We recently developed a liking for Panda Kitchen due to its favoursome dishes. I know it is well known for its clay pot dishes but I find them bland compared to the clay pot dishes I used to get at home. What we like about Panda Kitchen are some of the dishes that we rarely find in other places. For example, the braised duck - it’s not the usual braised duck. This dish also comes with yam at the bottom and the sauce is really nice! And the stir fry mixed vegetables - as boring as the name sounded, it was delicious! We also noticed a few vegetarian dishes and so will give it a go next time.
Have visited this place quite a few times with family and the quality of the food is very consistent.
It is a small, bustling Cantonese cuisine restaurant, who also do takeaways. I’ve visited here during both lunch and dinner services and they are always busy, but service is always quick! Never too long of a wait between ordering and service.
My favourites would be the salt and pepper pork chop and their clay pot rice dishes are a must try! So many good combinations. Have had their steamed fish also and it was lovely. Good selection of seasonal vegetables (you can ask the waiter/waitress for what they have). Generous portions and their dishes are always fresh, well-balanced in flavour (not overly salty and no msg to my knowledge).
Would recommend you to give it a go if you’re in the area and dining with a larger group!
A great place for fast cheap Cantonese style Chinese food. Very generous servings and food tastes pretty good. It’s becoming my favourite local place to dine when I’m too lazy to cook and want something fast and delicious. Mussel congee is the best here. Also love their chicken clay pot rice and crispy noodles with shredded pork and mushrooms.
I ordered "Clay Pot Rice - Chicken and Mushroom". It was very filling, could not finish it so took away the leftover. The meal was very very delicious although the wait time was slightly long. It was reasonavle ok. Soy sauce that was given wasn't too strong, went well with the rice. The only downside was the communication part..
Big fan of their Cantonese styled dishes. It's a low frill restaurant but food was top notch. Dishes were cooked over a big flame. We'd be back to try more!
Awesome little place we visited on a little exploration down Gooch. Lovely staff. $1.50 corkage where can you go wrong!? Ordered two seafood mains and the deep fried buns with condensed milk dipping sauce. All was to die for and enormous servings!! Suggested to all my friends who have loved it as well. Will definitely be back!!
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We visited this little restaurant (could be a past restaurant at same shop location) some years ago. We visited again today after searching for Chinese (Hong Kong) eating outlets in East Auckland. In fact We were craving for crispy combination noodles and found Panda Restaurant has this dish from a past review(thank you). Feeling very confident, we ordered combination noodles, salt and pepper fish fillet and chicken clay pot rice. After a long wait, the dishes came out. First the clay pot, then the fish and finally the combination noodles. The dishes we exactly how we thought they would be, nicely cooked, just as I craved for. The only disappointment was that the combination noodles were stirred fried and not deep fried ‘crispy as I read from the past review. I would have given this restaurant full marks had my craving been met 100% but nonetheless, all dishes were very delicious. Friendly service but the diners were extremely noisy and the tiny restaurant could not hold the noise well. This is a nice place to just eat and go, very reasonable price too and excellent food. The portion size was heaps for the two of us. Will definitely be back and next time, we must ask for the combination noodles to be cooked ‘crispy’.
PS. Since I discovered this place about 2-3 months ago, I had been back (both dine in and takeaway) at least 4 times since. However, each time we pay, the bill never really add up to the prices as shown on menu. It was often about $4-5 dearer (for 2 people or an order of 2-3 dishes). During the last order, I asked them to tell me the charges and was told the sweet & sour chicken was $20 and combination fried noodles $14. Prices on the first menu on Zomato was $16 for the sweet & sour chicken, the printed menu (photocopy of the actual menu) showed $18 for that dish. Now they are charging $20 for that dish. I feel a bit cheated though I love their food. I thought I'd better note this so if you are wondering why the charges are more, it is because they charge as they wish really, not according to the price as per menu. Going to change my rating from 4.5 to 4. (Updated 15/4/18)
Heard this place was pretty good, so dropped in here for an early dinner at 5pm. Serving Cantonese dishes, we ordered the Sweet and Sour Pork, Fish Fillet with Sweet Corn sauce, Braised Tofu and the Combination Fried Noodles. The Sweet and Sour Pork was crispy when I took my first bite, very delicious. The Braised Tofu is one of my favourite dishes to order for dinner. If only the tofu was a bit more hot, then it would have met my expectations. The Combination Fried Noodles was so good-the noodles were so crispy and the sauce/gravy that they used to stir fry it was tasty. The beef and chicken were cooked perfectly. This canteen only has a small number of tables, so don't expect to find a table during rush hour I suppose. This place is made for family style gatherings, and if you're wanting cheap eats, this is the place to go!
Great food. One of the better chinese restaurants around. The food wasn't oily and had awesome flavour. Very polite staff. Will gladly return.
