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The Congee
Rating Details »
- Price Range:
-
$
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- No
- Parking:
- Private Lot
- Attire:
- Casual
- Good for Groups:
- No
- Good for Kids:
- No
- Takes Reservations:
- No
- Take-out:
- Yes
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- No
- Outdoor Seating:
- No
- Good for:
- Dinner
- Alcohol:
- None
19 reviews for The Congee
After having lunch here, I walked out with this jarring headache and drowsiness that made me feel rather miserable. Upon considering what type of food eaten, and comparing the symptoms to other similar occasions, I came to the realization that what I just ate had an ungodly amount of...
monosodium glutamate.
The seafood jook (congee) was okay, though it wasn't anything special. The wonton noodle soup definitely had some MSG in the broth. While the wontons were oversized, this was definitely another case of having quantity over quality. Other than the broth, I guess the wonton noodle soup was passable.
Probably the food with the most amount of MSG was the fried chicken wings. Yeah, it's fried and savory, but the trade-off is that you end up getting really thristy, among the other things that MSG can do for you.
The service? Eh, for a place like this, my standards were low to begin with. The semi-brusque attentiveness of the wait staff didn't really bother me too much.
You can definitely do much better than this joint.
After a weekend where I gorged on really heavy duty stuff (hot pot on fri and korean bbq on sat), I was ready for some detoxification via congee on Sunday.
I came to this place under recommendation. While I found the congee to be tasty, the price was too much. I also had the fried chicken wings and that was super tasty also.
I only gave this place 3 stars because the service was really, really bad. For starters, my waitress forgot a second order for congee that I had originally ordered. Then it took her a while to get me the check. She also didn't pick up finished dishes that I purposely pushed to the edge of the table. I also noticed that many other patrons had to flag her down many times to get service. For such a tiny place such as this, patrons shouldn't have to flag down the waitress for service so often!
Overall, I'm not sure if I'd come back here considering I'm sure I can find good congee and better service for considerably a lot less than $5-6 a bowl.
I ordered the "fish fillet" with cilantro lo mein while my buddy ordered the wonton and beef stew lo mein (doesn't look like it's actually on the menu).
First off, "fish fillet" should mean a fillet of fish. Apparently, it doesn't. It means a fish ball. Second, "with cilantro" should mean that there's cilantro somewhere in the dish. I don't think it means that either. I could find no cilantro. If it was there, I neither saw nor tasted it. They did, however, have one thing in there that wasn't part of name. Grease. Lots of it.
As to the wonton and beef stew (which I got a piece of each on an exchange program). The wonton wasn't too shabby. Solid pieces of shrimp in a decently made cantonese-style wonton. The beef tasted ok but it was about as tender as lovemaking with a paddle and a whip.
I wouldn't choose to go back, but you might be able to coerce me once in a while.
A no frill / minimal service place where you can get cheap eats. They do have yummy jumbo wonton shrimp which are delicious! Reminds me of the hustling and bustling streets of Hong Kong without all those noise in this restaurant.
Upgraded to 3.5 stars. Mostly for their house made fish balls. They were really good, great flavor, very light and fluffy. The fish ball soup came with thin sliced fun in a light broth--delicious.
But note to self: their wontons have gotten really big, which is a very bad thing. They're so large, one wonton is like the size of 2.5 regular ones. Wontons should be small and bite size. And they put in big pieces of shrimp, but at least now there's more pork in it. The noodles are almost perfectly cooked, and the broth is good.
Service was excellent. Plus the place is clean and bright.
1 Previous Review: Show all »
-
10/18/2008
I disagree with the prior reviews. This may not be the best ever, but what I had was good. The… Read more »
We ordered the Chicken/Abalone Congee ($6), Fish Ball Noodle Soup ($6) and the WonTon Noodle Soup ($5.50?)
The noodles themselves are good. It's a really thin, chewy yellow noodle that I dig.
However, everything else is meh. The Congee had bits of bone in it, and was really salty. I've never liked that type of Fish Ball where it has a ton of that orange rind flavor and this place makes it with extra of that. The wontons themselves are HUGE, and has a ton of shrimp in it but the flavor was just OK. The broth was also really salty too.
The only things I liked was just the noodles, and the green veggies. I saw some people order it dry style, which could be good I guess but for that price, I can get better elsewhere in MP.
Ironically, I don't think they're congee is as good as you'd expect. I mean they named the place after the dish so you'd think it'd be the best congee you'd ever had. I've had some that I think are better at various yum cha places. Nonetheless, congee is just one of those comfort foods that you eat when you're sick, cold or just want some simple good carbs.
