If you live in Toronto you may wonder why I'm doing a food review on Asian Legend. It's fairly well-known and they've sprouted many locations all over the GTA. But, I thought it'd be nice to do one on specificlocations since it's never the 'same' experience in taste and service.
I've been to the Leslie/Finch, Yonge/Empress, Commerce Gate and the Metro Square location (off of Steeles/Warden) and I've found that they are not that consistent, so I thought I'd write it out and see what happens.
Last weekend my friends and I had a pretty late dinner at the Yonge Street, north of Empress Walk location in North York after we went to see a movie at the new Cineplex Empress Walk theatre. By the way, they have FREE PARKING up to 3 hours. They validate on the 3rd floor.
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Anyways, when we got there around 8:30pm - 9:00pm, it was barely full with many empty seats on the second part of the restaurant, yet we had to wait for a good 8 minutes to get a seat. It looked as though they wanted everyone to sit in one section, so I guess that makes sense.
Hungry after the movies, we order a few dishes
As a child, I've always loved the green onion pancake. But now, they've got many different twist on the green onion pancake.. by adding slices of beef and veggies. This one was on the chef's menu. Hmmm... this compared to the usual greasy bread, I think I prefer the greasy-looking pancake. This "chef's special" felt very dry in my mouth. It left me very unsatisfied.
Next, we ordered beef noodles and soup
This is another staple. When I'm out with my family, we love to order the Beef noodles. This was tasted fair. It said on the menu that it was spicy, but there wasn't a hint of spiciness. I'm not very tolerant for spicy (thought I'm trying to build one up) but when I tasted it, I was quite disappointed. Without the spiciness, the dish became bland and unflavourful.
The only thing that was good about the dish was the beef. It was very soft and tender and easy to eat.
Again, I stuck with my basics and ordered string beans. This is always a great dish to have. They made it well and it was nice and soft with lots of garlic sauce for taste.
And last but not least, a new dish for me. I forgot the full name of the dish, but it right under the "Crispy chicken". The full name entailed a region from China, probably to point where this certain dish was born.
The new thing was the dipping sauce. The sauce was tangy and a little sour. After my first bite, I couldn't say if I liked or hated it. To me, it was very... different. It wasn't bad, but I couldn't quite say I loved it. Would I order it again? Maybe.. maybe not. However, I can agree that the crispy chicken was very good and not at all dry. And for myself, I always love snacking on the sliced cucumbers underneath. =0)
For the service, it was slow, and though it was close to closing time, I found that this particular location is much slower with everything they do. They aren't bad, but the waiters definitely need to be quicker and around more in case customers need something.
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Overall, the food is decent and its a convenient place to get your Northern China food fix. But hopefully, the service does a better job next time I come.
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