Sun Wah Bar-B-Que

I was in the mood for a hearty lunch with rice, so I stopped here one Sunday afternoon. I ordered the BBQ Combo plate with duck and roast pork as well as the beef chow fun. The roast pork had crispy skin, but the meat was a bit dry. The duck was pretty good. The noodles were okay. Read my review at

Their food is served cold, they don’t say anything, and then they just microwave it for you when you dine in. Absolutely foul, people didn’t even want to deal with me after… You expect me to eat, non-​refrigerated pork that’s just been sitting there all day? BIG NO NO wish i could rate 0 stars. Or report them?

My lunch visit today made me want to call a Sun Wah-​mbulance; insert sad clown slide whistle here. It’s my dad’s favorite Chinese restaurant and we’ve gone every special occasion that he’s wanted. I’m talking about years of father’s days and his birthdays spent here getting duck service. It’s risen in price over the years but it makes my father happy and has always been delicious.
Today, the BBQ pork was as dry as the Sahara. I also ordered wrong with getting the lo mein so that’s on me. This was room temperature and resembled the ribbon egg noodles you buy for 99c. I deducted two stars for both of those facts and the indifferent service.
I always expect the indifferent service but have looked past it cause the food has always been excellent. They failed health inspections in the past. So what? I know what happens in some kitchens and they wouldn’t be open if they didn’t get back up to code.
Mediocre food is one thing I can’t excuse. I won’t be in a hurry to go back, special occasion or not.
The one bright spot of the meal was the shrimp with vegetables and rice noodles (chow fun.) The difference in texture of the noodles was excellent.

Sun Wah is solid and I have been going there for the last four years. Their food is pretty consistent and the duck special is definitely the thing to get here. It’s not on the menu and is $ 40 for the duck special (it used to be $ 35) — you can just ask for it and the servers will know what you’re talking about. It’s a great deal — you get a whole duck, which they cut in front of you, bao (buns) with pickled veggies, duck soup and duck fried rice. In my opinion, one special is enough to feed 3 people. The duck is juicy and its skin is really crispy — soo good. Service is quick — no need to wait a long time for the duck.
The service here is pretty standard — straight to the point and no fuss. The restaurant doesn’t look the cleanest so I wouldn’t go on a super nice date here. Also, the duck does not taste good reheated — so be sure to finish it all there!

Their famous peking duck is «off menu» so be sure to call ahead and let them know you’re ordering it! They were good enough to accommodate a large party of me and my friends within short notice on Memorial Day (thank goodness for us Chinese not giving a sh*t about national holidays and staying open!)
Seriously the duck is all you should get here, everything else is standard or even subpar.
Peking duck trio — the duck meat/​skin/​fat in a bun is classic classic Chinese cuisine and I LOVE IT!!! The bun, plum sauce, scallion, duck meat combo is delicious and everyone should enjoy it at least once in their lives. If you break your vegetarianism, this would be the dish! The soup was made out of the duck bones and was light and refreshing after the fatty duck meat you just had. The duck fried rice is meh, I coulda done without it, it just seems to be a filler.
Unfortunately this place uses lots of MSG as I was thirsting real hard afterwards. But the duck is to die for. Come for the duck, don’t order anything else!

My mom asked me to buy a whole chicken from Sun Wah in Arygle. Since my dog was in the car I hurried and bought it without noticing how small it was. When I got home my mom told me I got cheated because I didn’t know any better and got a really small chicken for the price. She went straight back in the store demanding a refund for «cheating my son». Got our money back and went to Hong Kee which is a block away and got our chicken for 4 bucks less and double the size.
Lesson learned…
1. You don’t mess with moms, especially mine
2. No matter if I’m a ABC (American Born Chinese), White, Black, or Latino you shouldn’t be giving product that is less value to those ignorant of what we can actually get. That’s just bad customer service. Our family owns a restaurant and my mom and dad is proud that we would eat whatever we serve to our customers.
3. At restaurants that sell Chinese BBQ meats, you should always be able to select which one you want.

