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| - It is not "often true" but "always true" when a restaurant changes hands all previous reviews immediately become worthless. I wish Yelp would delete such reviews when someone buys an existing restaurant location. And that works both ways ... whether previous reviewers loved or hated a place before the new owners took over is meaningless
So my first experience with Dragon Bowl was October 1, 2014 under the "new" ownership. My experience was first-class in every respect. Yes it is a small hole-in-the-wall mom & pop place (my favorite kind of restaurant) but it is cheap and for the most part, surprisingly good.
I won't mention by name a nearby place which I had been getting Chinese food delivered from for about 7 or 8 years. They originally had bad reviews, then they seemed to improve and I gave them a boosted rating, then they fell apart. The food was bad, the quantities were embarrassingly small, their prices went up, their delivery person was scary and the last straw was they grossly overcharged on a delivery and their receipt was a blank piece of paper with the total on it, no itemization.
Dragon Bowl was a substantially different experience. The person who answered the phone was nice but had trouble understanding us. Not a problem, English is probably not her first language. The food is lower priced than my previous favorite but the quantities are shockingly larger and of much higher quality. The delivery person was friendly, on time, and was in a good mood.
One of my litmus tests for Chinese food is Hot & Sour soup, which can range from sewer dredges to gourmet. I especially like it on a cold rainy night and once had my favorite go-to place that I would go out of my way to, um, go to. They were in a different part of the country so my challenge was to find a place in Phoenix that is anywhere near as good. Dragon Bowl is better. I was blown away what was in it for the very low price ... big tender juicy shrimp, tasty hunks of pork, vegetables, tofu, crispy bamboo shoots and so many things I couldn't identify them all. Even by the time it got to us it was steaming hot. And speaking of hot, it was one of the spiciest Hot & Sour soups I've ever tasted. In other words, perfect.
Having a light appetite we also had the Pu Pu Platter. Again the price was dirt cheap for the quantity of food and it had all of the traditional components. I did find the ribs too chewy for my taste but otherwise every part of it was larger and tastier than my old Chinese restaurant. Honestly, one bowl of soup each and about half the Pu Pu Platter was so filling the rest was saved for leftovers.
There are a lot of things that can influence dropping an old favorite restaurant and finding a new one. If I had read the negative rating first about the old ownership of Dragon Bowl I may not have tried it. I'm glad I did and recommend you at least give it a chance, or give it a second try if you didn't like it before.
PS. There are about 5 servings per container of soup, my photo shows approximately 1 serving.
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