Fung Lum Express

I’m surprised at the poor reviews.
Fung Lum is a restaurant name from the past and was a well-​loved and local establishment in San Jose. They closed after a long run but there are still people who reminisce about the restaurant.
Truthfully, the state of Bay Area ethnic food including Chinese food has improved leaps and bounds (Tung Kee was considered top notch though I think the original was better than the watered down chains we have now) so Fung Lum isn’t Cooking Papa or Koi Palace.
Still, I think the airport location is perfect. Airport food and concession stands always seem like a throwback in time and prices seem immune to competition (because there is none) so Fung Lum doesn’t do too bad.
The key is to avoid the precooked and buy one plate, choose three entrée items and select a made to order selection. Our order:
Hong Kong style «wet» ho fun noodles with black bean sauce — $ 10. Surprisingly tasty and both the stir fried beef and the bell peppers were fresh and tasty. The ho fun wasn’t overcooked and the sauce really hit the spot. For Bay Area lovers, I’d say it was comparable to Fung Lum Mum (Mountain View) and better than Ming’s (Palo Alto).
Roasted Duck entrée — $ 10. Ignoring the portion for the price, the duck hit the spot too. Flavorful, juicy, and good amounts of meat on each slice. Better than Ranch 99 roast duck (that’s not saying much) but perhaps not as tasty as Marina Foods.
Overall, given the limited SFO selection, Fung Lum hits the spot. Yes, there are way better options out «there» but you’re stuck in the airport and have this or Ebisu. Too bad they don’t have a Shake Shack here like in NYC’s airport.
Fung Lum accepts credit cards including Amex.

My friend just had food poisoning from the orange chicken + fried rice over here, right before her 15hr flight to HK, please beware of this establishment in their health standards.

I think have to be careful about what you order here. Now that Ebisu is closed next door, we tried Fung lum. The steam tray Chinese food definitely didn’t look good so we sampled the won ton soup. We didn’t want the noddles either because oftentimes they get really over cooked.
The wonton did turn out to be a hit. The soup is a little salty (what Chinese food isn’t) but the Bok Choy was fresh and flavorful and the wonton were surprisingly good. Although value is a very relative thing at an airport. The large bowl had about a dozen wonton with a nice shrimp and pork combo.
It’s a quiet spot before you enter the terminal so a decent choice if only for the soup :-)

I’m not a big foody person, I call Velveeta pasta, but even by those standards this was the worst/​fakest food I have had at a restaurant. Plus, $ 24 for a rice plate and dumplings. I felt awful after eating this food. This is the first bad review I have ever written.

Got mongolian beef which wasnt bad, a few tough beef strips but mostly fine with plenty of veggies. The chicken with vegetables has chicken with a weird slightly rubbery texture and strangely subtle sweet taste.

With SFO’s Fung Lum Express as an airport establishment I neither had high expectations (food quality was edible) nor anticipated taking time to review the exceptionally poor service we encountered.
In short do not go unless you: 1) have lots of spare time, and 2) are immune to horrible service.
The lady and girl at the counter took our order with scowls & exasperated sighs (maybe b/​c it was 9am, maybe not). We waited 15min for a few dishes and noticed they’d left something out. My mistake for not double-​checking the receipt, but when I asked where the missing dish was they were unapologetic and impatient when I ordered it again. When I handed the younger girl my signed cc receipt she crumpled and threw it against the wall. When I asked why she did that she snapped, «I gave you three copies, I don’t need them all back» even though I’d only handed her one. (Maybe I won’t be charged then, whew!)
Thought 2^nd time around would be faster since other places usually pick up the pace at their mistake. It took another 10−15min for the one bowl of congee. To avoid having my food openly spat on I kept flustered thoughts to myself (mostly).
While I waited at the counter the girl treated others also with such a sour attitude (asking for extra sauce or adding bubble tea an order was practically asking for her right arm) I half expected a Candid Camera/Punk’d crew to appear. The cash wrap was deep, and like some strange power play with each transaction she placed food trays & change on the far side, leaving confused customers having to awkwardly reach over. When my congee finally came she put it at the far end and left without saying a word.
Their receipts might as well read «F*** You Very Much» at the bottom.

Please avoid like the plague. I’d rather starve than eat here again. They offered rice or noodles with my meat, but I opted for just veggies and an egg roll with bottled water and my total came to almost $ 16 for very small portions of food. When I asked why it was so much, and want this a combo of some sort they said «no, it’s each half a combo so $ 5 each.» Smh, needless to say I removed one ½ entrée. I thought the trauma was done until I buy into the most nasty egg roll imaginable. It tasted like there was gristle in the roll and it was super dry. Yuck! Will never make this mistake again.

If you’re absolutely desperate for food, starving to the point where you are staring at the Grim Reaper near the point of death or just plain stupid — you’ll WANT to eat here.
This was by far the worst Chinese takeout food I’ve ever had in my life! Couple that with the outrageous, overblown, over-​inflated prices you’ll feel like throwing the food back in their faces and burning the place down after eating a plate full of shit for $ 20.
What is up with your orange chicken??? How do you screw up orange chicken? It tasted like fucking medicine.

One of the worst meals I’ve ever eaten, took two bites, one of the hard stale fried rice and one of the greasy tasteless beef and broccoli and then threw it out, what a waste of $ 16!

I eat there all the time. It’s inconsistent. Some times it’s really tasty and low in grease. The next time the same items are bland and very greasy.
If you get it on a good day, it’s 5 star. On a bad day, it’s 2 star.

