Utopia Cafe

One of the best Chinese Restaurants in SF. There Won Ton soup and General Chicken is delicious! I have eaten here several times and they are consistently on the mark!

It’s Chinese new year parade time! So have to get some authentic Chinese cuisine. I had the BBQ pork wonton noodles. Big bowl little price :-). The bbq pork flavor was spot on.

I came here with my friend a couple weeks ago and the food was great! I ordered the lemon chicken was it was juicy and perfectly seasoned. Today I decided to try the sesame salad and it wasn’t good at all and that’s why I am giving it three stars. Chicken was under seasoned and soggy, lettuce was half cooked. Also, some of the chicken pieces were so small that I mistook them for being lettuce.
I’m not one to complain about price, but portions are on the smaller side for the price.
My sister got the salt and pepper calamari and it was under seasoned and soggy. It seems everything I get is soggy

It’s quiet and the food is so good! We ordered steamed fish, stirred fried beef with broccoli, cuttlefish clay pot rice, spicy & sour soup. I will say the soup is not better than My China in SF Westfield. The steamed fish is so fresh and it tastes sweet. The beef is so tender. Just remember to remain them to put less oil on the dish!

I love their general shrimp so tasty and their house soup is so good. My dad always took me here and since he passed away I still come here because I love the warm welcoming of their food.

Good spot in Chinatown for claypot rice! Authentic as it gets without the grimeyness of a hole in the wall restaurant in Chinatown. I don’t know. Because I feel like cheap, authentic food usually means dirty hole in the wall. Thankfully that’s not the case here!
They got it down with the crispy edges on the bottom. Yyyyyyyyyyyyyas. Came with complementary soup (clearish broth with carrot and lotus root) that reminded me of what my mom/​dad make at home.
We also got the beef stir fried flat noodle which was alright considering their specialty is the claypots.
Approved!

Brunch with my parents and the fiancé
Coldand rainy Sunday
Free soup — root veggies, pork, carrots, dates — yum — perfect
Fried chicken wings — delish!
Steam egg with shrimp, mushroom, squid, peas on top — delicate. Definitely order again!
Chinese sausage + duck clay pot — very good but duck a little salty for my flavor
Chicken and ginger clay pot — standard but still tasty
Total: $ 45 w/​o tips
We all loved the food and good change of pace from regular Sunday dim sum in Chinatown

I came here with my friend for lunch after we finished our class from school. I came here because I saw the good review for the clay pot in this place. I really want to eat the beef in cray pot with raw egg since I ate the best one when I went to HongKong with my family. Then I found this place where serve the Hongkong style food. I order minced beef with raw egg in the cray pot which the waitress said it will take 20 mins and my friend got beef Chow Fan. I eat my friend Cho Fan and I like the taste of the noodle, it’s not to salty but my friend said it teastless. For my clay pot it come with the soy sauce on the side (?) and big bok choy on topped. I couln’t find my raw egg but I found cookes egg underneath. That’s fine I can eat it. Overall for my cray pot is good. Just good when I added soy sauce because if I didnt add it my dish taste nothing.
Anyway, I like it. May come back to try it again next time. :)

As a disclaimer: I did visit this place at about 9 PM when the rest of Chinatown was virtually closed, so whereas I would not visit this place again based on my experience, others may have had a much better experience during the day. However, in reality, the experience should be consistent from open to close, so I can’t base my review on what might have been.
PRO: One of the few open places open late in Chinatown (a lot of places close around 6 or 7 PM, and Chinatown itself is a ghost town at 9 PM).
SUMMARY: When we walked in we were warmly greeted, seated, provided menus, and then within a few moments after getting settled were asked if we would like anything to drink. Check. Looks like we are on our way to a solid experience. The menu is vast so you should be able to find something.
We ordered the egg roll (vegetarian) as an appetizer and I ordered the Hong Kong beef chow fun, while my girlfriend ordered something else (I can’t recall). The egg rolls came out promptly, but were super hot. Like, you might as well be drinking the frying oil hot (though they were not at all dripping with oil). Hot is good — heck of a lot better than cold. But scalding hot — I’d like a warning please. And it’s no fun being hungry and being forced to watch your food cool on the plate for 10 min before you can eat it. I’d rather it just be kept in the back until it is close to edible — maybe that’s just me.
The main dishes came out while we had barely begun the egg rolls, which, isn’t terrible since they were just egg rolls and this is a hole-​in-​the-​wall type place, so I can’t dock them for that. But, the meals were equally hot. Had to let those cool for a tad also. My meal was pretty lacking in beef and the entire thing was under seasoned and bland. It was like I got the leftovers from the day, which very well may have been the case.
While we were sitting down eating, the entire staff came out and had a «family meal» next to us. From then on, we received very poor attention. Now, I would not expect this to happen midday, but still, it was annoying in the least.
Good luck!

Great authentic Chinese (Cantonese) cooking. Their specialty is the rice clay pots, REALLY delicious. My favorite is the meat patty.
They serve complimentary «slow cooked» soups with your meal. It’s just like home!
Service is what you should expect at a Chinese restaurant that caters to mostly Chinese locals, i.e. It won’t be the best service but it’s sufficient.