The dining area of this restaurant isn't big. Only can hold less than 10 tables, including 2 to 3 big round tables which can sit up to 10 to 12 pax. So, when it's full house, can be quite intimate.
Decor is quite basic. Nothing fancy. Service friendly. Food came out quite fast. Food typical Cantonese food. Quite good taste. Relatively cheap.
We chow down when we hit Howick. It’s one of my family’s favourite areas for Asian eating, and that’s available in droves in the Meadowlands shopping area. So is carparking these days, which is a relief. The four of us hit up five-ish dishes and we spent very little and ate very much. We had mixed success with our food choices, but you end up getting a lot of portion for the price and the service is warm and friendly. The ambience is more clinical, though it’s the kind of place where my parents will bump into one of their casino buddies. A recommended choice for the area.
I go there all the time, really good food with reasonable price. What I love the most is the varieties of vegetarian dishes. Highly recommended
Literally a taste of home!!! If you are craving street styled canton/HK food, this place is a hidden gem in the neighbourhood!!!
Their claypot rice "bo jai farn" is absolutely amazing!!!! The rice doesn't get too dry down the bottom of the pot and the chicken, mushroom & Chinese sausage goes beautifully well!!! As well as the fish congee is so soothing and warm to have over the wintertime!!! Above all, the prices are so reasonable!!! Only $12 and $6 respectively!!!
Only let down would be the environment but then again, if you can cope with the noisy Asian environment then this place is amaaaaaaazing
Great variety of food. Owner is accomodating with orders saying "if you're happy, im happy". Roast pork and bbq pork rice meals are very cheap indeed with huge portions. I've been many times and this places a lot higher rating.
The various of food are nice & good big portion, especially the clay-pot rice. Price is reasonable. This had become my regular weekend lunch place with other families.
Best stone rice pots I’ve had. Authentic stone pots, yummy selection, generous portion, super tasty!! Efficient service, atmosphere I rated well cos it’s your typical ‘messy’ but hearty Asian congregation table layout for a feed.
Always satisfied with the stone pots, special shout-out to salted fish and pork. Won’t be disappointed! Consistency in the dishes is always spot on as well, have been a few times now and still happy with the food each time.
My first time to try Pand kitchen. From my 3 take away orders today, Steamed chicken w mushroom is nicely seasoned, fish fillet in braised tofu is ok, the fillet is tender. The Shanghai noodles a bit dry thus makes it hard.
A very small restaurant, came for lunch today, food were delicious, will come again!
Decided to try Panda Kitchen after a recommendation. Went there around 7.30pm, so it was not that busy. Ordered and the food came out quickly. The claypot rice is pretty good and the Cantonese style fried vermicelli was tasty too. The fried rice noodle with beef (& soy sauce) was a little bland. The Congee was ok, maybe too much pepper. Overall not bad and I would still come back for the claypot rice
First time trying here. I love claypot rice so definitely tried it here. We had the claypot chicken and mushroom, claypot salted fish with pork and also salted fish with eggplant on rice. My favourite was the claypot chicken and mushroom, the rice was nicely separated but good texture. The mushroom and chicken adds good flavour to the rice and also tasted good themselves. The claypot pork was not as good, the pork texture I feel was the wrong type of pork, probably would be better using pork belly, as well as the salted fish was too bony but I quite like the saltiness. The eggplant salted fish was not bad also, but I feel lacking sauce and for this dish the salted fish was not salty enough, therefore I am not sure if there are multiple batches of salted fish in this restaurant. Anyway I still quite enjoy my meal here and price is ok.
This was one of the few places in Auckland that does claypot rice so we came by to try it. They were quite busy but we were able to get a table without waiting too long. Their menu is decently sized with one side containing and rice and noodles dishes and the other the meal dishes for sharing.
With the claypot rice they had quite a few options. I have tried the chicken and mushroom one as well as the persevered meat one. Both were really tasty and had a nice amount of topping and rice. The rice had a nice texture and it did crisp up in the claypot so there were the crunch pieces to enjoy with it.
We also some of their other items and I really liked the raw fried sticky rice as well as their egg tofu. The prices were fairly cheap considering the amount of food that we got. It is a great place for lunch or dinner and has become one of my new favorite places for tasty Chinese food.
The most authentic Cantonese dishes are found here! Very tasty rice and noodle dishes with genuine ingredients and unbelievable price! Please be patient as the place is small and always full house especially in the weekend! Very nice Cantonese rice dumplings!
My absolute fav & go-to spot for claypot rice in Auckland.. Love the claypots, the Luohan Zhai (mixed vegetarian dish), the fried calamari, and for dessert: herbal jelly with condensed milk!! Lovely staff, authentic flavours and good portions :)
Worth to come back again. One of the most popular places to enjoy Cantonese Clay pot rice dish！
Dope as Claypot rice for $16. Was feeling well ready to take a nap afterwards. Could use a little more flavouring but otherwise value for money to be had. Will return when the cravings come back
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