幸福茶记

Tried this new Hong Kong style cafe and was really impressed. I especially liked their char siu pork belly and oxtail curry 💯

Food was amazing! I loved the baked chicken with rice and spaghetti and the pineapple buns were soft and sweet. The atmosphere inside was very welcoming and the staff were all friendly and attentive.

When I heard about a new Hong Kong-style restaurant, I had to try it. This is a tough business because in Chinatown, there are plenty of options to choose from. I came in for dinner and we ordered the chow mein, seafood baked pasta, and chicken wings. The chow mein, not too dry, maybe a little bit greasy but tasteful and the chicken wings were juicy with good flavoring but the seafood cheese pasta left a lot to be desired. While there was plenty of seafood, it was bland and tasteless — I would definitely not order that dish again. Prices are about what you’d expect in Manhattan’s Chinatown, coming in around $15 per dish. The service was slow, likely due to the restaurant being understaffed. I think I would come back because there are other dishes I want to try, particularly for breakfast, but so far my review is mixed. Update part 2: As of now, this place does not open at 8:30am so don’t be disappointed if you get there wanting breakfast it opens around 10:30am. We got a chance to try Singapore rice noodle and it was good, plenty of favors. The Fish ball was hard and have no bounces to it and the curry was way too water down so I’m going to pass on this one. The Hong Kong tea was warm, not hot and if this was the only place you can get HK tea, fine it is good enough but this is Chinatown and there so many better place to get HK tea. For now, I think I will stay away until soft opening is done with. I can think of a little tiny restaurant across the street from this place that is also hk style that I would highly recommend going too. Overall, not bad, not great just ok but in a town where there so much competition, ok might not be enough.

The staff is really nice. The place on the weekend gets packed so anticipate a wait when you arrive. You're whole party needs to be there for you to be seated if they are busy. However get a number ticket when you first arrive. There will be a hostess handing them out. They might walk away to help seat customers but they will be back. They will keep you at the top of the list if your number is called and your whole party isn't there yet. The food is ok. Basic flavors. A bit of a hit or miss depending on your palette. The Salt and Pepper Squid was good. Small portions for the appetizer. The Imitation Shark Fin Soup was ok. The Chicken with Spaghetti and White Sauce (Which I believe is their Carbonara Sauce) was good if you had a bite of chicken with the spaghetti. Because the spaghetti itself was not salty, but the Chicken by itself was almost too salty. But I prefer less salt myself so that is a factor. The Lava French Toast was ok. Not a lot of filling but I was ok with it. My friend and her daughter loves the Chicken and Corn over rice. The Chicken is really crispy. The Strawberry Matcha was really good, even if there was a small amount of Strawberry layer. I would get less Ice next time. When they seat you, they will ask you if you want tea or water. They come hot, so specify if you want cold water.

A Cantonese roast-meat shop couldn't stay afloat and has now turned into Joy's Cafe. The renovation looked pretty nice, so I decided to give it a try -- but it was a complete disaster. The servers were walking around looking busy, yet we sat there for ten minutes without anyone acknowledging us. The plates and chopsticks they gave us were not properly cleaned, and there was black sediment in the drinking water. When a server finally came over, they gave us attitude just for asking to change the plates and water. If this is because they're in soft opening and the staff is still untrained and inexperienced, that might explain the service -- but the food is the real fatal problem. The curry chicken chop rice looked like they just scooped some pre-made curry sauce onto the plate and placed a pre-fried chicken chop on top without even bothering to mix it. The salt-and-pepper pork chop was the same story: basically a breaded fried pork cutlet plus a packet of salt-and-pepper seasoning, dumped on the plate without even tossing it together. The stir-fried beef chow fun was at least made fresh and had some wok hei, but it was far too salty. Every dish came out lukewarm at best. This is clearly another Hong Kong-style cafe surviving on pre-made food. If they don't make changes, I doubt they'll last a year.