Chef Wong’s

At it is under new management, Well, after two years of staying away from Chef Wong, I saw a new sign and flowers which were sent ad part of the new launch in April.
So we thought we will give it a try… BAD idea!
We ordered yellow fin grouper fish with vegetables, BBQ meat, garlic steak … For two people, we ordered the higher price food, the group was $ 26 a plate, but we thought it was okay.
Usually, with a new launch and a higher price dinner order, you get complimentary soup. I also observed other tables were getting these soups, and their Order did not seem to be expensive
The food was okay to good, but their portion is small.
The service however is not good. The servers never came by and we had to ask for everything .
I don’t think I will come back because they have enough regulars and certainly don’t need our business

Ok, I came here hungry so this review may be a little bias. My brother and I decided grab dinner here because it was close to his place. I just thought I’d suggest Chinese food because I don’t get to eat much of that now that I moved north. The food variety is the same as before the name change but prices have went up a little. The food taste the same as before and that isn’t a bad thing. It’s just the price I’m not cool with, though I understand the importance of running a business and inflation. The place looks cleaner than before and tables are laid out very similar. Service was also pretty good, very fast and efficient. I feel like they were nice to us because my niece was there too. Lol
The food like I said is the same, so nothing special I can write about.

Here’s my usual weeknight dinner with mom up in her hood :) by that, our choices are mostly within FMP (First Markham Place). Again we are looking for a place with a few small dishes, a bowl of soup and steam rice. I, on the other hand, wanted to try a new place so we ended up here … Where it used to be Congee Wong. Upon arrival I found the services to be superb. They would come over and suggest their today’s specials (usually not the case at smaller Chinese restaurants), and really come by to check on you throughout he dinner. We ordered two dishes, fried spring chicken and tofu casserole both are very well delivered. Prices are very fair as well! This place deserves a 4 stars!
Highlight of the visit: services
Food (Taste): ⁴⁄₅
Food (Presentation): ⁴⁄₅
Kitchen (Delivery Speed): ⁵⁄₅
Service: ⁵⁄₅
Ambiance: ⁵⁄₅ — very clean :)
Fun Factor: na/​5

Quality of their food is great and above the average Chinese restaurant in Markham. They’ve stepped it up big time since their days as Congee Wong thats for sure.
Price are very reasonable.
For those who weren’t satisfied with their service, take it with a grain of salt and remember it’s a Chinese restaurant.
Highly recommend this place for sureeee

Walked pass this place and noticed it has a new identity. Went right in and gave it a shot. We had two lunch set; congee with pork liver and meat ball and bitter squash, chicken with flat rice noodles. The congee came with fried dough; and the noodle came with soup and drink. The pork livers were thick and juicy. The meat balls were tender. The congee was a bit too thick though. The noodle was delicious and not oily at all. The pork liver was so good that I went there two days later and had pork livers with noodles. The pork liver had the perfect thickness, it’s well cooked and yet tender! It’s full of meaty juice and that’s what you want in a perfectly cooked pork liver. Fast and friendly service.

After reading reviews figured I’d give it a shot
Ordered
Cantonese Chow Mein and hot and sour soup my usually order (28.76 $ total)
Waste of money the 7.99 hot and sour soup from ding tai fung is 100x better
The chow mien smelt fishy and noodles were cooked in old grease I wouldn’t complain if it was much cheaper
But for 30 $ was way below my expectations I defiantly will not
Be back much better restaurants in that plaza

Being Cantonese and such, I’m not a big fan of going out to Cantonese restaurants because my mom always makes better food. Congee places in the Markham/​Richmond Hill are a dime a dozen, so it’s hard to rate this any higher than 3 stars unless there was something superb.
We ate fried chili turnip patties, beef bone tomato noodle soup (I have no idea what it is actually called), and fish fillet congee with fried dough sticks and it came to a total of $ 26 tax in which was more than enough for two people. I liked the fried chili turnip patties a lot because it wasn’t too salty and had a good sweetness to it and they were perfectly grilled. Congee was a good size and tasty as well. In terms of the beef bone noodles soup, they were almost al-​dente, which was great.
Service was your typical Cantonese style restaurant, not terrible, but not good either.
Verdict: Not a bad spot if you are in the area.

