Ocean Star

Last night in Seattle. Wanted to have some real Chinese food before going home. First off, lost half our order. Asked the waiters 3 times, blank look. Final they delivered the two appetizers after the meal. Would like to say they were busy but 7 waiters and one manager with only 6 tables with people. Maybe it’s because one take out customer is trying to order lobster and it’s taking 5 waiters to figure it out. Chinese fire drill. Hate to stereotype because I’m Chinese, but this place is your typical bad Chinese restaurant with bad service.

Came in for early morning dim sum and experienced very unprofessional customer service. I had to wait a few minutes just get the table when there was no other customers. I actually had to walk to the waitress to tell her that I needed a table. She did not say a word and pointed one of tables… It took 6 mintutes just to let them know that I needed some dim sum… A lady looked like owner’s family member did not even pay any attention basically showed «Don’t care attitudes». I almost wanted leave and finally the waitress came and served me some dim sum. I would not come back and never would bring my family and friends anymore. Very disappointed.

Formerly known as Sun Ya, this restaurant has been around for a long time in Chinatown (perhaps 30 years).
This restaurant is huge so the wait time is always minimal. I have been to Jade Garden a number of times and still don’t understand why people would wait hours for it. So each time if I want dim sum, this is my go to option. I always try to come here a little before 11 AM to avoid long waiting time.
They have a huge (free?) parking lot in the front but they get full very quickly. So come early, say before 10:30 AM to claim a spot.
They serve dim sum during dinner time too, but no food carts rolling around. You pick from a picture menu. Credit card accepted.
Service can be hit or miss. Granted, most Chinese restaurants in Seattle share similar service attitude so it should not be a surprise to you.

Everything is saturated with sesame oil. It was hard to eat. Served most dim sum in 4s, bad luck. I was hoping for something to cut the oil but dish after dish reeked of old cooking oil.
The service was a amazing, the host was super attentive I just wish the food lived up to the hype. I hope this review was helpful for a better experience next time.

So this place used to be Sun Ya. It was an institution. As I understand it, there is a new owner, but the staff is basically the same, and very little changed inside. They cleaned it up a bit, but it’s mostly the same. That said, I’m writing a review for Ocean Star, not Sun Ya.
I recently went they with some family from out of town. I wasn’t expecting to be wowed, but that’s what happened!
We had roast chicken, pea vines, egg drop soup, two different claypot dishes, a whole steamed fish, and probably a couple of other items I’m forgetting, given how we order. Every dish was out standing. Everything was fresh and cooked exactly right. I was blown away and pleasantly shocked.
Now, there was a big private party in part of the restaurant, so maybe they had their A+ game on that night, and other times it won’t be as good. Who cares?! Plenty of bad reviews are given based on just one experience that might have been a fluke, so why not a great review? They earned it for what it’s worth.
I will definitely be going back to see if lightning will strike twice.

This place was delicious for dim sum. We came with visitors from out of time and we were all delighted with the service, the food, and the atmosphere. The dim sum was delicious, was not too oily like other places I’ve been, and the dumplings were on point! Definitely recommend this place.

Similar to Sun Ya, but fairly renovated. Go for dim sum instead of a late dinner. We went on a weeknight & was able to get parking in their lot. I like that you could order the smaller dim sum size of Chinese Broccoli rather than the large for dinner, because we hardly ever finish the large. Skip the honey walnut shrimp, too much mayo. The sticky rice in lotus leaf is still good. Peking duck is lean & served with moo shu buns.

DO NOT GO HERE; A KITCHEN WORKER WAS ABUSED.
A relative of mine works at this restaurant and supposedly tonight (1÷31÷16), the owner’s wife SLAPPED another kitchen worker, who was hungry and stole a bao (Chinese steamed bun) to eat, across the face. While stealing isn’t right, slapping your employee is NOT right either. It is illegal.
Unfortunately, this worker does not speak English and is afraid to go to the authorities (or she does not know how). I am personally boycotting this restaurant as such behavior from management cannot be tolerated. There are far better ways to deal with an employee who steals from your business, i.e.
1. Warning and deduct cost of food item from wages
2. Termination if this has occurred before
But NEVER to slap someone across the face, for crying out loud.
I WILL be reporting this incident to the Washington State Department of Labor tomorrow during business hours; who knows what other abuse the workers are receiving.

I don’t know why this play got 3 stars. It’s much better Dimsum than in LA. It even comes in like these little wooden containers (Everything is Metal in Los Angeles) But why is it better? All the carts are heated! thats right there’s like intense flames under each cart! Nothing got stuck to the containers (Very Common Here) parking kind of sucks (Double Parking) but its free compared to Metered Parking!
It’s more pricier than Dim Sum in LA but portions are bigger!
I would gladly go here again for Dim Sum.
Insert Random Rant about Seattle. Minimum Wage is already 13, and set for 15 dollars next year. I hope this gets rid of tipping!.

