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Categories: Chinese, Japanese, Gluten-Free [Edit]
Neighborhood: Theater DistrictMention Yelp and get 10% off your next bill.
Exp 2/12
57th St-7th Ave (N, Q, R, W)
57th St-6th Ave (F)
59th St-Columbus Circle (1, A, C, B, D)
Mon-Thu. 11:00 a.m. - 11:00 p.m.
Fri-Sat. 11:00 a.m. - 11:30 p.m.
Sun. 12:00 p.m. - 11:00 p.m.
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gluten free chinese food!!! need i say more?!?!
The other lili's has more of a gluten free selection but this place still has a full menu of delicious gluten free items. I work just 4 blocks from this place and order here often. LOVE LOVE LOVE.
GF Shrimp Tempura
GF Sesame Chicken
GF Fried Rice
GF EVERYTHING!!!
Fast, affordable, super yummy, and--most mind-blowingly--GLUTEN-FREE dumplings and massaman curry! I am in love.
I'm giving Lili's 57 a Yay! because of the cold sesame noodles. The portion was large for an appetizer and these noodles had some fantastic heat (especially once I got to the bottom of the dish, later, in my hotel room). The sushi (vegetarian) was good and my sister liked her Boston roll. We were a party of five: another diner loved her plate of steamed, green vegetables (too healthy for me). The service was efficient, helpful with menu questions and quick to refill our water and alcohol beverages.
I think that the owners of Lili's 57 also own Lilli and Loo on the UES. Both restaurants have extensive, gluten-free menus of Chinese food. The food might be better at Lilli and Loo, but I prefer the environment at Lili's 57 (less formal, friendlier service, cozier). At Lili's 57, I've ordered both the tom yum seafood soup and the laska seafood soup. Both were very spicy--too spicy for my taste. But they had ample amounts of seafood and could have been a meal unto themselves (if you weren't that hungry). In addition, the lask seafood soup--setting aside the flaming spices--was bland. The General Tso's chicken was not to my liking--although the chicken was fine, the sauce tasted like ketchup. In contrast, the crispy sesame chicken was good. The sushi is also good and served in large portions. Although I like Lili's 57 and Lilli & Loo, I still think that there is room in this city for another Chinese, gluten-free establishment.
I choose this on seamless purely for the bubble tea, but I was pleasantly surprised by how great the food was.
I had the tofu skin vegetables, which were unique and delicious! It consisted of mushrooms, cabbage, carrots, etc wrapped in very thin tofu skin with sauteed bok choy. yummy!
Cheap fast Chinese offering in the area. Sometimes I'd come here if I feel like something Asian and want to do a fast dinner when I'm in the area (either because I'm attending some performance at NY City Center or at the Carnegie Hall).
Nothing fancy, but they are fast and affordable (as with most Chinese restaurants). Too bad they are far and few here.
I can't believe Lili's hasn't gotten more favorable reviews! This place is the crack of Chinese food. I eat it till I get sick. Then I get sick and eat it some more. Legitimately the best Chinese I've had in NYC north of Chinatown. Let me break it down:
The food is very good, always consistent.
Unlike most Chinese which tastes good, it isn't loaded with nasty shit and the ingredient are of a much higher quality than you will typically find.
They deliver large amounts of food very quickly. Even their damn delivery containers are better than you find at normal Chinese places.
The service is well above par for a Chinese restaurant.
To address some of the complaints I've just read:
Yeah, it's small. But honestly, with rare exception, who the hell goes out to eat Chinese food?? It's something you sit at home and order. Pointing that out is kind of like going to McDonald's and complaining about the decor.
The portions are not "not small". They are huge. I can stuff a shitload of food into my face, but find it not easy whatsoever to get through one main dish at Lili's.
Lili's is NOT expensive. You would have to be earning a salary in a third-world country to say it was. If you want to see expensive Chinese food, check out Chin Chin or Shun Lee, where incidentally the food is pretty half-assed.
It is unlikely the food made you sick. Perhaps it was appendicitis or your friend. (kidding about the friend)
Pretzels?!? Fuck!
i cant give it 5 stars because much like another poster i only order the bubble tea on seamless web. i usually get the strawberry and the apple because they arent made with milk. warning: these two flavors are extremely sweet and you might want to water them down.
the lemongrass lime tea is SUPERB as well. i wish it came with tapioca pearls.
the lunch menu is double the price of any other chinese restaurant's so i never ever get anything off of it.