Man, this has been a long season. I finally have a chance to sit down and relax, and so I thought I would write some reviews.
This place used to be called Congee Wongs. It was a great place to get some congee, and it was always our go to place. It is still an ok place, but it isn’t as impressive as before.
Looking at service, as it is a Chinese restaurant, I always expect it to be almost non-​existent. I am happy to inform you that it is indeed non-​existent. We sat there waiting for hot tea for quite a while. The person never came back and we just kept waiting. After a while, we would have to call and ask for it. They would take their sweet time.
The décor looks exactly like Congee Wong. It seems like they just changed the name. Not a good place for a first date, but it wasn’t dirty or anything.
The food wasn’t as good as Congee Wongs. The thing that we liked the most was the turnip cakes. Everything else, there was left overs. The deep fried donuts with rice something wrapped around it was soggy and a disappointment.
Overall, not a great experience, but it was ok. It was up to what we were expecting… nothing fancy and nothing crappy.

I ordered takeout for my wife and I for dinner. At first glance it seems as though we got too little food for our dollar, but once we open the food containers we realize that we paid for quality and taste over quantity.
The garlic stir fried gai lan (Chinese broccoli) was trimmed nicely, removing the thicker stems and shaving down the skin of the stems to reveal the tender core. I’ve never seen it done that way before. Each stem was laid out in a straight and orderly fashion, with a dusting of toasted sesame seeds on top. The quantity was about half of what you’d typically get at other places. I know, that’s a lot of talk about gai lan! So what I’m getting at is you’re paying for the effort on food prep and presentation, taste, and overall dining satisfaction.
The sweet and sour beef with onions was excellent. Nice tender beef with enough sauce to soak into white rice. The congee was great, not overly salted like some other places, but did have a peculiar gooey texture that made me think they used corn starch in the mixture to thicken things up. But otherwise the amount of preserved egg and pork bone meat was quite adequate. Nice!
Would we go back? Maybe… Sometimes we just want the quick and dirty Chinese food that’s cheap and plentiful. But if we’re after a higher quality take out, I would give this place another go.
Prices are above average.

Chef Wong’s, was once a Congee Wong. It has revamped and had a new modern and less broken down look. It looks much better and has a different look to the menu. There were some menus that were just in Chinese that I could not read, so that’s always useless when I walking into those types of Chinese restaurants. Generally Chef Wong’s has the same types of items as the Congee Wong, but seems less greasy. It’s a nice change from what the Asian food motto usually is,“Add Oil, Add Oil!” Although the grease always makes the food taste so much better at times. The service is your typical Chinese place, pump customers in and out as fast as possible when it’s busy. It’s your typical place for decent priced Chinese food. I would come back when I feel for less greasy asian food. Jimstar Out!

This was the first restaurant my boyfriend’s family and I ate at during our trip to Markham/​Toronto and was pretty close to the hotel we stayed at.
Chef Wong’s is very spacious and has a modern décor and atmosphere. Although we came fairly late for dinner, there was still other families having dinner here too. The staff here didn’t seem to be too on point nor enthusiastic and I guess it’s probably because it’s been a long day and late. The food was sadly mediocre and unfortunately, I wasn’t able to take photos of what we had, but I do remember a few items we had and how I felt about it.
Seafood with Dried Garlic Fried Rice — I liked how it was shaped like a pyramid, but it did tumble down into a mess on the plate. Honestly, I felt the fried rice wasn’t too special nor was it seasoned correctly. There was hardly any season or salt in it.
Angus Beef with Mushroom & Green Onion — I actually enjoyed this dish primarily because there were mushrooms in it and I love mushrooms! The Angus beef was cooked to just the right texture and savory!
Salted House Chicken — This dish was alright, not great because they gave us pieces that didn’t seem to have too much meat on it.
Watercress Soup — I really enjoyed this soup and it taste just like the one my mom makes at home, except slightly saltier but not oversalted.
Overall, I felt the food was standard — nothing too fancy nor enough to drive me to want to come back here. I’ve definitely had better Chinese food in Canada. I think the service could be a little better. This isn’t a bad restaurant to come to if it’s near your hotel and your dead hungry like we were, but if your look for really good quality Chinese food I would go somewhere else.

