My Auspicious Review

Over the holidays, I passed by Auspicious Chinese Restaurant, right next to Milkboy on Ardmore's Cricket Ave. It seemed swanky, and strangely out of place. The name was weird, and I asked myself "is it auspiciously good?" K had told me that she got takeout from there and had liked it, so I decided to give it a shot. I decided to overlook the corniness of their website address (go ahead, click on it and find out for yourself). They also have very punny dish names. Weird.




Indeed, it is very swanky on the inside. Clean lines, dark woods, definitely not typical of a chinese restaurant. The serving staff was also caucasian. PF Chang's anyone? Some green tea was ordered. It said it was "gourmet tea". It seemed pretty ordinary to me.



We got the sesame chicken. It was very breaded and the portion was small. We were still hungry afterwards. We've both had far better sesame chicken at my local takeout place. They're also very very stingy with their rice. You get a very small cup. Way too small for my liking. You have to ration it.

We also got the ni hao ma po tofu, or to normal people, just ma po tofu. I've had this before, but never this runny. It was good though, and extremely spicy. It sure would have been nice to have lots of rice to eat it with. I know it was a "lunch" portion, but come one. We're hungry. When you eat chinese food, you expect decent portions. And espcially with the prices, they shouldn't be so paltry.

When our check came, they brought out chocolate fortune cookies. I've never seen these before. I was intrigued. Then I ate it. This was the grossest thing I've ever had in my life. Not only did it taste bad, it was beyond stale. Even if it wasn't stale, it would have been disgusting. Awful. Just awful! The service was ok. Nothing spectacular. You can tell it's a pretty new restaurant. If they put a bit more effort into the FOOD and not the decor, they might have something. But it's not for me. I'll stick to my local takeout. It's about the food, and thish place just isn't anything special. Auspicious Chinese Restaurant - it's auspiciously mediocre!