TLT BBQ

Great place for friends to gather and enjoy the taste of authentic Chinese skewer! There are so many choices which I cannot find in other Chinese skewer restaurant. or maybe they have but not the same taste or quality. Cold noodle soup is also northeastern style. My favorite. Highly recommend if you are from northeast of China.

Worse experience, we ordered before 6:50pm. By 8:45pm our order was still not ready. But FOUR other tables of customers got their orders first because they are Chinese. We are Asian also. VERY BAD SERVICE

Bad service not acceptable. We came around 9:30 at night and no table here. But all waiters didn’t serve us and no ETA for the waiting time. When we ask they just said no idea in hurry.

not too greasy
MSG a little
good variety

A waste of time. Wanted to order to go but they said they don’t take it. Their reasoning is because it’ll take an hour?!! What about the people sitting at their tables? I’m sure it would take the same amount of time as a take out order.

Cool spot for some cheap meat on a stick. Too bad everything taste the same, but I guess that’s the way it is. I like the new location, seems clean and they have a nice variety for drinks to go along with your bbq. I’d come back for sure, to be honest the flavor can be addicting.

I was a 2 year regular of the TLT in Newark but stopped going because we just couldn’t deal with the inconsistent service at the time. Fast-​forward to today! I am sooooo happy that I stumbled upon this new location and gave it another shot. The original owners work here. Not sure if both locations are under the same managment, because I tried the Newark location recently and now Fremont. They are two completely different experiences. From the menu, service and the quality of the food, this location by far surpasses the Newark location. It is truly a gem and Fremont is lucky to have a TLT here.

So glad to have stumble onto this place. The skewers are reminisant of the BBQ skewers from Asian night markets and meat on stick in Asia street carts. Price is right and the meat is sooooo good!

I have never tried Chinese skewers so this is setting a bar for me. It’s an affordable place, worth trying if you already know quality won’t be great.
Service — not that great, but like for more Chinese places, you shouldn’t expect decent service if it’s more authentic.
Food — I was warned beforehand that most skewers use a lot of cumin and spices in it, and it was true. We got Chinese vegetables and they were grilled with tons of chain/​spices. It was interesting with the smokey taste on the vegetables.
Meats — we tried a variety of items such as chicken cartilage, chicken skin, lamb, beef and tendon. The chicken skin was really yummy! It looked like intestines so it kind of threw me off but upon biting it, it was crunchy but had a soft texture in the middle. I loved the spices on it and added more of the spicy seasoning offered on the table.
We went on a Saturday night so it was pretty packed and the wait was at least 15mins, but most likely longer. We were a party of 4, placed at a smaller table meant for 2. They said they were going to move us, but it never happened.
Parking — street parking is a bit jammed and don’t expect to park in their small parking lot of like 5 spaces. There is a less than 25 car parking area to the left of the place though so I would try there before looking for street parking as it’s closer.

Good for late night bbq skewer munchies.
Fried rice: The fried rice was oily beyond belief, which was pretty disappointing. Some parts were flavorless, while other parts were a mixture of oil/​salt
Quail eggs: yum! crispy, textured outside… I’d get multiple orders of this!
Lamb: $ 3.99 for one chop only? it was worth getting once, but not amazing
Beef & lamb skewers: highlights of the night!
Spicy beef soup: suuuuper spicy (just how I like it!), but they’re not apt at refilling waters
Overall, I’d still come back, but I’d stick to what they’re good at — BBQ!

My family and I were looking for a new place to eat at, so we arrived here due to Unilocal.They have like a 4 car business parking space, but you can easily find street parking. There are about 8 tables of various sizes, and simple décor.
Beef skewer ⁵⁄₅ Everyone loved this.
Lamb skewer ⁵⁄₅ Only my mom didnt like this cause it was fatty, but I believe fatty is good.
Chicken skewer ⁵⁄₅ This was good.
Pollack Skewer ³⁄₅ meh, i dont care for fish like this.
Corn Skewer ²⁄₅; the corn wasnt very good
Green Bean Skewer ³⁄₅; i regret getting veggies when I could have just ordered more meat
Sliced Pork leg with garlic ⁴⁄₅; dad loves this stuff.
Yang Chow Fried Rice ⁴⁄₅; pretty average fried rice.
I would stick with just getting beef/​lamb/​chicken skewers and fried rice and you’ll be happy here.