However, their fish cakes are really tender, flavorful and juicy. And the restaurant is convenient. Thus, its a good place to go if you want a simple chinese canto breakfast or simple noodle dinner.
SIde note: I had their ou lahm houh fun: beef noodle soup and thought they were perfectly acceptable but have had better elsewhere.
Grand opening weekend:
The Congee replaced the much loved WonTon Time: http://www.yelp.com/bi... . Being smart businessmen the operators are, a basic won ton mien is also inclu...
Waitamin, let just get to the point and skip the didactic mumbo jumbo.
I never liked Wonton Time and this "The Congee" joint is no better. $5.50 for a bowl of $.25 greasy oily noodles in a very prosaic, ie, bland, chicken stock with 4 overcooked wontons each containing 1 large shrimp apparently fed growth hornomes? One must season the entire mess with vinegar, hot chili oil and mad amounts of white pepper just to induce any sense of flavor out of this bowl. And yes, for $5.50, you get 1 stalk of Chinese broccoli. Ugh!!!
But what about the namesake? Them bowls of steamy congee? Again, I don't get it. $5 for a bowl of boiled rice soaked with MSG, speckled with a few slices of scallions and shards of low quality beef? C'mon. These are the 2 dishes that drew the hoards of Cantonese peeps in on the opening weekend?
Don't believe this place is the lowest of all common denominators in the world of SGV noodle shops? The beef balls and fish balls, used in a third of all menu items, are straight from frozen packs, akin to anything you can buy from Ranch 99. The only thing of interest is the tofu-life silky "fish paste in Special Sauce". And that's at a mind boggling $5.50 for 8 small squares of fish protein doushed in, again, an MSG-laden sauce. It's special, but not $.70 per piece special.
I hope Steven(?) and Amy(?), the owners, well. Unfortunately, you won't find me battling this crowd ever again.
I am a fan of traditional wonton noodle soup, and I could say they have the right idea and the basic formula for a traditional wonton soup but have not perfected it. This place is crowded for a reason, not because the place is small and can hold limited amount of people. It is because it has a traditional taste of Cantonese wonton soup, not a perfect taste but enough to bring back old memories from those excellent wonton soup taste in Hong Kong. I try most of their dishes on their small menu and found only the "Wonton Rice Noodle Soup" is worth to go back for.
The major difference is the rice noodle. They use the narrow kind of rice noodle instead of the wide one. The vendor they choose to purchase the rice noodle from has good quality, chewy and not easily broken when you lift them up with your chopstick. This kind of rice noodle is available in most popular Chinese supermarket, and I am surprise their selection of rice noodle is smarter than a lot other restaurants.
The Wonton itself is above average and they need to spend more effort in finding the right spices to marinate the pork and work on their shrimp and pork proportion inside the wonton as too much pork or too big of a shrimp could ruin the outcome of the wonton taste.
Regarding their regular egg noodle, I don't see any difference than other average wonton noodle restaurant since there is no egg noodle factory in the US can produce high quality egg noodle that can compare with Canada and HK, and I don't blame them for it. However, I really don't like their Lo Mein since their plate is too small and I don't see how I can mix the noodle without dropping and wasted some of it on the table. The beef stew sauce has a lot of room for improvement and I find it not even close to traditional Cantonese style beef stew. Their Fish Paste is ok since the right kind of fish to make fish paste is not available in the US and the taste of their fish paste is acceptable under limited resources and fish meat selection in the US. Don't bother to try their fish ball since they use common frozen fish ball from supermarket.
I would only recommend their egg noodle soup and rice noodle soup dishes.
Wow, Tony beats me to it!
You know you are in a Hong Kong restaurant when everyone call you by "nan jai" or "nan nui" - "pretty boy" or "pretty girl" in Cantonese. I have to say, I was VERY disappointed with this place. Tony pretty much sums up how I feel about this place. Price, over priced not worth it. The food are okay but nothing big to rave about. Service and order are HIGHLY UNORGANIZED. They definitely need to step it up, seriously.
Came here for lunch, very unorganized with the wait time. We have to wait for them to get our order, wait for our food, and wait for them to get our check. Few things I observed today: The waiters are newbies and untrained, especially this guy just stood there and walk around not knowing what to do most of the time, the young girl waitress, she seems VERY busy yet she missed us many times even when we called her. Also, they apologized a lot to different customers - yes, they make a lot of mistakes with wait time and among other things. The guy seated next to us paid $10 bucks for his order and they returned $1.00 something to him while he was suppose to get $3.00 something back. Again, they apologized and fixed it for him. Overall, I see a lot of unhappy faces and complains through my lunch experience here.
Since it is grand opening, I am being reasonable and nice and will leave it with 2 stars. Overall, THEY NEED TO STEP IT UP otherwise, they won't last a month.
