Great Mandarin – Eden Prairie, MN

I work close to the Eden Prairie Mall and sometimes during my lunch break, I have to run errands and buy random things. Today was one of those days where I had to take out a flock of birds with very few stones. While perusing the mall, I saw a Chinese food restaurant. I was in an eating mood, so I popped into the Great Mandarin on the lower floor of the mall.

A random guy seated me and ended up being the nicest waiter in the world. Super talkative and not annoying. He told me to help myself and I headed to the buffet. There was a really large salad area, but the Chinese food items all looked pretty sad. It looked like it was all slightly overcooked and had been sitting there a while. There were plenty of people in the restaurant, so I don’t think that was the case, but everything looked really…. Brown. There were about 8 entrée dishes and a couple of appetizer things and two soups. I piled my plate high and grabbed a bowl of egg drop soup and went back to my table.

I started with the appetizers: the cream cheese wonton was really quite overdone. The shell was painful to bite into and the cheese on the inside was just a little too firm, like it was long past it’s time to be on a buffet. The egg roll was also quite overdone, but the flavor was fine on it, so I’ll only complain a little bit about it. The egg drop soup is the kind that reminds me of snot, so I didn’t even finish my bowl. Uggh. Not a good start.

The entrees didn’t redeem this place at all. The General Chicken was super overdone and gummy. The broccoli beef was sad. The vegetable medley wasn’t good at all. However, the green beans in some brown sauce were quite good, so I’m glad I got to finish my meal with those things. Most of the food here was not appealing and I’m hoping the things on the menu are much better than the buffet indicated.

The friendly waiter made sure my glass was full and let me eat in peace, and occasionally came over to chat without being a pest. Seriously, the staff here love their jobs and are really good at them (well maybe, not the cooks, but the service staff were fantastic). I also noticed this place has a super stocked bar. There wasn’t a single person in the bar area, but it looked like it might need to be hit up. In fact, on this day, I decided what the theme for 2011 would be. This is the earliest decision on a theme I’ve ever made. In fact, 2010’s theme – The Year of Three – was decided at the tail end of December. So the theme of 2011 is going to be The Year of Drinking in Malls. Anytime I can find a full bar in a mall, I’m going to grab a drink, because…. Why WOULDN’T you?!?! I’m looking forward to 2011 more and more now.

Overall, this place was really disappointing and had very subpar food. But honestly, I feel awful about giving it bad marks because the staff was so awesome. Heck, I want to go back and just hang out with my waiter. Hahahahaha. They’re good people, so maybe I’ll give the place a shot and order something off the menu on the safe side. I’m a big fan of three-strikes-you’re-out at restaurants ad this is on the first strike… I’ll just have to talk myself into it (or fully utilize the bar…..).

Top 5 things about Great Mandarin
1. Wait staff
2. Full bar
3. Green beans in sauce
4. Egg roll flavor
5. It helped me plan the theme for 2011

Bottom 5 things
1. General Chicken
2. Overcooked cream cheese wonton
3. Overcooked egg roll
4. Snotty egg drop soup
5. Broccoli beef