What is it about the Lili's franchise (and its various name incarnations)? Now, while I didn't have the Chinese food, which probably wasn't that great an idea, I did have the Japanese maki rolls. They do crunch in their rolls, but unfortunately it isn't very good. Too mushy and the crunch is more like mush. Even though I had it for lunch (I work down the street), the food was pretty okay. The one thing they make KILLER there is their Thai iced tea. I usually have a hankering for that thing... TASTY! It IS $3 though, so it is a pricey craving to indulge. Lunch on average is around $9.50 for the 2 roll maki lunch special, which I think is on the higher end of lunch pricing for a mixed Asian restaurant. I'll try the actual Chinese food next time! I promise! :D
EDIT (2007/04/01): I have since had the Chinese food and I actually like it! Very large portions, so you can have this over two days if you want. Stick to the simple end of Chinese fare, like shimp w/ broccoli or garlic sauce, like those.
Since I've never been inside, this review is on the take-out only. As another Yelper said, the veggies are always fresh. I like their bubble tea a lot and you can order direct from their website and type out your persnickety preferences for each item in the "comment" fields or leave them blank. Direct means you can do all this without using Seamless and registration's optional. Tasty duck salad has enough firm veggies to steam later on on your own. Nice sushi, quick delivery, just file their food under "g" for good, okay? One blah dish was the gluten-free beef kalbi. They have lots of gluten-free menu items if that's important to you. Since I've never been inside Lili's 57, I took away a star
I get takeout from here all the time as I work in the office building upstairs. You better have a lot of room in your stomach, because its as if these guys dont know that most people can't shove about 8 serving sizes of noodles into their cupboards much less their stomachs.
Its one of those pan-asian places, the staff is very friendly (although because of the volume they have on occasion messed up my order, missed it, ran out of an item, etc.).
I'm telling you know, if you get the beef chow fun, take the rest of the afternoon off or maybe change into the next pant size up. The girth of the takeout container is ridiculous. I don't even want to think about it right now.
their sushi isn't half bad either, the spicy rolls are quite hot for me so I need liquids to counter that (remember kids, the best way to temper spicy and hot foods that singe your mouth is sugar water or liquids with sugar in it; carbonation aggravates it to some extent, and milk or water has very little effect on the capsasin)
The place is SMALL. I work right upstairs on 57th so we frequent here. We can never really go with more than 3 people because the seating is so freaking tight. I felt that I was going to knock someone over with my big booty when I was slipping into the seat.
The food is decent. Not to die for.
The only awesome thing is ordering here when the weather sucks, since it's so close. Otherwise....you don't have to make this a pit stop when you are at Carnegie hall across the street....you're better off somewhere else.
Just went there for dinner. The setting is not too bad, but nothing to write home about. We had a couple of appetizers. The Classic Egg Roll tasted worse than Jack in the Box's. The Wonton Soup was too salty for our taste. We also had a Cold Sesame Noodles - its sauce was very bland (peanut butter with soy sauce?), not spicy at all and lacks any of the zesty flavors that it's supposed to have. The Crispy Sesame Chicken was pretty good though. The other dishes were about or below average.
Obviously this is a Chinese restaurant, but they have other Asian dishes including Japanese, Thai and Indian (what the ?!) They should concentrate on just one (e.g., Chinese) instead of trying to cover so many different varieties- then maybe they will have a better chance of making everything more consistent and authentic.
The way I feel about Lili's is the way I feel about pretzels.
Clearly, pretzels are not anyone's favorite food - God help you (with your taste buds) if you love them.
They are dry. Even the large soft ones are dry, even if they aren't all brittle and hard.
They have large pieces of salt on them. Wow, great, I suppose salt is magic: it can turn cooked cardboard into edible pieces of consumer goods. People will pay for it!
Put some mustard on a soft pretzel? Fine. But really, there has to be better options than a fucking bland-ass piece of quasi-bread, right?
dish: chow fun
cons: extremely salty and laden with msg.
pros: quick delivery.
consensus: dehydrated. will not be ordering from here again.
One of the better Chinese take-out places in the area. Very cheap, very diverse lunch menu that gives you plenty for your buck. I got the cranberry-teriyaki chicken the other day, which was delicious. The sauce comes separate, so you're food isn't swimming in it. Vegetables always taste fresh and crisp. Ordering online that saves your information makes it super easy to put in your order without taking too much time out of your day.