I agree with some other reviews here. It was good but not amazing. We ordered the Peking duck and various other dishes that weren’t overly memorable. The Peking duck had good flavor, but I think the fat could have been rendered a bit more under the skin. I wouldn’t mind eating duck here again, but I wouldn’t make a special trip for other dishes. I’ve certainly had better Pecking duck in my life, but I haven’t had it elsewhere in Chicago, so I can’t compare. Nice to go here in a group and enjoy family style. If I remember correctly, they only accept up to 2 credit cards on the bill.

The food was alright, the price was cheap.
The service was not good, our water was not refilled. The restaurant was so busy.
Rice with roast pork and duck, wonton soup were good.
Dont order dry chowmein with combination bbq: So salty because of the oyster sauce, and the meat (especially pork/​charsiu) was really dried. Duck and chicken were good though. I had to add more soup to make it noodle soup.
I will come back to this restaurant to try peking duck!

I might be hated for this, but I thought this place was just aight. It wasn’t my choice to eat at a Chinese restaurant in Chicago, but we had a family member who really wanted Chinese food, so we obliged. The duck was good, but not the most outstanding duck ever. Coming from LA, I was expecting the reviews for his place to be inflated, but it was okay.
We ordered the duck meal which comes with buns, fried rice, and soup. Like I said, the duck was good, but the fried rice and soup are super-​duper bland. Those two side are essentially made of duck scraps, and whatever other stuff they want to toss in there. I was really disappointed in those sides. We did order some other items which ended up becoming the saving grace for the meal. There was salt and pepper shrimp, tofu cubes with shrimp (these were the standout), and heir eggplant was also pretty good.
Oh! And this place is BYOB, but the condition is that they charge $ 10 for you to drink your booze there, so, I wouldn’t say it’s legit. If I have to pay to drink my booze in your «BYOB» establishment, that defeats the purpose of BYOB, no? In short, drink somewhere else, get some duck, but not the meal, and order some of the tofu with shrimp. Those were good :)

For me, Sun Wah occupies one is of the — good deal, I’d eat here again, but I’m not going to rave about it types of restaurants. Considering portion size, price, and speed of service — this is definitely going to win over a big crowd as I’m not sure you could eat better Chinese BBQ in this area at prices this low. At the same time, I’m not going to say that this is the best Chinese BBQ I’ve ever had (not by a mile) — and it’s not even the best in every category in the area either (unfortunately, there’s not really one place that wins it all — but individual restaurants do have their own best Chinese BBQ dish).
With that said — definitely come here for the roast pork and roast duck. I’d skip any of the chicken preparations (not tender and juicy enough in my opinion) and am okay with pretty much every other BBQ item they have. I’m pretty indifferent to their other dishes as they’re done alright (but not great… and actually a bit on the pricey side for Chinese).
Definitely give this place a visit if you’re in the area and try their duck, but don’t make a special trip if you visit the normal Chinatown often.

I just moved to Chicago a month ago and came here twice already! I came here on a Wednesday night and again today on a Saturday. I would highly recommend that you make a reservation on a weekend as it gets pretty busy.
The Peking duck here is one of the best I’ve had in the states. although the duck skin can be a bit crispier, it was really tasty. The bun is nice and soft and goes really well with the meat. (Tip: put lots of meat in your bun!)
The order of Peking duck gives you a large portion of fried rice and soup. I would say the plate serves 3 – 4 just fine.
So a review of the order:
1. Duck (¹⁰⁄₁₀)
2. Fried rice (⁷⁄₁₀) — nothing special but will give a high score for the portion they gave
3. Soup (⁶⁄₁₀) — nothing special, but do ask for more scallions for the soup, tastes better
The second time I came (2 of us) we ordered the bar b q pork and some veggies on the side. Obviously ordered too much and regretting it as it sits waiting in the fridge.
The bbq pork wasn’t that good it was cold, too — don’t recommend. The veggies which I forgot what name it was, was alright — came with rice.
Overall just come for the duck — won’t disappoint. But the rest of the food, I’m not so sure — didn’t really try it.

