Mei's Kitchen

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  Staff very attentive, good bfast food.

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  Posted on 12.10.12 James D.

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  I just left Mei's Kitchen restaurant after being seated and ignored for 10 minutes.
  I kid you not, there were more employees than customers, and no one came to my table.
  A waiter walked by me three times and didnt even look at me, acknowledge me or anything.
  I am a 45 year old male professional. I was on my iPad while I was waiting.
  Skip this place.... Plus it's menu is bizarre... From potstickers, chicken tenders, pizza and burgers. Why did I go in in the first place!??

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  Posted on 08.19.12 Hunter D.

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  I really wish I could like this place especially since it is so convenient BUT I just can't.
  
  I came here for breakfast awhile back and I was so disgusted that I swear I will never return.  The food looked okay and presentable... but nothing special... but the service was something indescribable.
  
  The wait was about 15 minutes even though there were only a few people in front of me and they were surprisingly not busy for the time.  Once we were seated, we went to the buffet to check out the buffet menu and their literally was nothing left... they said they would be refilling it but the point of a buffet is to get it right away so we decided to just order.
  
  We watched who seemed to be the owner run around and take food to tables, and it is very embarrassing, but the owner was sweating an uncontrollable amount.  So much that I was so grossed out I asked our waitress to please be sure to bring us our food and not have him serve it because I wouldn't eat it.  I explained why- he was literally dripping and I am not even joking- dripping sweat in the food.  
  
  To say the least when we finally got our food 50 MINUTES LATER I had no appetite left and was turned off by the place I will never return.

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  Posted on 09.16.11 Jen K.

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  I have passed by this place for years without stopping.   I must say that the Seafood Fried Rice here is the BEST [hands down] rice I have ever eaten.   The flavor profile is right on. Its so delicious that I came back just one day after to have it again, and waited over 30 minutes for lunch to start just to order it.   Sally, the waitress from Africa, is a sweetheart.

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  Posted on 09.11.11 E J.

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  DON"T GO!!! Went to Mei's when line at Yolk was too long...took an hour to get food and when it arrived,  (I ordered an omelette) canned mushrooms, frozen spinach and frozen hash browns in the shape of a triangle...something you'd get at burger king!  Unbelievable!  The manager seemed uninterested as did the entire wait staff.  The table was dirty and their were sticky fingerprints everywhere.  This place could be great (location) , but fails in every aspect.

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  Posted on 09.04.11 Kathy K.

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  I ended up here because yolks line was too long for me and my stomach was touching my spine (super hungry) and I could eat my arm off.
  
  I ordered off the menu a basic breakfast of eggs, hash browns, toast, and bacon. The eggs were that fake egg stuff, bacon was deep fried in oil, hash browns reminded me of McDonald's hash browns and greasy. Orange juice was obviously from concentrate and needed more water to dilute the taste a bit. All I enjoyed was the toast.

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  Posted on 04.26.11 daynia S.

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  The first night I got spring rolls and a salad to go. The gal at the counter was super nice. The inside of tje spring rolls were strangely mushy but still were good.
  The next day we ate in. the food was great but our waitor had to come back a few times and ask again which beverages we had ordered which seemed a little ameteur and unprofessional but he was nice and thw food was jiat fine. How much can you really expect from a hotel restaurant.

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  Posted on 02.23.11 Jessica F.

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  Underwhelmed. Person at door seemed uninterested in me as guest. Waitress took order dropped  and off food. had to wait 30mins b4 she came bck. Food was lukewarm and mediocre. Won't go back.  The Cantonese Duck wraps were cold and soggy.  The Potstickers were cold too and mediocre.
  
  I put my debit card down so I could atleast get a check, seeing as how my waitress never returned. Some random person walked by after 10 mins and I had her cash me out.
  
  We were one of three tables in the enitre restaurant, so I have no idea why the service sucked so bad.  
  
  We were staying at the adjoining hotel, it was cold (-8 degrees) and we were hungry and desparate for food, so I chanced it at Mei's and was sorry I did.  I won't go back!

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  Posted on 02.10.11 Kay Z.

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  my boyfriend & i tried mei's kitchen because it was connected to the lobby of our hotel. we ordered seafood dumplings and spring rolls to go, which we thought would be pretty hard to mess up. however, the appetizers were pricey and super disappointing. the dumplings were soggy with air pockets in them, and the spring rolls were mediocre at best. the sauces that accompanied both weren't complimentary taste-wise, either. definitely not worth the price or the wait. don't do it!

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  Posted on 12.23.10 Rebecca B.

