New Empire Restaurant

I’ve been here numerous times now and I have yet to leave a review. This is my favorite Chinese restaurant in Toledo/​Holland. Not only do they have great dishes for lunch and dinner, but they serve delicious dim sum. My favorite dish is still the chicken chow mein and beef and broccoli. However, the other dishes they serve are also delicious and worth a try.
If you’re looking for a great Chinese restaurant or dim sum, this is the place.

What a huge difference when we revisit this restaurant today after few years. I knew that it has a new owner to run this place. But the service was so bad today. I had a dim sum order to go that I placed in twenty minutes ago. Nobody care about my presence. Because all of the workers keeping busy themselves to talk with each other; not customers. Impolite and rude; do you know what? The owner wasn’t there!

Slow service, and food had a weird aftertaste to it. I also felt as if serving me was an inconvenience for them.
I have eaten here once before, and it was ok, but today’s experience has left me looking for other Chinese restaurants.

If you are looking for your dim sum fix, this is the place to go to! Soooooooo good! Came here with a friend on Saturday, not too crowded where there is a wait but it was busy. Sadly, they do not have the carts here :(But the dim sum is yummy! This dim sum is pretty similar to what’s back home in Seattle… I would just say with the har giaow (shrimp dumpling in white wrapper) wrapper did not taste very fresh. They do use a lot of shrimp and not too much filler in them tho! Pork shiu mai (pork in yellow wrapper) is a must to get here. We also loved the turnip cake as well! I’ve never had it before, but it;s not really a cake. It’s more like 3 square, white gelatinous pieces that are made up of sliced turnips and with ham meat spread throughout it… DELICIOUS! Definitely try that! Other goodies we had were the sticky rice (comes with 2 big pieces) and rice noodles with shrimp wrapped inside over soy sauce. These dim sum plates I thought were ok… not sure if i would get them again: garlic spare ribs and curry cuttlefish. BEWARE! Don’t get the BBQ pork buns… they taste frozen and bland on the inside… yuck.
And of course another great plate was the chicken feet! My friend was not daring enough to try it (I was disappointed) but it was great for me cuz I got all of them! Try it if you are willing to be adventurous… you won’t regret it!
Overall, the dim sum plates are from $ 2.50 -$ 4 (majority are $ 3)…not too bad! They will charge 50 cents per person for tea here so watch out! We ordered about 11 – 12 dishes… came to about $ 35…and we still had leftovers for my bf back home! So 3 meals for $ 35 worth of dim sum is awesome!
Biggest complaint here was that we waited forever for the check. I don’t know if it was because we had like over half of our food on the table or if it was because we were talking so much, but no one would stop by our table! It was annoying, but I can put up with it to eat some tasty dim sum: D.
Pros:
— TURNIP CAKE
— lots of variety for dim sum
— hot chili oil! They have the good kind here, so ask for it on the side to kick up the flavors: D
Cons:
— don’t get the BBQ pork buns… bleh
— service was lacking
Why I gave it a 4…
Tasty authentic Chinese food that is very reminiscent of my hometown of Seattle. Dim sum was great and I would definitely come back for round 2!

This place is amazing. Great food and is much different than other Chinese restaurants in toledo. My favorite for sure!

Went to New Empire yesterday in hopes to find some more «authentic» Chinese food that I was accustomed to getting in Denver, CO. I was primarily craving a few specific dishes including Ging do pai gwut (Peking or King do Pork Chops), deep fried whole fish, and walnut shrimp.
Lucky us, the staff spoke Cantonese and was able to confirm that their Peking pork chops and deep fried whole fish were indeed what I was looking for. The menu states seasonal for fish pricing so I inquired and she said around $ 22. Very pricing compared to what I was used to (12ish in Denver) but I was feeling adventurous and gave it a go.
The food took forever to come out. I guess we ordered dishes that they aren’t accustomed to making as both tables next to us were served and half finished with their meals before ours came out.
The fish was very nicely prepared. The batter was neither too thin or thick and it was fried to a proper crisp. I am accustomed to sauce and onions being drizzled all over but there were no onions and the sauce was on the side, no biggie. Delicious overall, but definitely not worth $ 24.
The pork chops on the other hand, weren’t even pork chops… Their menu has both pork prepared Peking style for $ 9.xx and Peking Pork Chops for ~$ 12. I elected to go with the pricier pork chops but was highly disappointed when they weren’t pork meat on the bone. Instead, we were given what looked like standard pork Chinese restaurants would serve for all other pork dishes…
Also, the portion was tiny. At first glance it seems to be a lot but most of it is sauce. I personally love excess sauce, but not in lieu of meat. Only good thing about this was the sauce tasted good even though the meat wasn’t very tender either.
All in all, I would come again, but try other dishes that are more fairly priced and see what the pork prepared Peking style is compared to the chops.
I posted pics of both meals as well.