I had an afternoon tea special Guilin Rice Noodle with milk tea for $ 5.75. It was pretty good, along with other dishes I have had in the past.
The location has changed names several times in the past. Still has good selection of chinese food and friendly staff. The lady at the front cash seems grumpy though, need some cheering up.

My friends and I needed to grab a quick dinner before our movie. We were all craving Chinese food and thought Chef Wong’s would satisfy our cravings. One of my friends could not eat meat for the day so we ordered mainly seafood and vegetables. Chef Wong’s has a wide variety of selections on their menu. Their menu is quite colourful and extensive but it did not lose my attention. I think we wanted to order everything!
My other friend and I actually wanted peking duck but we chose the 2 BBQ item combination as an alternative since it would smaller and our other friend couldn’t have meat that day.
I liked how this place had the full BBQ section for everyone to see and perhaps pick what they want. They also offer take out; similar to the Chinese supermarkets.
For our dinner, we opted for the following dishes:
— Seafood Supreme Super bowl congee
— Scrambled Egg White with Seafood
— BBQ two item combo– Roasted duck and pork
— Fried Rice Noodle with X. O Sauce
All the dishes were really tasty. The thing about the congee was it was tad too thick and we opted for the expensive seafood option with surf clam that was rubbery. We’ll just stick with the regular seafood super bowl next time.
The service was fast and our food came quickly. Portions are great for sharing.
At the end of the meal, we had a lot of left overs and it was great that the server packed our food– not a lot of restaurants do that nowadays… it did catch me off guard:)
I recommend this place if you want fair priced Chinese food and the location is great– right in the First Markham Place plaza.

I believe this is a new restaurant replacing an existing one (or perhaps a name change?). I found the food here to be good, solid Cantonese food. Nothing fancy, of course, but some good classic dishes with a bit of flair, mostly congee, noodles, rice and or the sort.
I really enjoyed their meats (chicken, BBQ duck) so when I ordered the Hainanese stone pot rice, I was pleasantly surprised with it. I also ordered BBQ duck rice noodle in soup, which was good, but skimpy on the rice noodles? The price was reasonable, so I assume the portions reflect that. I ordered a side of yu choy ($ 4.50) to get my green veg on, but found that the entrees I ordered came with a few stalks of greens itself.
Overall, I would say come to this place for a quick bite in a small party, and you’re just craving some generic, simple Chinese food.

Food was fast and hot. portions weren’t as much as you would expect but the service was good and the waiters were friendly. price wise was ok

Came here with my parents for lunch after browsing the plaza. It was pretty full and we had to wait a few minutes while they cleaned a booth for us. Service as a whole was a bit slow but nothing uncommon for a Chinese restaurant. A few of the serving platters had chips and nicks but over all food presentation and atmosphere was pretty nice.
The menu they gave us was freakin huge, thick and heavy enough to be a college text book. Highly doubtful that the chef would be able to make everything in the book delicious, we asked the waiter for suggestions and he recommended the beef riblets as well as the other bbq options. We ended up getting the lobster congee (we love seafood and I was still recovering from the under-​cooked xiao long bao we had from Ding Tai Fung last night), honey bbq beef riblets, and duck tongue (was on a separate sheet of paper listing Chef Specials).
The beef riblets came first and man were they tasty. The beef was tender and well marinated, sweet but not too sweet. It was a bit difficult trying to chew the meat off the bone so do make sure to use the knife provided to cut the meat off. Next came the duck tongue which was pretty interesting. It had pieces of duck tongue stir fried with different colored peppers, asian mushroom and an asian veggie I don’t know the name of. The duck was crunchy and well flavored. The dish as a whole had a little heat to it but was still very yummy.
It wasn’t until after we were done with the beef and halfway through the duck that the lobster congee finally arrive. Might have been why the waiter was trying to convince us to get the seafood congee instead, the lobster congee came with a full, almost 2 lb, lobster cooked to order so the lobster was fresh (hence the long wait). It was very delicious and I would highly recommend it if you like lobster. We finished the whole thing, cleaning off the shells and everything.
All in all it was a very satisfying meal and we were happy with everything we ordered.