There’s not too many places around that have Chinese BBQ skewers so this was great! Also super cheap, you order by the skewer and everything is reasonably priced at $ 1-​$ 3.
⁵⁄₅: chicken, potato, bun, chicken wings, chicken heart, corn
⁴⁄₅: mushrooms (on the smaller side), yam, lamb, beef
³⁄₅: beef tendon (thought it would be softer), chicken skin
If I’m in the area I would go again! Next time I would try some of the veggie skewers.

The service was so bad, literally the worst restaurant experience that i ever had. And the food takes forever to come out.

Meat and other stuff on sticks. Plus yang chow fried rice with hot dog! What more do you need?

Wow why is this place not more talked about? It’s freakin delicious. In fact, it might be one of my favorite spots to go to in Fremont now. Also ITS SO CHEAP! And they stay open late! Perfect for drinking and eating.
I did not have a single bad thing here. The skewers were on average $ 1 — $ 2 each and have an amazing seasoning on all of them! They say it’s spicy but my dad who can’t eat spicy food was ok with it. Service was also good. They don’t all speak English but the ones who did were very patient with us because we didn’t know what to order.
Everything was so juicy and cooked perfectly. I really loved the beef, chicken, chicken skin, egg plant, chicken wings, and pretty much everything.
I drool just thinking about this place and it is becoming my staple. Yum! Please give it a try. You won’t regret it.
OH yeah don’t forget to try their sweet potato dessert! What a unique experience. SWEEET potato covered in melted sugar syrup and you dip it in cold water and it hardens. The potato is still sweet and the outside is crunchy. Delish.

The food is so good! Especially the lamb skewer. Also love the chicken wing and man you. So happy Tlt is now in Fremont; we are regular customers to the Newark one.

Wow! Can’t believe the owner paid Unilocal to start a new account! Well… I’m just gonna paste my review on the new page to make sure new customers do not encounter same experience as I do!
Worst customer service ever. I will pay $ 100 to Unilocal company if they can have this review in negative star.
During my last visit they sat my friends and I next to the door freezing our butt off while restaurant is empty. They refused to give us table more inside from the start, their reason was «it’s for reservation people». BULLSHIT! You call them for reservation and they won’t give you one. Anyways, service is bad too on this day, we left $ 1 tip when we are leaving. Now this tall idiotic disgraceful Chinese guy had the gut to come out BEGGING for tips when he needed to improve his service skill to begin with.
NOW today 7÷9÷2014 I decide to give them another chance. we were greeted (party of 2 only) and sat down in a table. The waiter (tall Asian guy that takes everyone order) comes over and whisper to me «we require 15% tip here». I silenced for a few moments to myself and my friend asked me «what did he tell you?»
I silently talked to my friend about what he said. We decide to leave this restaurant because we are afraid they will spit in our food!
Just to let everyone know out there, tips are to be earned, not asked or required.
If you are the owner or the waiter reading this review. Here is what you get «操你媽»
I recommend F. T BBQ in Milpitas or yang’s BBQ in Cupertino.

Simple, satisfying, CHEAP!
It’s just your basic grilled Chinese vegetables and meat on a skewer with some seasoning — it’s not complicated and sometimes that’s all you want and all you need!
There are a loooot of choices on the menu, the must tries being of course the bun skewers, the lamb-​rib skewers, shitake mushroom skewers, and the grilled chicken skewers (but in all honesty, it’s all personal preference — but the bun skewers are definitely hype. I always see them on Snapchat lol, if you’re into that type of thing.)
It was really empty when we walked in (2-​ish PM on a Friday) and service was really nice and attentive! They’re not super fluent in English (we spoke Mandarin with them) but whatever, as long as they understand your order and smile (which they did.)
Anyway, I had a pretty bomb time there. Basic skewered food. Simple. Satisfying. CHEAP.