Was recommended this place by a chinese resident foot reflexologist nearby. Great chinese food, with a true simple home-​cooked taste of Hong Kong. This is where chinese people eat.

Guys. I debated on writing this review, only because my friend really likes this place and knows the owner. But, seriously this is a no, no, no! The fish tank next to the bathroom in the main dining room had 2, maybe 3 dead fish. The water was so dark I couldn’t tell. Yes, dead fish! Then when you hit the bathroom the overwhelming odor of bleach damn near punches you in the face. Not to mention the dirty garbage bin, compost bin AND mop that hasn’t been changed probably since never! Lord have mercy. I am eating here? Do my friends not know me, or where they punishing me for something?
The one star is for the food and service. Honestly, the food was amazing! Each plate that arrived: the shrimp fried rice, Sweet and Sour Chicken, Mongolian Beef, Vegetable Pan Fried Noodles, the dumplings, everything was so flavorful! I really am glad that it was only after my meal that I saw the dead fish, and condition of the bathroom otherwise I would have said Happy Birthday to my friend and bounced!

Solid food and good value. I’d stick with the preserved meat claypot over the minced pork and salted fish.
$ 20 min for credit card, so if your light eaters, bring cash

As far as I’m concerned this is authentic Hong Kong style. It’s set up as a low key place with modest interior décor. This restaurant is not set up for tourists which some Chinatown restaurants do. I really liked everything I had including yang chow fried rice, cucumber soup and some fish. It can get busy at lunchtime because of its growing reputation. Prices are also lower than what you would expect.

I’m walking by and an elderly Chinese gentleman walks out of the restaurant. He looks at me, points to the door and says, «good food.» I have a frog hotpot (tastes like Chicken but better). It’s excellent. Service us businesslike but friendly by the standards of Chinatown. I think I saw the same gentleman going out the door several times; he is right, though — good food.

The service is mediocre at best. If you come with two people they expect you to at least order two things.
The clay pot rice was a good size. It fed the two of us. The rice was crispy on the bottom.

Came on a Sunday night at around 7pm. Only around 20% full. My friend grew up in SF recommended this place to me having the best clay pot rice in town, so decided to give it a try.
#Soup (free): A.
Yes I have to talk about this soup. It was really good and served for free! I think they put red carrot, green carrot, pork bone and some other ingredients in it. Clearly the soup has been boiled for a very long time otherwise it wouldn’t have a rich taste to it. My friend and I had 3 small bowls each of this soup. Wish we could have more!
#Preserved Meat Clay Pot Rice 臘味煲仔飯: A-​.
Pretty good. Not to a point that I would say it’s exceptional but the preserved meats were very tasty (sometimes with low quality preserved meat they could taste bland) and they put a lot of meat inside. One of the key point of clay pot rice is the overcooked rice at the very bottom of the pot (飯焦) — those are usually brownish-​black color literally taste like burned rice but with the absorption of soy sauce from the top, it’s one of the most unique and good flavor one can ask for. And yes, this clay pot has got it right! Although it would be even better if it’s overcooked even more.
#Garlic Pea Sprout: A.
The vege was fresh, garlic amount and cooking time was just about right. Very nice.
Will definitely come back and try other clay pot rice flavors!

Trying to get through the list means exploring new places to eat and having fun while doing so. Since there was a slow day at work, my coworker and I decided to go up to Chinatown and grab some food.
We ordered:
Soup — I think we got this for free? I’m not even sure. It was pretty good regardless.
Clay pot with salted fish and minced pork — really was a good dish, but since there was so much rice, it was really hard to mix together. Although when it was mixed, it was delicious. Just beware of the fish bones!
Mongolian beef — came out earlier than our other dish. But the Mongolian beef wasn’t bad. Definitely was a great accompaniment to our rice.
They definitely have a great tea — so definitely get it.
Overall, service is as you expect at a Chinese restaurant, but the food was great too. I did wish that they brought the food out together… or at least a little more together. Not waiting 5 mins between dishes — even though we were sharing.
Protip: those clay pots are great.

They are known for clay pot rice so get one!
Takes about 20 minute for the clay pot rice to be done.

I was fiendin’ for clay pot rice so I ventured to Utopia Café as per 7×7’s recommendation. It was packed at 6:30pm on a Saturday night, so that was reassuring. Service was quite slow, but you are quite foolish if you expect attentive service at a Chinese restaurant.
We started the meal with complimentary wintermelon and pork soup. It was lukewarm, but hey, free is free.
Salted fish and minced pork rice in clay pot: This made 7×7’s Big Eat 2014 list, and I don’t quite understand why. The dish lacked the characteristic crispy rice at the bottom of the clay pot, and the topping was satisfactory at best. The strongest flavor came from the saltiness of the salted cod. This dish was overall rather disappointing.
Braised Tofu & Mushrooms: I recommend this dish. My friend who claimed to not like tofu actually really liked this dish. But then again, this was his first time having tofu outside of a cafeteria.
I don’t see myself returning here. My hunt for bomb clay pot rice continues. I’m sure I’ll find something in Chinatown.