Very good food. Good service. Food was fresh. In my opinion one of the top Chinese restaurants around.

My family loves the take out I bring home from here. Very friendly staff and looks to be a clean restaurant. I recommend the crab rangoon and cashew chicken… yum.

In terms of the dim sum, the food tastes a bit mushy, like it was frozen before it was cooked. Can satisfy your craving if you live in the area and don’t want to drive far.
Price per dish: Small ($ 2.60), Medium ($ 2.95), Large ($ 3.95)

Enjoy most of the time until recent incident. Got chocked by a steel wool in a dish. Just watch out for every bite.

Unilocalers are all over the board on this place, so I have stayed away until now. I was doing last minute Christmas shopping at the adjoining shopping center on a cold winter day and, when through, I was in the mood for a nice hot bowl of Hong Kong Style Noodle Soup. I went in to New Empire hoping to appease this desire. Time to make my own review of the place.
First, the place was very clean. Tonie said the carpet was scary just 5 days ago, but I didn’t look that close. I do know that tables and other surfaces were clean. There was a fresh, good food aroma in the air and no stale carpet or overly fragrant cleaners to mask trouble. I’m in the business. You can tell a lot by the first sniffs as you enter a restaurant. Especially restaurants that have seafood on the menu.
I was by myself and was seated promptly and with a genuine smile. I looked at the menu and did not see the Noodle Soup I craved. There was about six pages of great looking items. Included were Pan-​Fried Noodles, which are another of my favorite noodle dishes. When the waiter came up and asked if I was ready, I took a chance. I told him i was looking for Hong Kong Style Noodle Soup. He was kind of quizzical, so I described what I wanted. He then said «we can do that». I said great and started to look at the appetizers. He waited about 30 seconds and when I looked at him, he said «that will probably be enough». LOL He DID know what I was asking for! This dish, when done right, is a Chinese version of Phở (that great Vietnamese noodle soup) with a milder broth. What I got was heaven in a bowl on a cold winter day.
A bowl that had to hold a quart of soup came steaming to my table. Two ladies that were sitting at the next table asked «Hey! What’s that?» I told them and described the dish and a little of its «history» (you know me, frustrated food critic and know-​it-​all chef that I am). They were very interested. I dug into a bowl of thin noodles in a heavenly chicken broth with large flat chunks of VERY tender and juicy white meat chicken, top stems and leafs of gailon (chinese broccoli), carrot slices and scallions. Simple, yet perfect. After tasting, I added a little soy sauce and some of the chili paste in oil they brought as a condiment. AWESOME! As I slurped my first chopstick load of noodles, an Asian family at a table a couple away looked at me and the patriarch smiled and nodded as I unabashedly dug in. I know this is my only experience here, but if the rest of the food is half as good as this soup… winning. The food I saw at other tables looked appetizing and people all looked like they were enjoying their food.
The two ladies at the next table asked if it was good and as good as the place in New York I had mentioned. I had mentioned the place to which I compare all bowls of HK Style Noodles. (Choirs of Angels sing in background…) Ollies Noodles in Manhattan. For me, the gold standard. I give them an 8 on a 1 to 10 scale with ten being Ollies good. Now, that is good as scores go. Ollies rules!
So anyway, i am going back. Gotta try the dimsum and the pan Fried Noodles and until I find a decent Phở in this town, These are my noodles on those many cold days to come! The women again asked about the noodles and said maybe they would try to order it next time they were there.
That warmed my heart as much as the soup warmed by belly and soul. Converts! You have to love spreading the word of good food. If you don’t, I do enough for the both of us! ;)

There are VERY FEW authentic Chinese restaurants in Toledo. Yes, this place does have all that Americanized garbage on their menu for those of you who enjoy super sweet sugar chicken and crap. However, this place is legit. The menu is full of traditional Chinese menu items. The food is always delicious.
This is also one of the extremely few places in Toledo that serves Dim Sum. The dim sum is FANTASTIC.
If you are looking for traditional Chinese food in Toledo, go here!
Tip: There is a specials board by the door. It’s written in Chinese, so bring a friend you can read traditional, or ask your waiter.

Atmosphere is sketchy, but food was good. Egg roll def tasted like it was frozen first. Veggie lo mein was delish. But fried rice is dry and not that great.

Not only does New Empire have some of the best Chinese food in Toledo, they’re also pretty much the only place in the area to get Dim Sum (11:00−4:00 daily). Their Dim Sum is a little different than you’ll find in larger cities, you won’t find any mobile carts with food. What you will find though is some really amazing dishes. Their steamed buns are fantastic and the rice congee with pork is amazing.