Before my trip, my mother told me of Sun Wah in Chicago, known for their delectable Chinese BBQ. As my boyfriend and I were up in Wrigleyville for a Cubs game, we decided to take advantage of being so close and venture the couple of miles to Argyle and Sun Wah. We arrived early on a Friday night, and the restaurant was busy but not completely packed yet. We snagged one of the last open tables and fortunately, did not have to wait. The dining area of Sun Wah is pretty huge, and for the entire restaurant to be packed, this was a very good sign.
We were greeted with menus, waters, and as expected with any Chinese restaurant, a swift and curt ordering process. I love wonton soup and the congee on their menu looked appealing, but my boyfriend is not a huge fan of soups, so I stuck to ordering my favorite Cantonese dishes, some of my requests were even off-​menu but they made them anyway! We enjoyed the following, which was obviously way too much food for the two of us:
–BBQ Combo: BBQ pork, roast duck, soy sauce chicken
–Beef dry flat noodles
–Peiking spareribs
–Salt and pepper squid
The thing I love about this place is that many of their dishes come in two sizes, so we opted for a smaller size on most dishes. We would have been wasting much more food had we been subjected to the normal full-​size Chinese family servings.
There’s things this place does very well, and things that are done not so well. Firstly, their BBQ is fantastic – the duck, chicken, BBQ pork – all of it was fantastic! The salt and pepper squid was good but not the best I’ve ever had. The Peiking spareribs were also good although slightly too sweet, and finally, the beef noodles was the worst dish of our selection – some noodles were burnt, most had fallen apart, and the flavor was not all there. I’d love to come back because the food was overall delish, but I’d likely stick with ordering more BBQ next time and less of their other items.

Awesome place to get Peking duck. I’ve been here twice now, one for a birthday which I got to try a plethora of dishes and another for family gathering. Needless to say, I really really love the Peking duck here. Other stand outs are the bok choy with garlic — oooh so good and I liked the shrimp soup. Prices were reasonable although their large order of fried rice looks more like a medium to me, but that’s not that big of a deal.

4 stars for chicago suburbs; 3 stars for the general chinese/​peking duck restaurant.
Great with a group of friends — very large restaurant. I came with a group of 5. We ordered peking duck, tofu seafood casserole, cha siu, chinese broccoli, and black bean clams.
Peking Duck ($ 40) — This is what they are known for. It isn’t bad but it’s also not really peking duck. This is more of the bbq duck chinese people buy as a dish for regular dinner. Peking duck has much crispier skin due to the way they cook it. (drying out the skin and roast it until super crispy). I’m probably being picky but it’s an improvement area. It comes with buns (pre-​bought and steams) plus garnishing. The duck also comes with duck fried rice and duck soup. This probably serves 3 – 4 people.
Black bean clams — flavor and taste is decent but they give you a handful of clams and mix in pork. Since clams don’t have a lot of meat, this dish usually gives you a big pile. Sun Wah is pretty stingy here and I guess they mix in the pork to balance it.
Chinese broccoli — standard.
Cha siu — a bit dry.
Tofu seafood casserole — don’t order this. The seafood is likely frozen which fine. But the squid is pretty poorly cooked. There isn’t a lot of seafood but a lot of tofu. It’s supposed to be a lighter dish but it came out pretty bland.
I would consider going back when I miss eating authentic Chinese food but I would probably order differently except for maybe the duck because it’s hard to find that around here.

I love their duck feast. Their duck is one of the best ducks I ever had in my life. I usually have it with century egg on the side. You should also try their spare ribs. For appetizers we had fried fish ball served with lemon sauce.