Howzit!?
Despite all the 2 star Yelp reviews on this Won Ton Time replacement joint, I give it a rare 4 star rating.
Perhaps they have improved their food since grand opening in October. The 2 dining experiences I have had were quite good. Yes, it is a bit more expensive than other places. But the 2 notable dishes are worth the extra quarters.
Won Tons are a bit larger than the previous WTT version in different shapes. Quite flavorful in tasty broth garnish with fresh chives not green onions. 1st class Won Tons almost always serve in a broth made with shrimp shells and fish bones and garnish with fresh chives.
Look Fun is sliced in perfect width to show off its smoothness.
Fresh Fishcake Congee has a hint of sweetness which all good congee should have.
Friendly staff.
Notable dishes: Won Ton look fun. Fresh Fishcake Congee.
We went here for lunch on a weekend and wanted to try their "congee" hence that's their NAME. I ordered the highest price "seafood congee" in their menu ($6.50) thinking you can't go wrong with a dish that has their NAME on it. Now that's pretty OVER PRICED, and when it arrived it SUCKED!!! The congee was plain and the seafood but little or none. a few fish paste chucks that are the size of a cheetoes, the shrimp was the tiniest you can buy from the market, like a size of a dime. there were some frozen flat squids that tasted like rubber. Also, they ran out of twisted cruellers during their busy hour for lunch. How can you call your business "THE CONGEE" without a decent congee and no twisted cruellers.
OVERALL : OVER PRICED, BAD FOOD, ...SERVICE IS OKAY.
This place is not gonna last if it continues like this.
also, what was funny was this mom at the next table ordered a beef and fish ball combo noodle and had to return it, because she thought the fish balls were suppose to be like the old "WonTon Time" fresh made fish balls. They were frozen fish balls. That lmom should of knew that this place is a grand opening and "wonton time" no longer exists.
Overpriced with small portions. The food was okay I actually dropped by to try won ton time....but I guess I was too late =(
Food: 2
Service: 3
Environment: 2
Price: 2
I prefer the old Won Ton Time. The "famous" congee here has nothing special. I think the demise of Won Ton Time was that they were charging too cheap for their great wonton. I really don't mind paying more for good food, but not for mediocre stuff, like the ones here. Especially with hot soup pouring down the back of my son's neck. What they offered was immediate drying with napkin and a free soda! What the heck!!
I think the secret to this place is you have to order the beef stew noodles, and add wontons or whatever you like. I ordered beef stew and wonton noodle soup. The broth is darker and more flavorful then regular wonton soup. Make sure to specify how much tendon you want if any with your beef stew, or you will get lots of tendon. Bowl came out to $7, not too bad although more noodles and a bigger bowl would have been nice. Wontons are just like old Wonton Time. The chili oil is not as good as old place but still does the job. Beef stew just as good as har lam kee in monterey park. Will be back for just the beef stew noodles.
$5- $6 for a bowl of congee - quite pricy in Asia-town standards. And the taste is not all that....
I miss WonTon time....at least you had the $3.95 wonton mein with hormone fed plump and juicy shrimps. Now, it tastes worse and almost nears $6 a pop..... Bring WonTon Time back......
why did they close anyways?
Wow, what happened to Wonton Time? We here here after a long Halloween night, craving some nice big juicy shrimp wonton. When we walked in, we noticed something was different, the decor has changed, the servers have changed, and most importantly the menu. They had other stuff on the menu, like congee and appetizers. I don't know what happened to Wonton Time, maybe they sold their souls, maybe they decided that selling wonton soup is not proftiable, but whatever it is, I miss it. Now we have "The Congee", just the name makes me want to gag. The food is way overpriced, bland, and small portioned. Not worth it. Don't try to jack us with your 6 dollar bowl of boiled white rice. I can make that shit at home.
I have to give this place a four star for the deal you get here!! It is super cheap...I don't know if this is common in the San Gabriel Valley, but in the SFV, this is a freaken Grrreat deal! $4.50 for porridge?? $23 for four servings with decent sizes....I mean, wow, you can't beat this. Especially in this questionable economy where everyone is watching their wallet?! I was surprisingly pleased with the food... I ordered the salty wings and preserved egg porridge and was happy with what I got. Oh, and the waiters were decent. They were eager to serve and get us in and out. Love it! Yeah, I'm a fan!
im sad that this replaced wonton time cuz i liked it - this is ok but everything congee cant replaced big juicy wontons & fish dumplings noodles! they didn't have chinese donut for the congee to dip in how disappointing when i came to have bkfst this 1 time & the chicken abalone congee not alot of abalone flavor in there but i guess over it i give it an average C