Came here to meet up with some friends for dinner. My first time trying this place out but my friends have been to the San Mateo location (both have same owner).
FOOD:
The beef and lamb skewers are one of the best things to order here. Each skewer comes with about 5 – 6 pieces and I probably could’ve eaten many of these. The chicken skewers were also pretty good; full of flavor and the meat was not dry. The corn was savory but a bit starchy and I didn’t like that some of them came out pretty burnt. The tendon was a bit chewier than I anticipated and some pieces could’ve been cut smaller. I almost choked on a piece! The gizzard, if you are adventurous enough to try, was good but overcooked a bit and a bit too crispy. The yams were pretty good; they had a soft texture, almost mushy when you bite into one. The eggplant and veggies were ok, nothing really special about them.
Overall: ³⁄₅
SERVICE:
Average Asian restaurant. Food came out very quickly, so quickly some of the skewers got cold. Luckily, the servers were nice enough to bring back some of the meat skewers in to reheat for us. Our server also recommended some skewers to us as we were deliberating which to get since there are so many options!
Overall: ⁴⁄₅
DECOR/​AMBIANCE:
Decent size with simple decorations and a couple tvs. The table for 2 and 4 are a bit small. We had a bit of a problem trying to fit all our food and drinks but we made it work out.
Overall: ³⁄₅
Small parking lot out back but there is also street parking if the lot gets full. Pretty much all the skewers come topped with cumin/​chili powder (you can ask for them to put less if it’s too spicy) so if you don’t like spicy, this place may not be for you. Overall, food quality is not bad and the place is cheap considering all the food we ordered. I’m sure we will be back again for more because of that.

For those of you familiar with TLT, this is how the story goes:
–TLT opened on Cedar Blvd.
–Owners split off and TLT on Cedar Blvd. turned into TLI then TIT
–Original TLT owners opened a location in San Mateo and now on Bay St. in Fremont
For those of you unfamiliar with TLT, they’re northern style Chinese skewers with a bunch of side dishes, some which seem Chinese-​Korean even.
Here’s a comparison of the two:
–TLT (Bay St.): Original recipe with seasoning that’s a lot lighter. Food comes out sort of lukewarm. The beef tendon was really chewy. They have a couple more items on the menu than TIT: chicken grizzles, beef backs, cheese-​filled sausages, fried pork with sweet and sour sauce, tofu with pork blood, and some fish ball looking thing. The chicken grizzles are literally that tendon-​y part of a wing end so you get cartilage and occasionally some bone – choking hazards. The beef backs are that whiteish part of the beef chunks when you make Chinese style beef stew. I can’t tell you how the fish ball was because I just realized they forgot to give it to me. The best new item was the fried pork with sweet and sour sauce, which is a syrupy soy-​based sauce, that reminds me of tangsuyuk (Korean fried pork). It came out at the very end but was really hot. Other than the couple extra items, the menu even looks exactly the same as TIT’s but with the original, slightly cheaper pricing.
Location wise, it’s a bit out of the way and far from the freeway. The restaurant itself is spacious though with a large round table with a lazy Susan. It might have been because the restaurant wasn’t full, but it felt a little stale. Service was pretty good.
–TIT (Cedar Blvd.): Seasoning intensity is like 5x that of TLT’s but the food is laden with grease. For example, when you get vegetables, it’s literally dripping oil. I don’t know if I’m just accustomed to eating here but I prefer the more intense spices. The extra seasoning and oil make it good with rice. Also, the food comes out piping hot which is nice – skewers should have that extra sizzle. I haven’t been to the new TLT to know how consistent they make their food – maybe some days were better than what we had today. While TIT has been inconsistent in the past, the food has been really really good in the recent months.
Location wise, I like where TIT is because it’s in a relatively vibrant plaza with other late night establishments. It’s not a large space but it’s comfortable whether you go with one other person or 8 other people. There recently added larger TVs so it’s not awkwardly quiet even though it’s usually a weird Asian singing competition playing on screen.
The verdict? I’ll have to stick with TIT.