I ADORE this place and have eaten here 4 times in one month (and many times over the years). It is the highlight of long international travel and pretty much the only reason to fly through SFO. I actually directed a mileage run through SFO specifically so I could have lunch here.
The key items are the dim sum but be sure and ask for the chili oil/​ponzu combo packets at checkout. Mix these together for an amazing dipping sauce.
The banana shrimp dim sum is pure heaven as are the pork dumpling and the shrimp Har gow. My only complaint is that they recently changed the formula for the veggie dumplings (removed the mushroom perhaps?) and they aren’t nearly as good as before.

I have tried their food a couple of times. The quantity sucks. Not good value for money at all. Almost as if they are cheating or trying to fool their customer. Would not recommend this place.

I would not have went there if I know it was rated so low. But the Wonton noodle tastes good, and costs only 9 dollar in an airport.
A four star for it.

The real ass Fung Lum restaurant in Hong Kong (Tai Wai, near Shatin in the New Territories to be exact)
Signature dishes include a mouthwatering taro duck 香酥鴨 where the exterior is like a flakey puff pastry taro dumpling in dim sum, with an incredibly juicy roasty duck, 燒乳鴿 (roast squab) and apparently one of the top two to three preparations all around Hong Kong, pan fried tofu of the highest caliber, amongst a myriad of other classical Cantonese style dishes. And I actually walked right by it during my trip after a hotpot meal… it’s right across the street from the Tai Wai MTR station!
Some years ago, there was a replica Fung Lum that opened in Campbell/​San Jose area. The décor/​exterior tried to mimic the real Fung Lum, and alas they became more of an upscale dumbed down cuisine kind of place, with a baked tapioca pudding that really did save the day (even when they couldn’t even do a wet stir fry beef chow fun to save their life).
And that leaves Fung Lum Express at the airport as the sole survivor of the Clone Wars.
Real ass Fung Lum lives on, as does Fung Lum Express. Except the latter is Chinatown crap with airport prices. People with little cooking and Cantonese chef experience (even for comfort food and dim sum) should NOT be serving this kind of food and charging these kinds of prices, and should not be using famous name restaurants from abroad to justify serving sub par food. Whatever happened to «cooked to order»? Dude, stir fry rice or noodles is all about the wok hay! Steam table food is just steam table hay! Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeyuk.
Maybe someone in Hong Kong should start craptacular eateries called French Laundry Fries, Meadowood Mu Shu, just so that they feel our pain.

Think of Panda Express. Now think of smaller portions, lower quality ingredients, and higher price. And servers who are less friendly. This is Fung Lum Express.
We all expect airport food to be more expensive. I did not expect the beef to be stringy and full of fat, the dishes to have too much oil, the sauces to have very little flavor, and the server to seem annoyed that I was there. I ordered the Mongolian Beef and the Tofu mixed vegetable.
I did not try the Dim Sum, which looked pretty good but was expensive.
It took a lot of «benefit of the doubt» to give this place 2 stars instead of 1. Either way, I will never go there again.

Never in my life have I encountered such rude and stubborn behavior. All I wanted was meat and veggies and was willing to pay twice the price but the server behind the counter (male w glasses) refused unless I took rice and noodles. I made sure that everyone in the line heard my complaint but he continued to refuse to allow me to buy what I wanted so I stormed off in protest. Probably best that I did as I read from other reviews the place serves garbage.

This place is terrible. I don’t even know where to begin. They have a captive audience in the International terminal where a majority of the travelers are Asian and are looking for some thing to be better than the up coming long plane ride and airplane food. They really take advantage of the people and if you had a choice Fum Lum Express not a good option.
They charge $ 12-​$ 15 per plate of garbage, give you attitude while they give it to you and it’s served in the cheapest disposable bowls, plates, and utensils. I know the only way they continue to stay in business is because the other options are not any better and the wary traveler does not have a choice.
The lady cashier there is clearly up for the Unilocal «I hate my job» award and is the front runner. No redeeming value here. Eek! Me Thinks Not Ever Again.

Inedible. Run far away. Worst airport food I’ve ever had. Mad that I have to give it even 1 star.

I trepidatiously asked for udon noodle soup, with roast pork.
A cute cashier gave me a number[1] and instructed me to come back in a few minutes to pick up my bowl. Since I got caught up chatting with a friend[2], a Fung Lum staffer delivered my food to me, unexpectedly — now that’s service!
My udon came in a plastic «to go» bowl with disposable chopsticks. It was a perfectly serviceable soup, with a huge, fatty, tasty piece of pork. For me, the udon did the trick for a late evening[3].
[1] not hers, sadly
[2] we were both on layovers
[3] obviously overpriced, but this IS the airport

Think of it as Panda Express for international travelers.
This was in the food court before the travelers went through security, so everyone was able to have a bite to eat before the farewells were done. The travelers met us with dishes they had picked up at other restaurants, and we all ate in a booth in the center of the room.
I had the orange chicken (which was mostly bread dough), the Mongolian beef (which seemed to have peanut sauce on it, although the peppers were hot enough), fried noodles, and a diet Coke. I know diet Coke doesn’t sound right; it’s an acquired taste.
My Lady chose teriyaki chicken, fried rice, and bottled water. She was much more sensible than I.
Together, we paid about $ 26 for the meal. Later, I discovered a diet Coke all by itself was $ 2.17. Another dollar gave us the treat of five fortune cookies, which included such brilliant insights as «You are going on a long journey soon.»
— — — — —
Heads up: the Federal Open Market Committee believes we MIGHT experience inflation some time in the near future. I guess they haven’t had dinner in the International Terminal yet.