be a long wait because it’s busy at 10pm on a Sunday night in Wash Heights. Yeah… ALRIGHT.
So I get my orange soda like 20 mins later. A free egg roll and a «hey, sorry we messed up» would’ve been nice. I just feel bad for the delivery guy. But damn, this is the best orange soda I’ve had in a while.

FOOD POISONING! Chicken and eggplant w/​brown rice and hot sour soup.
I normally don’t write reviews but just couldn’t let this go by. I had gone here a few times back in 2012 but stopped because they refuse to put less soy sauce in my food when I explicitly ask. Forward to 2015, today I ordered a chicken and eggplant dish with brown rice and the hot sour soup. Ate it around noon and the stomach cramps came around 1pm. Had to leave work to go rest at home. Twisted in bed for about 4 hours and then the diarrhea kicked in. Feeling better now but definitely won’t be coming back.
And the dish today was again very oily and too salty. This is not close to real Chinese food. While Jade garden isn’t much better in terms of quality at least you don’t get food poisoning.

I had one of the specials. Pork chop in hot pepper bean sauce. It was excellent. Nothing fancy place. But happy with my choice.

It’s true what «they» say in that people only review restaurants if the service was really great, or really awful. This review falls into the latter category. I work at CUMC and have patronized this place at least 2x/​wk, since 2012. My experience up until today has been good; sure the customer service when dining in is a bit lacking, but it’s not fine dining. Drink your noodle soup, pay your bill, eat your fortune cookie and bounce. It’s Chinese food in WaHi– the expectation isn’t all that high; however, I do NOT expect to be called a LIAR by the owner.
Its snowing today (¹²⁄₁₀), so I ordered delivery. Food arrived approx 15mins later. Awesome. I met the delivery person in the lobby of my office bldg; the total was $ 7.08 and I gave him $ 8.25. I get back upstairs to put food in my office. I then go wash my hands. Then I go make 2 cups of tea: one pomegranate green, the other citron/​ginger korean tea. Come back to office, shut the door and lock it. GRUB TIME!
Rip open the paper bag and start pulling the goods out: egg drop soup, white rice, napkin, fork, blah. Wait. where is my chicken and broccoli? Oh damn! So I simultaneously open up the soup and dial Empire to tell them they forgot the chix/​brocc. «Sophia» answers and claims to be the owner. I tell her what happened (calmly) & she immediately responds that the driver sent it. I said Nooo… he did not. That’s why I’m calling you. She puts me on hold for a minute or so, comes back and then goes in about how the chef said he cooked the food, and the driver said he delivered it, and it was delivered at 2:20p and I didn’t call her until 3, so clearly I ATE it.
That’s when I got LOUD.
I then told «Sophia» that just because the chef said he cooked it, he’s not the deliveryman, so he has no idea what was sent. Furthermore, the deliveryman doesn’t pack the food (YOU do, bish), but delivers a stapled-​up bag to whatever address is on the receipt. I then gave her the contents of my delivery: rice, soup, a fork, a spoon, a plate, a menu and the receipt. No chix/​broccoli, and could the driver PLEASE come back with it bc I paid for it, as well as his tip.
Then SOPHIA got loud. (kinda, lol) Had the nerve to ask me what size bag the food came in. WHAT??? (I complied lol). «Not too big, not small. It’s brown», I said. She said some thing about calling me back in 5 minutes. I replied: «Yeah ok (pulling on my coat)…me and the cops will be there in 3». And hung up.
Walk (in the snow) to the restaurant. She’s waiting for me at the door. Straight-​faced, as if she’s won the battle. #GirlBye.I’m a Warrior. She proceeds to walk me to the table of Elders (the cook, line cook, deliveryman, etc). Nice to see them enjoying their meal and i have to fight for mine. REAL NICE.
She again starts with the «they all said it went out» business and that’s when i got close (real close) to her face, stuck my pinky finger out for dramatic effect (just like Aunt Wendy taught me), and informed her that I have FAR better things to do than to pull on coat and socks and boots and scarf and gloves to run back to a restaurant that mucked up my delivery. All for $ 5.00 chicken and broccoli??? GTFOH!
Then this FOOL lady commenced to hand me a bag. Of what? You guessed it… chix/​brocc. I almost slapped it from her hand to the floor. Instead, I politely (yet loudly) told her to give me my money back. Then I gave her a 10sec lashing about customer service and NOT calling patrons LIARS. I walked to the register (lol), she followed. She opened it, pulled out a 5 and counted out 3 singles. I left it right there and said «I paid a total of $ 8.25. Your refund is missing a quarter».
She gave it to me, I said thank you (yep, sure did), and walked out. The patron lady standing to pay for her own food grinned at me; I swear she did a small hand-​clap. Needless to say, I won’t be back. Sayonara. 再见. Have a better life, Sophia.

Run down and disgusting food. This place was ok a while back but recently returned for lunch and was grossed out. The «soup» options they serve you during lunch are like jello. Extremely disgusting and is sure to clog your arteries. Place looks dirty and for some reason 75% of the restaurant is taken up by their giant kitchen. Honestly, so much potential with the space. It needs new management/​owner.
Don’t come here. They try to be authentic but it’s worse than fast food Chinese. They stare at you until you pay your bill and rush you out. Hate when places do that. Plus, not personable not friendly. Jello soup? No thanks. Thumbs wayyyy down!

Having eaten at NY for 8 years, I need to give it a fair evaluation: this is probably the best Asian food you can find in Washington Heights area. If you order the right dishes here, it can be one of the best eating experience throughout the entire Manhattan!
I am very picky with food but having eaten here for more than 10 times, I found these dishes are absolutely amazing: (1) pork chop in hot pepper bean sauce (2) Spring lamb hot pot (3) fish fragrant eggplant.
Right now I don’t have the menu with me, I hope to update more in the future about dishes that you should pick and the ones to avoid.