COST:
~ $ 40 (Tofu, Fish Stew, Wonton Soup, Crab Fried Rice)
How can I begin? Rice just isn’t one of my food staples anymore so when I had family over for a weekend and they asked for some rice, my brain just couldn’t process where to take them. So off I go and searched for some good Chinese restaurants on Unilocal and found this place.
It’s a very convenient location right by the Argyle stop. Once you get off the train you actually start smelling all the delicious Asian cuisine aromas: phở, ramen or chowmein dishes. We were going to try a phở place, but we decided to stick to course.
I’m so glad we did because the food was delicious and tasted like authentic Chinese cuisine that puts Chinatown back in LA to shame.
The best part of the meal is probably the tofu dish for me. It had little shrimps inside the tofu… nice touch! The sauces are so flavorful too. Next time, I’m trying a duck for sure!

Great for large groups. The food us fantastic — every dish we ordered was well seasoned, succulent, filling, and serve hot. The fact the place is BYOB also not only makes it «cozy» (you know BYOBs just have a certain feel), it also makes it easier on the wallet.
Date/​outing suggestion: pair dinner here with a trip to Green Mill Lounge and you’ve got a nice night in Uptown.

Shanghai Palace in the Peninsula hotel, Chicago has excellent Peking duck. Their sauces are made fresh and are uniquely delicious.
The Peking duck at Sun Wah was also excellent — and more in quantity and more skin — which is the desirable and delicious part of the Peking duck eating experiences.
It is difficult to say whether the Peking duck at Shanghai Palace is better or worse than the same at Sun Wah. Both are different dining experiences.
The dining atmosphere at Sun Wah is quite basic. They are very busy but the service was quite good.
The order of whole Peking duck comes with Clear broth soup (enough for 5 people!), fried rice and a bun type of pouch for the peking duck, along with the sauces. This is a large order, enough for 3 to 6 people. Even if you don’t order anything else from the menu, the peking duck is sufficient for 4 people.
I disliked the clear broth soup. It is probably authentic and a Chinese person might give it 5 stars but it is not to my taste.
The fried rice which came with the Peking duck was not good. Completely, I disliked it. It is like a fried rice you might get at a fast food Chinese. Nothing authentic about it.
We tried the hot and our soup — small serves 4 to 6 people! Really!
I disliked it but my friend put some hot sauce in it and loved it.
The hot and sour soup was not bad but nothing special either. It is better than the typical hot and sour soup, you find at most Chinese restaurants.
The Peking duck, how ever, was very good. I loved it. At Shanghai palace, even if we order the whole duck, they seem to severe a whole lot less in quantity. You get the whole duck at Sun Wah and it really is quite delicious.
Parking is a pain. Very difficult to find, near by. The garage next door is not open to the public. The entry gate was left open and there was no clear notice nor an attendant. We parked there and then asked the people at Sun Wah, assuming we could pay the garage at exit. But the Sun wah people told us to move the car and there was no way to pay for parking in that garage.

Saw this place in new york times (
). Its peking duck was being featured, so immediately, i made plans to come try it out. Didn’t end up getting the peking duck, as it is $ 40, with soup and fried rice. I just wanted the concept of making your own peking duck, didnt care about the soup and the rice. Truthfully, real peking duck is wrapped in thin crepes, not buns. We did ended up ordering a small order of roast duck ($ 7.50) and it was quite good. The sauce goods very nice over rice. $ 1 for small side order of rice, $ 3 for medium and i think $ 4.50 for large.
Also got the wonton noodle soup. $ 5.75, the broth was very tasty, so were the wontons.
We wanted to try their lo mein, this was our least favorite. Though you are getting more authentic style lo mein, because in chinese style cuisine, lo mein literally means noodle mixed with a sauce. You get that here, bit the noodle was not very good. I could have replicate the same
Noodle with my own dried noodle i have bought. Our lo mein also came with beef tendons and some you choy.
Some language barrier issues, but they are pretty advanced on their checkout system, uses ipads and is not sketchy in just writing out what you ordered by hand.
Will be back to try more of their dishes, finished up the meal with $ 23 for two people with tax, can’t beat it!

BBQ duck is the special here. Just in case you didn’t see the hundreds of posted photos.
Street parking in front and don’t forget to feed the meter.
Reservations suggested and a must on the weekends.
Very good service and great selection on the menu. Don’t forget to flip it over because it has two sides.