My family arrived in this sprawling parking lot hellhole called First Markham Place in search of the fabled popular Ding Tai Fung restaurant, but found instead a long wait for a table. There are a gazillion other Asian food options in this confusing shopping centre for those not in the mood to wait, including the one conveniently right next door: Chef Wong’s. There were plenty of seats at lunchtime here, and generally speaking we found this to be a decent choice if you wanna just eat but can’t wait to eat and don’t mind putting up with the horrible driving skills that seems to be the norm here to be here.
Apparently this used to be a Congee Wong – a familiar name in the Chinese Toronto suburban landscape. The basic clean contemporary décor is heavy in muted olive drab green tones, stuffed mostly with large group tables with diner booths lining the walls.
Unlike other reviewers, I did not experience any food or service woes. Service was at a basic satisfactory level, except for not having a host show up to seat us for a full minute.
We ordered mainly noodles from their overwhelmingly huge menu, generally around $ 7 – 10 each for a giant plate to share. Food comes damn quick, but overall I found them to be kind of an average kind of greasy Chinese comfort food like you’d find served in mall takeouts. The fried beef udon noodles for example, though I enjoyed it much like I enjoy a good greasy burger, was heavy on sodium and looked and tasted like it was slathered in Magi (the cheap man’s fake soy sauce).
Anything here labelled as ‘spicy’ should be avoided by true chiliheads. We had also the Szechuan style beef rice noodles-​and by Szechuan, they really meant more like «dumbed down Szechuan style for whitey.» Which of course meant a severely mild hot dish that suited my don’t-like-too-spicy family, but would disappoint those craving authentic bold and hot flavours associated with Szechuan cuisine. That dish in question was also overloaded with a medley of peppers-​of the red/​yellow/​green «traffic lights» kind.
{YRT/​VIVA: once you get off the Purple/​Pink line at Woodbine, you’ll need a car to cut through the giant parking lot sprawl just to reach anywhere in First Markham Place}

Used to be called congee Wong — change of ownership and now is called chef wongs.
That didn’t really change much. The seating is very cramped for the lounge tables. Sitting two average sized individuals together feels like the middle seat in the back of a small car. Can’t move in the seat — really reduced the quality of the experience.
As compared to it’s competitors value proposition of fast service, cheap and quality food — they can’t compete. Food took 20 min to come and was undercooked. They heated it up but by that time I was frustrated and really hungry.
Decent presentation of food, however the plate was dented with too many nicks.
The manager is really into the business but that doesn’t make a difference.
Overall, not up to Chinese food standards. Go back to congee queen.

After my last experience at this restaraunt, my and my family were hoping for a decent time at Chef Wong’s. We ordered the squid tentacles agin, thinking it would be better from the previous time. It turned out much worse than it should, and we sent it back regretting of ordering it.
The manager comes up to us again, and realizes we are the people from last time who did not enjoy the squid. He defended the food, saying how the recipie has changed, and how we should enjoy it. What? Nobody can tell me, or my family, that we should enjoy it — if we don’t like it, we don’t. That’s our choice, not his.
I forgot to mention we ordered two squid orders, both gone back because of our tastes. The manager said he was going to charge us for both, even after we sent them back (1 or 2 squid tentacles were taken out, but the dish was barely touched). After about 3 minutes of explaining how we didn’t eat the squid and sent it back, he said he would take it off the bill. The bill comes, and he takes 1 order off and keeps 1 on. Absolutely disrespectful of the customer.
Finally, as we get up to leave, the manager says if we don’t like the food don’t come back. He completely disrespected us in front of the restaraunt and threatened to call security to keep us out. He insulted us, saying we have no taste for foods (and this is with a 9 and 13-​year old) which made me absolutely disgusted by his treatement of us. We came to give the business money, and we left with only one thought in our minds: to never return to this place again.
The customer is always right, and this mananger has a problem with that. Making us pay for food we didn’t eat, insulting us and making a scene in front of the restaraunt. That is absolute terrible management, and I don’t recommend bringing your kids here unless you want them to hear and see see such rude treatement.

