Swan Garden

OWNERS ARE VIOLENT AND DANGEROUS!!!
I pulled in the back parking lot after ordering takeout and had the owner run out and rush the car, yelling because he assumed we were going to New Seasons. I got out of the car and tried to explain we ordered food but he was screaming and trying to fight me, throwing his fists in the air asking if I want to fight!
I just
called the cops and left.
Not a safe establishment for anyone only other customers are drunks and gamblers
We were trying to get food but ended up being treated like criminals

Should be shit down for terrible service and food poisoning! Also three employees came out to yell at me for parking in the parking lot when I was planning on getting wine at new seasons (across the street) and then picking up my order. I wish I would have cancelled everything from this disgusting establishment.

Don’t eat the chicken. Have been dealing with food poising for the past 24 hours. I contacted the restaurant and no one will help.

I love this place. Great food. I’ve been going to Swan Garden for as long as I can remember. I have never had a bad meal. Needs updating but other than that the food is great.

My husband and I have been here twice. It’s nasty. It reminds me of being in the grade school cafeteria and getting a scoop of the ‘chinese surprise’ for lunch. Nothing looks fresh and its a sloppy saucy mess. We ordered the chicken chow mein and mongolian beef. Both were puddles of salty goop. The ambiance is lacking with its 70s era décor and table tent advertisements for ‘year of the dragon — 2010.’ Hello, its 2013. My favorite Chinese right now is Republic Café in China Town.

Karaōke tus&fri. Nights! I live a block away & love that its dead! I get fresh food &stiff drinks! Nice local dive. Good people!

They lack the knowing, reveling-​in-​their-​own-​swinish-​tackiness, ala’ Wishing Well or even Lung Fung. They have been in business a very respectable 30 + years now there on N. Interstate, although to all appearances, the bar lounge and video poker, etc, is how they pay the rent.
The menu offers much of the same staples you can find at pretty much any Chinese place the entire world over — - the chow mein and sweet sour ribs/​soups and curry chicken and wontons and fried rice. They have no salt and pepper squid or shrimp, sadly enough, and the shrimp fried rice offered middle-​sized, quite fresh and juicy rice. This was the best American-​Chinese shrimp-​fried-​rice I’ve had in a while, and I’ve been actively on the lookout lately. Most of it was NOT good
The lackluster menu and complete lack of effort w/​décor is what loses The Swan Garden a couple stars. Neither the menu nor the décor look like they have had any modifications or brushing ups. It’s far from clear that anyone has even SAT in the one of the boxy, pleathered booths since 1981, as the last few times I’ve been by, all the customers were in the lounge and/​or video poker parlor. However, the staff was friendly and patiently gave thorough answers to any and all questions. Here’s hoping they’re able to keep it up for another 30+ years…

Well I can’t say I like the food or the ambiance.
I don’t enjoy giving a place one star.
But the owners are very nice people.
It’s up to you to keep this place alive, (but mainly video lottery)
buy a drink from the full bar
play a game of pool
socialize with the indigenous people
maybe even order a swan special
support your local chinese dive hole…
because if you don’t this place will become an overpriced vintage store
and you will say, «wow, I lived here for 11 years and never even gave it a chance.»
and that is the yuppification process of a neighborhood in a nutshell.

I just threw my entire dinner from this place away, and will never, ever be back.
I ordered the dinner #8 which consisted of Mar Far Chicken, Shrimp Fried Rice and Chicken Subgum Chow Mein and Egg Roll. Two seconds after biting into the Mar Far Chicken, I instantly regretted it. The coating on the chicken was completely soggy, and the oil tasted old and burned. The chicken inside was grey, tough and stringy. I spit that in the garbage and shrugged, maybe they forgot to change the oil, stuff happens right?
I decided to pass on the Egg Roll, since that too was fried.
So, I opened up the Subgum,. The vegetables were limp, over cooked and when I took a bite, had the after taste of a musty basement.
The Shrimp Fried Rice had nice large whole shrimp in it, which would have been nice, had the rice not had the taste of burnt oil, basement and too many bean sprouts for my liking.
I really feel like bagging the whole thing up, taking it back and telling them how awful it is.
tl;dr: Stale, stale oil, tasted like a basement, sopping with grease. Will not be back.

The food here isn’t great by any means but you get a large portion for what you pay. The drinks may not be overly strong unless your a regular but they are cheaper than any place around. Also, the pool table is a dollar a game but its a newer table and much better than any in the area.

This place was horrible! We went in to order take out. I am a huge fan of fried shrimp, and theirs was soggy, and everything fried tasted like 3 month old oil. I will never eat here again, and unless you like stale oil, you shouldn’t either.

Just went there and got some take-​out, the food was okay. I’m not a Chinese Food Expert but I ordered Shrimp Chow Mein and they gave me shrimp with bean sprouts and a bag of what looked like fried noodle sticks, when my sister, who was visiting saw this, she said it was wrong. We went back and asked her for what we ordered and she said that is what we ordered. We explained that in all of our years of eating Shrimp Chow Mein we had never seen it with just shrimp and bean sprouts. She wouldn’t let us order something else saying that it was not like a dress we could return, funny. Big fat zero in customer service. She got to keep the 8 bucks she charged for the dish, but she lost my repeat business.

I live nearby and have gotten the take-​out a few times. Last time was probably the last time. The food is pretty average for Chinese food, I’ve definitely had better, and probably haven’t had much worse. Whatever you do, do NOT order the sweet and sour soup as it will make you want to NEVER EVER eat here again. It looked so gross I was afraid to try it. My husband had about 3 spoonfuls and couldn’t bring himself to eat anymore. We might eat here again if we had a sudden overwhelming and immediate desire for Chinese food and were utterly desperate, but will probably just find somewhere else not too far away.

I dropped into this place a few nights ago, because it was on my hit list now that it was non-​smoking. It was a Saturday night, the place was dead except for this really drunk girl. I couldn’t help but overhear her conversation with the bartender. She was asked if she’s got a job and she said yeah she’s a laborer then did this pantomime of rowing a boat like she was a slave in a ship’s galley and that she wasn’t some office person, then she acted like she was talking and giggling on a phone — then she settled up and staggered out. My vodka-​tonic was good, didn’t seem too weak, but at $ 3 it was cheap so it was fine. There’s a pool table, but other than that not much going on.

The original part of this place is a tiny little restaurant that looks as though time started and stopped in 1977, especially for the pleather banquettes and the string art lamps.
The food is fine. This won’t be the best Chinese you’ve had in the city but its not the worst and it seems very clean and the staff — though small — is friendly. While we ate the front door opened and closed again and again with locals picking up take-​out; for this part of North Portland, there’s not much else for Chinese.
So I’ll give it three stars for all that. If you live in the neighborhood and don’t want to blow your carbon-​footprint for the week by driving over to Thien Hong on Sandy for the really good stuff, then Swan Garden is the place for you.