The very best thing here is the Peking duck or stir fry crab. Also order the garlic fried rice. A secret is their outstanding wine list. Arrive at 4:45 pm for the 1st seating.
This was our first restaurant when we first came to Berkeley about 3 years ago. Our Taiwanese friend who lives here over 20 years took us here. We waited over an hour for a table. We ordered about 7 plates for 4 people. This Chinese food reminds me of my childhood. Everything is so delicious, but very expensive. If you ever go to the wedding in Thailand, food are pretty much like this restaurant. Chinese-Thai style wedding food. To me is nothing spectacular, nothing like I have ever had before, but if you have only Chinese buffet or only Panda Express for your Chinese meal, this restaurant will blow your head off!
Pretty decent peking roast duck. The skin was crispy and the meat was tender. However, the wraps came uncovered and they were sticking to each other. And the wraps got cold really fast and then got hard since they came uncovered.The snow pea leaves was good. We also got the wonton soup which wasn’t to my liking. There were broccolis in there and the soup was pretty bland. But overall a good northern chinese restaurant in Berkeley.
So happy that Great China is open again for indoor dining! They open at 11:30 and we arrived at 12. Thankfully the line wasn’t around the corner like pre-pandemic but we still had to wait about 50 minutes for a table of 8. The wait wasn’t so bad since it was great weather and half of our parties were running late.We were seated closer to 1 pm but it did take a while and us trying to flag down a waiter a couple of times before being able to put our order in. We ordered, 2 Peking duck, a large sizzling rice soup, sautéed crab meat with steamed buns, Mongolian beef, mandarin chicken wings, sautéed Ong-choy with garlic, combination fried rice and combination chow mein. Sizzling rice soup was clean and refreshing and a great start to the meal. The Peking duck came out one at a time (probably due to the limited table space we had) but they were perfect. The duck meat was not fatty at all and the skin is -chef kiss- perfect! Our friends who were first timer in eating Peking duck and/or first time at Great China went wild on the Peking duck and cleared the two orders pretty quickly. Next up was the sautéed crab meat with steamed bun. This was the perfect combination and a must try! The crab meat is mixed with egg yolk and some sort of soy sauce that can be a bit salty if eaten by itself but if paired with the hot and soft steamed bun, it was perfect! The Mongolian beef, sautéed Ong-choy, fried rice and chow mein were also good. However the other star of the day was the mandarin chicken wings! The wings comes out on a bed of sauce hut somehow still stayed crunchy/crispy and the sauce packs a ton of flavor for it.The service as mentioned early on is a bit slow at times but picks up and is attentive in parts of our time there. I think it could just be the fact that everyone is understaffed and when we had little service/attention, it was when the restaurant was packed. During these times, I would encourage everyone to be a bit patience as the service industry as a whole is understaffed and they are doing the best they can.Overall a great experience and the food is still as amazing as I remembered it pre-pandemic. We also got some of our friends to try different types of Chinese food than they were used to and they loved it! Highly recommend this place. Pro-tip: you can reserve a table on Yelp or on their website if you plan a bit in advance to visit here. We didn’t because we decided to come here around the time they opened.
Excellent dining experience! Have not been here in over 2 years and was happy to discover food is still so good. The wait staff so attentive, kept refilling our glasses without fail. The duck was the bomb just as before. The pork dumplings were so flavorful, the spring rolls crispy and yummy. And all the portions generous. The only dish I didn't love was the thrice cooked pork, but everything else was awesome.
Once upon a time the best Peking duck in the bay. Still good but not jaw dropping.
Good place for chinese food. I came here with family for a birthday. The service was great. The food is great. Good place for groups and sharing food.
The Chinese food here is kinda cracked if I'm honest. Everything we ordered was really good. I especially like the honey walnut shrimp, Beijing roast duck, and xue yu (codfish?). But the other dishes were great too. There was a green vegetable I like a lot but I don't remember the name.
Great food, lovely atmosphere. To be repeated
Best place for duck. It's already deboned! Nice setting but the service isn't great. Better than the hole in the wall Chinese place but still lacking. Reservations only for 6+ people and there's a requirement that everyone spend at least $35, which is a weird requirement. Everything is pricey so it's not like that's not going to happen.