Food was delicious as expected however, service was horrible. Having worked in customer service for over 15 years, it really irks me when people are rude and lack the basic knowledge of common courtesy. We came as a party of 30 plus people with reservations at 7:30pm and got kicked out at 9 with the waiter saying that our time was up. It was a family reunion, and the entire time there we did not feel welcomed. We were told constantly to «hurry up and order» and was given dirty looks when the kids got up off their chairs. It was busy which I had no issue with, but there should be no excuse for anyone to be rude especially in a place of business.

The staff are really nice and the food was indeed less oily than usual, but I felt that their dishes were very lightly seasoned. I’m just the type of person who loves having different flavours of sauces and spices when it comes to Chinese cuisine, but my visit just did not exceed my expectations.
I had a full sized lobster and it tasted very fresh– many people ordered it too so I strongly recommend it. I also found their vegetables tasting quite nice.

My friends and I were originally coming here to go to congee wong, to see it replaced by Chef Wong’s. A little inebriated from a solid Unilocal event earlier in that evening, we decided to try it out and see how it fared.
To our surprise, the food here was actually very solid. For 4 of us, we ordered the Hot and Sour soup, the seafood chow mein, sweet and sour pork, and BBQ short ribs. The portions were large, everything was hot, not overly greasy, and well seasoned. the non-​greasy part is what really impressed me. Too often, chinese food is just dripping in cooking oil, which to me is unappetizing to see and taste.
All in all, I had no complaints about the food or the service. everything was spot on, and I would definitely go again if and when I’m in the area.

Chef Wong is wonderful! The manager was attentive and truly cared about our opinions! We ordered 4 dishes and they were all made fresh with quality and super super good efforts!
We had cantonese chow mein, hot and sour soup, beef ribs, and sweet and sour pork! They were all made with love and amazing flavors!
Come here for great chinese food and great attentive service! One of the best chinese restaurants in markam! Yummy!

Came here for dinner once and most recently for lunch. It’s nothing special but your typical Cantonese comfort food. I can’t remember specifically what we had for dinner but it was a fried rice and a fried noodle. It was decent enough that I wanted to come back. Lunch we had a beef brisket noodle soup and a wonton noodle soup with a side of fried spicy tofu (yummy), and rice noodle roll.
The servers were very attentive and friendly.
Will come back whenever I need my comfort food. I think I actually prefer it to my neighborhood Congee Queen. Feels less hectic.

I came here for lunch last Sunday. We ordered a stirred fried noodle and a BBQ Pork. The BBQ pork was average, in that it was a little bit better than grocery store quality and a little bit below a good BBQ store. I think the BBQ Pork at Congee Queen is better.
The stirred fried noodle was not properly seasoned. I sprinkled salt on it myself. I think there are too many menu selections, to the extent that the chef may not know how to make all of them well.
Most notable was that it took a long, long, long time for the food to arrive. I saw many people sat idle, staring blank and waiting. The servers worked at super speed, like a train engine.
If the food can arrive faster, Chef Wong’s is 3-​starred for lunch. Otherwise, it is 2-​starred for lunch. My average lunch hour is only 1 hour after all.

2.5 star
Chef Wong’s is a new Chinese Restaurant that replaces Congee Wong in First Markham Place.
Interior has been totally renovated but still keeping the similar colour theme of green.
Menu is quite similar congee and noodle but with additional of more Cantonese stir fried dish which are good for dinner.
Cuttlefish Ball with Vermicelli in Fish Soup ($ 5.95), I am not even sure if it was fish soup as it lacked the fishy smell and taste. The vermicelli though cooked well with a good bite. Portion size though a little small as I can probably eat 2 bowls of those as snack. Loaded with MSG… I was so thirsty afterwards.
Service though was really friendly and courteous.
No Afternoon tea special offers.
Just be really careful as the floor is really slippery.
I might come back to try out other items. Not a bad option for a quick meal.