Good tasting reasonably priced Chinese American food. They have a Chinese menu as well if you like mainland Chinese food, but most go for Chinese American. The atmosphere isn’t fancy but is nice. It is a stand alone building but is in a busy plaza area. It is convenient if you are Hungary while shopping. This in my opinion is one of the best Chinese American restaurants in the area.
UPDATE October 9 2015
The menu was recently revises with higher prices. Its not too much more, but an increase ($ 9.50 chicken dishes and $ 11 for beef dishes. But the food quality in the last 6 months or so seems to have declined. We will return and see if it improves.
Update Feb 2016
Food quality and service has declined. Its not bad, but not as good as it used to be. We come here less now, which is a shame, it used to be the best place around.

Been here twice for dim sum, seeing as it appears to be the only place in Toledo that serves dim sum. Half the fun of getting dim sum is watching them wheel the different carts around so you can survey the options, point to what you want, and get served instantly. Unfortunately they don’t offer that here, and you order off a menu, but beggars can’t be choosers. I do enjoy coming here every once in a while to get my dim sum fix, and the food is generally very affordable. Haven’t ordered off the regular menu yet, so I can’t speak for the rest of the food.

It was a very lackluster meal. We had 15 people in our party, and the restaurant did not accommodate well. The dishes were even more sub par. We ordered vegetable soup regrettably. It seemed like they literally warmed up some chicken stock and dumped a bunch of vegetables in. All the other dishes tasted the same. I am pretty sure they use the same sauce in a lot of them. Do not order the fried rice because it is bland.
Overall, not a legit chinese restaurant+expensive for the quality. I left with a confused tastebud and feeling not satisfied.

Came here with a friend for some much needed dimsum after not having it since I went back home to Cali in December. New Empire surprisingly has pretty good dimsum! We shared the usual: turnip cake, pork sui mai, shrimp ha gao, shrimp rice roll, fried taro buns, pork ribs, and chicken feet.
The turnip cake was a little disappointing because it had no flavor. All the seafood dishes, on the other hand, were surprisingly fresh. It didn’t have a funky taste anyway. Minus one star for not having carts wheeling out dimsum like what I used to see in Hong Kong and LA, but this is Toledo. We all know we can’t ask for too much…
This place was cheap for dimsum. Our food came out to be $ 20!
I also noticed the waitress automatically gave me the dimsum menu, but never bothered to ask the white people if they would like to have dimsum… I thought that’s a little strange. They shouldn’t assume people want fried rice and general tsao if they are not Asian! They also charge .50 per person for tea. I hate it when they do that. It’s not even good tea to begin with!
I’ll definitely go back because this seems like the only place in Toledo that offers decent dimsum.

Stopped in here on my way to a meeting in the area and was pleasantly surprised. The restaurant isn’t much to look at… two seperate dining areas for some reason with a nicer quieter area in the back, and a sunny sun-​room dining room for lunch.
I can only comment on the dim sum as I had a craving once I saw they offered it til about 4PM. For chinese authenticity, the dim sum was good– of course there’s dim sum from frozen and fresh dim sum and i’m almost certain this was fresh, but i could be wrong. My shui mai, shrimp rolls, noodle roll and spring rolls were all piping hot and tasy. The shrimp items were not too fishy, as it should be. Since I was dining solo, i only got 4 items altogether, which ended up right around 12 dollars, but for a good sampling and a nice lunch that somewhat satisfied my dim sum cravings overall, I was suprised at the good execution for a Chinese place that sits next to Kroger.
I probably won’t be back for awhile, but as a guy who’s sampled dim sum all over the midwest and NY area, you could do a lot worse. In fact, if you’re reading this, live in the Toledo area and have never had dim sum items before, try it here and then you’ll see why it’s deliciousness all over the place.

The one star is for the decent egg drop soup. Everything else was really awful.
Décor: when I walked in I was really grossed out by the tanks of living critters awaiting their certain death. I asked for a table where I wouldn’t have to look at the sea food. So we sat right next to the filthy lace curtains from the 1980s.
Food: I knew we were in for trouble when I tasted the tea. I tasted like they had filtered it through potting soil. How do you mess up tea?! I got the chicken in wine sauce. It was rubbery and the sauce was flavorless. It came with what I was told was mushrooms, but it looked like stringy seaweed or squid tentacles. I have never seen mushrooms like that! The best thing about my dish was the pea pods. I had about 4 pea pods and one piece of chicken before I gagged and couldn’t have another bite. My husband got the Mongolian Beef which he said was not what he expected and that the sauce was gross. He took a few bites and couldn’t eat more either.
Service: They were nice. However both my husband and I pushed our plates away and waited for someone to come ask how it was so we could maybe order something else. No one ever asked us how it was or noticed that we were not happy.
We had to leave a tip for the staff and money for the soup on the table and leave BC we just could not eat the food. It was very disappointing based on the great reviews. We just moved to Toledo and all we have to find restaurants is Unilocal.I’m hoping our next attempt will be better! We will be trying the Golden Lily next.