Service for dim sum was terrible at Ocean Star, at the site of the old Sun Ya Restaurant. I’m with a dim sum club that meets monthly for dim sum at dim sum places in Seattle. Out of the last 10 places we have eaten, Ocean Star ranks in as ¹⁄₁₀ for the worst service. Our large group of 15 or so was ignored for the first 15 minutes after we were seated. The dim sum cart came by once only so not all the dishes were hot and fresh by the time we ate them. At most dim sum places someone will come to take the used plates with leftover wrappings and napkins. This place did not. Even though the lunch rush was over and servers were free, they had no interest in coming near our table to see if we needed anything.
Our table was tightly packed, even though we called ahead to reserve for our large group. So when the dirty plates stacked up as people finished, it really looked unappetizing. I moved the big piles of dirty napkins to an empty table so people who stayed later could talk without looking at the mess. No one came by with the dim sum cart again or to offer us more tea when our single tea pot was empty. With over 15 people I would think they would leave a couple pots with us and show some interest in customer service. I will vote against our dim sum club coming here again.
From the pile of crabs in the tank in the front, I know they would be fresh. I would never come here again. I am a very generous reviewer, as you can see from my many 4 – 5 star reviews. I would not give a 1 star review lightly.

Came here for dimsum on a weekday with my family. The dimsum was good, but the service was kind of spotty. They didn’t come around with the carts as often as at some other dimsum places and their food selection during the weekdays seemed a little limited. But everything we ordered was very good. And they have their own parking lot! :)

I’d actually give it a 3.5
Came in with my family for my little sister’s birthday. It was a Thursday night and pretty busy in the restaurant. It’s a very large space so we got seated quickly. Server put down 4 menus for our group of 10.
We initially wanted to order the family combo dinner but we didn’t realize that the price was per person rather than a set price. Instead we got a few dim sum dishes, Peking duck, Mongolian beef and sautéed green beans. Dim sum was decent. Peking duck was moist and the skin was crispy. Mongolian beef was salty but okay with white rice. And the green beans were perfect, still slightly crunchy! At the end I also ordered salt and pepper chicken wings to go, and they got it out very quickly. They were good too!
Servers were busy but attentive enough to check on our tea and beers. We did have to wait a bit for ice water and our check though.

The dim sum is fantastic! Fresh, steamed just right. It is busy, crowded but worth it.

I haven’t been here in a long time since they were still Sun Ya and now they have changed ownership to Ocean Star. The restaurant as I remembered it awhile a go was old looking and definitely needed a remodel. This time around they have done a decent job of upgrading the place with a new paint job and having all new furniture plus adding white table clothes which always enhances everything.
The food on the other hand was only ok as the portion sizes here a not very large and with the 9 of us for our table, we were able to finish mostly all our dishes with not much leftover. The pea vine vegetable we ordered barely had enough for each person to have a serving and was not very worth it compared to the broccoli dish we had. We also ordered two king crabs cooked in two ways. The first being the black bean with chillies which wasn’t bad and second we had it cooked with garlic. The king crab sizes weren’t very large for either crab and we were able to finish off two of them amazingly. We also had honey garlic shrimp which again came in a small portion with me only getting one piece out of the whole dish. The other items we tried were the black bean spareribs which definitely tasted like dim sum style except in a bigger serving and the pork belly with preserved vegetables which was one of the tastier menu items.
Service here was good as our bone plates were changed out since we ate quite a bit of crab and they were pretty quick in serving our meal once we put in our order. A big plus here is that they have their own parking lot which can save you time and money from parking on the street, but was totally full when we arrived. They also have a couple big screen TV’s which can keep you entertained as you dine and can best be seen sitting near the back of the restaurant.
Not too bad for my first time here with the change of owners plus they also have dim sum served here which I will one day have to come and try to give my final verdict.

Worst service ever. Waiter was rude all the way through out the dinner. Was pretty empty, but the eaitors did not ask how we are doing, and did not even come to my table to get order. Waiter mabe had a bad day … I do not know, but Waiter’s face was angry and was really unprofessional.

It’s my first Cantonese meal in Seattle. It’s a warm experience. Special Thanks to Derek/​David, he’s very nice. Since I caught a cold and Derek suggested to try some traditional Chinese herbal soup with ginseng. It’s not in the menu but it’s worthy for a try.

We went there thinking It was Sun Ya, but it had changed under new ownership to Ocean Star, their lunch specials were way over priced and when I payed it was way more then the bill, I conversed with the owner about this, but there seemed to be something lost in translation. Seemed a bit shady. So I went be ever going there again.