Definitely get the wonton soup. Great tasting broth with actual hand-rolled wontons. Delicious!
I've only been here for take-out. Ingredients are always fresh and tasty! Sushi is decent, pad thai is just OK, but the pork dumplings and Bangkok rolls are delicious! Great take out spot.
We used to love this place for a fast, inexpensive and generous lunch specials, however, the last time we were there, I got chicken with broccoli which literally had 4 broccolis and maybe like 10 slices of chicken. When I asked the waiter what's up with the smaller portion, she told me that it's lunch special, which to me looked more like recession-special. Not sure whether we would go there again. The food definitely tastes good, but honestly, when you are paying 10 bucks for lunch and getting a nicely sized portion, you feel OK and when you are getting half of what has been expected this stinks
I was faced with quite the conundrum last night, when going home after my dinner at Lili's 57. How do you Yelp about a place you know you won't go back to when you don't have a good enough reason why? And then fate or God or whatever stepped in. So, if you'll indulge me- my night.
(If you want a quick review, then just read Christine J.'s. I'm feeling long-winded.)
I had dinner with a friend there last night. It's one of her favorites, and right by my office, so it seemed like a good bet. And the whole times I was there, there just wasn't enough to win me over, or enough to complain about. That's the problem with middle-of-the-road sushi- you're not getting a good enough deal like you would with cheap sushi, and you're not getting anything out of this world like you would with expensive sushi. It's just kind of there, and you're paying more than you'd like for it. The prices are pretty uneven, too. My tuna avocado was the same price as my friend's Boston roll. I have a huge problem with places that do that. And the place is pretty cramped, but it's a nice enough ambiance, and the servers are friendly and we got our food at lightning speed. Their Thai iced tea looked delicious, and was a big glass, but I'm trying to watch my weight a little better (if one announces it on Yelp, does that mean it will happen?) so I didn't partake. And the food, despite the pricing, was good. Not extraordinary, but fresh, good temperature, and not terribly small.
So how could I validate to myself the fact that I didn't want to go there ever again? It hadn't been bad, but it hadn't been good enough. That still wasn't enough of a reason for me. I needed more. I wondered.
And then a few hours later I got a horrible rash (I know, ew) which I can't quite attribute to the food or the restaurant, of course, but you know when you get sick and no matter how unrelated, you can't eat that food again? Done and done! BUT! For the fates, it wasn't enough. I woke up at two in the morning with the worst piercing stomach I've had on this side of getting my gall bladder removed. I can't say that it's the restaurants fault- it's probably more than likely my new vitamin- but still. Double the pleasure, double the "no, I won't eat there anymore".
I know that my reasons are arbitrary enough, and if you're not cheap/poor like me, then this is good, affordable sushi at a nice place, especially given the neighborhood. But just don't look around the place for me, because I'm not going to go back.
I work close to this restaurant and order delivery from it at least once a week. The food is consistent and the variety is very good..A little Thai, Chinese, Japanese & Sushi. I don't think I've really had a bad experience. Food portions are large and delivery is typically very fast. Not really much more to say, all positive thoughts when I think of this place.
Very disappointing. We ordered Orange Beef, Basil Ginger Shrimp and Chicken (chef's specialty), and Bok Choy with Black Mushrooms for delivery. We thought this had to be better than your average hole in the wall Chinese restaurant with the higher prices and fancy website. We were wrong. All dishes were extremely greasy and flavorless. The Orange Beef was more oily batter than beef, and there was hardly any orange flavor. I found myself scraping the batter off just to find the tiny shred of beef within. The Ginger Basil Shrimp and Chicken only came with 5 shrimp and tasted neither of ginger or basil (unless you actually ate one of the few basil leaves). There were a few decent pieces of chicken, but the rest were small pulverized bits less than 1cm big. The Bok Choy with Black Mushrooms would've been really difficult for them to mess up. It was basically just sauteed in oyster sauce, but this was ridiculously greasy as well, so much so the oyster sauce just slid off the vegetables.
Save your money and avoid this place. You're better off ordering from the hole in the wall Chinese place around your corner.
Neighborhood: Theater District
Category: Japanese
Neighborhood: Theater District
Category: Japanese
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