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  My wife and I ended up here after trying to get a table at both the Bongo Room and Yolk. 45 minute waits at each. No thanks. Mei's Kitchen was empty, and we got seated right away. I guess I'm not surprised by the number of sour reviews of this place. I'm sure that a good number of people, disappointed that they couldn't get in to Yolk, end up walking through Mei's Kitchen door.
  
  But, for folks who are just looking for food rather than an experience, this place would suit just fine. I don't know if the breakfast service is *that* odd: You order at the counter, sit down, and they bring it out to you. The food came out in a reasonable amount of time. My french toast and bacon were to my liking, and my wife enjoyed her chocolate banana crepes.
  
  The end result is that we ate a good breakfast for a quite a bit less than we would have at the first couple places we had attempted. We'll be coming back again.

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  Posted on 10.02.10 Mike R.

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  What is the deal with service? I walked in. Nobody there to greet us. Waited for a minute, and the owner/waiter/counterdude/? handed us a couple of menus. I said, "can we sit outside?"  He says, "sure".
  
  We go outside, sit down, and when is he ever coming back? He had handed us a menu of lunch specials which was pretty much turkey sandwich, burgers, some pizzas, and then some Chinese food on the bottom. Kinda weird, huh? What kind of place IS this?
  
  The menu says, this is lunch menu but you can order from the FULL menu as well. So when he comes back, I ask for the full menu. It looked more Asian, as the name of the restaurant would suggest.
  
  It had potstickers, bbq pork buns, wonton noodle soups, etc, as light fare. Alot of the menu items showed the pork ingredient as BERKSHIRE PORK in capitals. What is Berkshire Pork? (Ok, I just googled it.......it's a high quality pork from a rare breed from Britain)
  
  So I ordered the wonton noodle soup. My wife ordered the roast duck over rice plate.
  
  After 15 minutes, the orders came out. My wonton noodle soup (with 5 Berkshire pork wontons) was delicious. However, I don't know Berkshire pork when I taste it. It was good, though. It had a hearty serving of egg noodles, and the wontons were homemade, as well as the rich chicken broth. I hate those broths made from instant Chinese soup aka MSG broth powder from a can. This was the perfect antithesis. Ahhhh....quite the change from most Chinese restaurants of late.
  
  My wife's duck was awesome....perhaps the best I've had in many years since my Dad, who was a Chinese chef used to make that in the BBQ oven in the back of the restaurant kitchen. Most notably, the skin was really crispy, and the meat moist. It tasted like it was just made. On the side was some steamed baby bok choy and some dipping sauce which tasted like hoisin thinned out with a little rice vinegar. I was really impressed, because based on the service, I thought we had made a bad decision.
  
  Oh yeah, 10 mins after we started eating, this dude who I hadn't seen yet shows up at the table and says "Is everything ok?". He had startled me, but may have been a waiter who showed up late for a shift or something. He ended up bringing us the check.............so yes, there is more than one employee there.
  
  I have to give them 4 stars for the food, 1 for service. Yes, I'd go back, but  at least wait to be seated..........

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  Posted on 09.13.10 R Y.

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  My fiance and I went here this morning because the line at Yolk was so long.  I would NEVER go back.  First, we walked in and no one sat us.  We waited a few minutes, had a waitress walk past us mumbling something a few times, then finally what seemed like the owner maybe sat us but only gave us one menu and one place setting.
  
  After 5 minutes of no server, I saw the maybe-owner and asked for a server.  He tried to tell us that he didn't even sit us there and that was why we had no server.  Excuse me?  He seriously argued in the middle of the restaurant that he didn't seat us there.  
  
  Finally we get a server, I thought he was nice in the beginning.  To make a long story short, we asked for coffee and water and since we only had one coffee cup on the table- he took one off the un-bussed table next to ours and gave it to us; brought only one water glass and left the pitcher w/out filling the water; took 10 minutes before he came back to take our order and I had to remind him for another water glass; never came to refill our coffee; wouldn't bring me another set of silverware until my food would come.  That's the little of it all.
  
  After he told me he wouldn't bring another silverware set until our food (nevermind I wanted a napkin!), we got up and left, paid for our coffee and said we wouldn't be needing the food we ordered.  My fiance who is the nicest guy ever told this owner how horrible the service was and he just nodded his head saying he didn't think it was bad at all! Don't go there!  Don't even try it.  The service was horrible and I bet the food would be too.

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  Posted on 07.05.10 Becky H.

