Chu's Taiwanese Kitchen & Bar

Decided to try this place as there's really no good Chinese food on Miami beach.  Came here on a Saturday night around 9 pm, there was only one other table filled in the restaurant ( plus a few people at the bar).  The soups were good ( hot and sour, and shrimp wonton), was disappointed they did not have egg drop - they tried to make it for me by adding egg to the shrimp wonton soup, tasted fine but was definitely not egg drop!   Many minutes pass by and they finally bring our entrees --  not good.  We had beef with broccoli which had little taste and had some other vegetable instead of broccoli, and shrimp with lobster sauce, the shrimp did not taste fresh.   We also ordered the dim sum shrimp dumplings, which were still frozen/raw as my boyfriend bit into the first one.  The took it off the bill as we no longer wanted them.   Wouldn't go back here,    Still on the search for some good Chinese food in Miami!

If you are lucky enough to be there with Mr. Chu himself, you are in for a real treat!

I can't even believe that I have been going here for 2 years and have yet to write this review. I guess that's because I rant and rave so much about it via word of mouth to those who have never heard of the place. Yes, it is a little hidden gem that is hard to spot if you don't know to look for it but once you discover it, you will ask yourself how you lived without it for so long.

The food is always spot on, I have yet to be disappointed by any dish here. They have dim sum, for lunch and dinner, and while I am relatively new to dim sum it is in my opinion some of the best dim sum in Miami. They also have great cocktails and during some nights have good drink specials to make sure you have a delicious libation to go with your spectacular meal.

The bar is open pretty late too, so you can come revel here until 3am on a weeknight or 5am on weekends, as we did on the glorious night of the 2013 Heat victory over the Spurs.

If enough drunken debauchery is going on, you may even get to sing karaoke with the regulars. Oh yes.

I went here with a few coworkers of mine for lunch today because one of them suggested it, having been there once. We were greeted by what I would assume the owner, an older man. There were a few people eating lunch there that worked nearby. They had a lunch special menu which I didn't look over because we were there for dim sum and other Taiwanese specialties. So we ordered shrimp har gow, shrimp noodle roll, turnip cake, garlic chive dumpling, fried stinky tofu and beef noodles.

For the most part, I think the food was just okay... Nothing special. Most of the dim sum items (especially the shrimp noodle roll) were premade, possibly bought frozen. The shrimp noodle roll especially disappointed me, just because it's one of my favorite dim sum items and the noodle skin instantly fell apart, meaning that the skin wasn't fresh. The soy-based sauce wasn't astounding either. The shrimp dumpling was nothing noteworthy. The garlic chive dumplings was good, although a bit small. The turnip cake was pretty good though and possibly the best dish I had. The stinky tofu was what I had expected. It wasn't "smelly" at all (unlike its counterparts in Taiwan), thus it was blander than I would've liked. It was authentic though in terms of ingredients. It came with pickled vegetables on top of it and was covered in a soy-based sauce too as it should. Though the flavors were muted, it was nonetheless pretty decent, especially when it's the only place I can think of that actually serves this dish. Be noted however, it is a very Taiwanese dish and is especially an acquired taste for non-Taiwanese/Chinese people. Lastly, the beef noodle soup was bland with a few diced Chinese sauerkraut pieces. I wasn't impressed by it and I suppose the best I'll ever have of it in Miami is in my own house.

That said, the prices are wayyyy too high. I get that it's in Coral Gables and in a relatively nice location, but I think the prices aren't justified with the portion sizes and generally so-so food. I'm sure their Americanized Chinese and Asian fusion dishes are delicious, but I came here to try out the authentic stuff and critiquing the food as someone who comes from that heritage.

It's good that they have Taiwanese-style dishes since just about nowhere else serves it (except for Shing Wang in North Miami Beach, which isn't serving entirely Taiwanese food either). But for the price and mediocre food, I don't think I'll be back (unless the check's on someone else)!