BEST dimsum! I see old cantonese people there, I think it shows how authentic it is.

They have their own parking! Customer service here is iffy. They will probably treat you better if you speak Mandarin/​Cantonese.
Fresh seafood. Not great quantity. Good quality. Clean bathrooms. Carpet floor looks nice but there’s a bunch of garbage laying around. Big space. Small crowd.

The nice part about this place is that they have a bar that opens fairly open on game day with two TVs so you can watch the earlier games before the Seahawks play. The bar gets really busy so come early. They serve the same food as they would outside but no carts go into the bar.
Service is spotty but what can you expect? It’s still a bar.
They’ve since renovated the whole place after changing the name/​management? from Sun Ya. The bathrooms are cleaner and overall atmosphere feels a bit better. The food is decent. I’d skip their congee, very very plain and flavorless even with the shredded pork. Other items like shrimp balls, siu mai, sticky rice, pork buns were all pretty good.

Came here for dim sum and left with a happy stomach. My only other visit was when this place used to be Sun Ya, and in all honesty, I didn’t notice a big difference. I see a lot of reviews here just slamming this place, but coming here on a football Sunday… Well, it was packed with Seahawks fans who seemed to be enjoying their late breakfast before the game.
Overall, I had a good time and got food in front of me extremely quickly. Didn’t order anything out of the ordinary, so the bill was really manageable. I will admit that the parking here is pretty absurd, but the guy out front directing things did a good job of making sure we got in and out.

I came here for dim sum on a Saturday afternoon. There wasn’t much of a wait and the place was pretty busy. The food was good and the service was good. There would always be carts passing by filled with food, so wait time on food is pretty fast. I like this place cause of the variety of foods in the carts, they even had honey walnut prawns up for grabs. I definitely recommend getting the sticky rice, its probably my favorite dim sum item next to shumai. Overall this is a pretty solid dim sum restaurant, I will definitely be returning!

Combo appetizer — pork, crispy duck, and jelly fish. So good!!!
Shrimp and snow peas
Braised crab in ginger and green onions
And sweet fried rice w Chinese sausage.
It was delicious.

Awful experience here. Found a huge piece of glass in my food and the owner accused me of putting it there instead of owning up to a HUGE mistake on their part.
I am not struggling financially. I do not need to plant glass in my food to get a free meal. It’s just dim sum. Chinese food doesn’t really break bank. Why I would be accused is shocking.
Failing to admit fault and rectify the situation leads me to believe there is gross negligence in this establishment. Please, if you decide to dine here, cut open each dumpling before you eat it.

I was there with Bernice — the other reviewer — when we found the glass and her husband’s meal. Before leaving we wanted to speak with the owner to understand how it could happen. It’s really unfortunate that for many years I’ve been going to this restaurant, and we were pretty much shouted off the front porch, accused of lying and putting a 1″ triangle of glass in a shrimp dumpling ourselves.
One of the owners (the wife) actually started taking pictures of us saying that she’ll never forget our faces as we left the restaurant. It got uglier than that. They comped our meal, and no we didn’t leave a tip.

The food was very delicious. I gave 1 star because we found a good 1 inch chunk piece of glass in one of the steamed shrimp dumpling. We have children with us and the good part was that no one was injured.
However, I just want to warn people to be careful biting into the food. Take extra precaution please.
Also, the manager decided to give us the shrimp meal for free and as we kept complaining, she decided to give the entire table free of charge. We decided to continue to eat the other foods and order a Mango Pudding to at least make-​up for the horrible experience we just had.
Next thing we know, the manager yelled at us and called us liars because we «continued to eat our food and laughed/​smiled/​tried to have a good time» as we continue to our lunch. The sad part is that she accused us then of putting the glass in the food because we chose to enjoy the meal despite of that large glass. We were trying to have a less traumatic day and enjoy the rest of our vacation here in Seattle.
And because of that horrible customer service, and accusations that was thrown at us by the manager, I do not recommend this place. I am sure you can find other Chinese dimsum’s around that care about their customer’s well being. Especially with KIDS.

This place has fresh seafood tanks and its own parking lot right in front.
My husband says he is the only Caucasian guy in the restaurant, which is a good sign of authentic Cantonese cuisine. By the time we finished our meal, other non-​Asians arrived for dinner.
The Pea Vines in Garlic sauce is a must have, buoyant and fresh, they are «Melt in Your Mouth» tender.
I love the Braised Sharkfin Soup with fresh crab claw meat lurking in the tendrils of abundant shark fins.
Prawns with Snow Peas with Fresh sliced Ginger was perfectly balanced, and very Cantonese, which highlights the freshness of the cuisine.