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  Lettuce wraps were good, but a bit salty, and $12 was a bit much for just three wraps. Same can be said for the dumplings, though they were three for $4.
  
  Waited almost ten minutes after we finished eating for the bill and finally got up and found our waitress to ask for it. Waited another few minutes before we finally got it.

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  Posted on 04.18.10 Kevin S.

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  Sometimes when a restaurant is not what you're expecting, and not quite up to par, it's really disappointing.  You feel like you've wasted your time and money and wish you'd just gone to McDonald's, instead.
  
  Other times, the experience is hilarious enough to make up for it--if you're with good friends in a good mood, that is.  Luckily, that was the case for us a couple of weeks ago.
  
  My brother is a music student at Columbia College and all of his recitals and concerts take place about 20 feet from this place.  This time there were 10 of us, mostly my parents' friends, and we were in a celebratory mood after the brother's triumph: the senior recital.  It was a Thursday evening and my dad attempted to make a reservation--they INSISTED he didn't need one.  Which was true...we were basically the only ones there. We told all our friends we'd been there millions of times but...wait?  Had we?  How has this been an Asian place?  Had we just not noticed?
  
  The menu was eclectic, mostly Asian food (featuring especially BERKSHIRE PORK, which they seem to be obsessed with) but also burgers and pizza.
  
  Our waiter was awfully sweet, and good lord did he try hard, but his English was just not very good.  Most of the hilarity of the evening came from trying to communicate with him what it was we wanted, and the manager had to intervene/translate several times.  The server knew every item on the menu, and everyone got the item they ordered--but he really couldn't understand details like how people wanted their burgers cooked, if they wanted cheese (and what kind), and the names of wines (nothing complicated...just Merlot and Pinot...)
  
  I had the veggie pizza and I think it was the big winner of the evening (it really was very good--had unexpected pizza toppings like corn, peas, and broccoli.  Sort of random, but tasty).  The burgers were hit or miss (extremely well done or very rare) and I think the Asian stuff was as well.
  
  Service was a bit slow, which always seems to happen when there's no one else in the restaurant and I can never understand why.  
  
  Also, my dad ordered lemonade and ginger ale, and the manager said they didn't serve lemonade....then halfway through our meal I saw some waiters carrying a giant jug of it through the restaurant.  It looked like it was for a special event or something, not regular restaurant service.  But still...they clearly had it on hand.
  
  Finally, the bill felt slightly high, but it honestly wasn't bad...I think there were just a lot of us, and many of us ordered drinks, and the food was slightly disappointing so it felt slightly more overpriced.  Add in Cook County taxes and you've got yourself a pricey total.  But meal by meal, I actually thought it was very reasonable.
  
  In conclusion: my pizza was great, and we came away with some new stories and family catchphrases...but we probably won't be back.

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  Posted on 06.19.09 Rebecca W.

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  I was seeking breakfast after having done the Race for the Cure 5K.  Of course, Bongo Room and Yolk were packed.  I wasnt too keen on waiting an hour for an overpriced, overcrowded restaurant.  Thankfully I stumbled on Fornetto and Mei's Kitchen.
  
  Admittedly, the place is a little confusing.  It appears to be a hotel restaurant but I dont think it is.  The have a huge dining room.  When you walk in there is a coffee bar, the dining room is to the left and all the way to the left there is a bar and a cute lounglike seating area.  
  
  The breakfast menu is pretty average.  They had a breakfast buffet for $9.95 which included coffee, 5 kinds of juice, a selection of cold cereals including granola, assorted bread and pastries, bacon, sausage, waffles, eggs, hash browns and fresh fruit.  I think the breakfast buffet was the most expensive thing on the menu.
  
  You can dine outside on Michigan Avenue or inside the large airy dining room.  Again, it's not extraordinary gourmet foodie type stuff but if you are looking for no frills breakfast in the South Loop this place is a great option.

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  Posted on 09.27.08 Rona J.

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  "It's a good place to go when i need to think"
  
  That's what my dad told me about this place, and when I joined him one afternoon after work for a beer I know why. There was not a single other person there at 5pm on a Thursday night. When you're on Michigan Avenue, that's pretty bad. And to be honest, when I lived on Roosevelt and Wabash I walked past here quite a bit and never really saw anyone there at any time of day. I'm not sure why as I hear they have good pizza, a nice view of Grant Park and pints of Honker's Ale were a reasonable $4.  Maybe its because it's located in a Best Western hotel and people are deterred by that. Maybe the rest of the food is bad, or the service is bad or something. I honestly have no idea.

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  Posted on 08.11.08 Denise P.

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