Le Yen Chinese Family Restaurant

I’m happy to see this place is gone! The last time I placed an order to go, they told me 25 minutes. After over an hour wait, I walked out and they couldn’t have cared less! Sad because at one point, their sizzling rice soup was our favorite. Once they started offering discounts on the tab if you paid cash along with «our credit card machine isn’t working» I knew there were issues. Good riddance! Please don’t open another restaurant again…

So sad they are now closed. Very fond memories of the staff as a child. It was a good family spot and will be missed!

After 45 years in Bixby Knolls, my favorite Seaweed soup place is closing … I am truly going to miss this place A’ hui Hou (till we meet again)

So glad this place is closing for good. They are giving up this location and their lousy food for something good to come into Bixby Knolls. Finally! Hooray!

We have been coming to this establishment since the late 70’s (not to age myself) and this family restaurant watched me and my children grow up over the years. As they are closing their doors for good in a week, we decided to have our final meal and say our good-​byes. As always, we were satisfied with our order. They make the best won ton noodle soup!!! Their chow mein was full of fresh vegetables and we always order it with pan fried noodles. The fried rice and shrimp were delicious as well. I have to admit, we were there at lunchtime and Kenny was single-​handedly working the kitchen and Susan and Kenny’s son were trying their best to keep up with the flow in the dining area. So our dishes did take a while to arrive but we didn’t have any place to be, so it wasn’t a concern for us. I believe most of the patrons were long time customers (like us) and were just enjoying their final dining experience at Le Yens.
Thank you for decades of wonderful memories and meals! Le Yen will truly be missed by many loyal customers. Best wishes to Susan and Kenny and their family as they embark on the next chapter of their life.

This was the worst Chinese food I have ever had the rice was hard and uncooked the garlic chicken had absolutely no flavor and the food was barely even warm it’s really a good thing they’re closing

Place is nasty bad! Heard that this place was closing after 45 years of service, all i can say is how could they have stayed open for so long serving such horrible food! Beef chow mein was 90% sprouts, 8% who knows?, and 2% beef, the broccoli beef was likewise! PLEASE CLOSE UP NOW AND STOP PROLONGING THE PAIN! Dirty floors/​carpet. I left 85 cent tip and that was too much… Let’s get a real restaurant in this location with real restauranteers who care about what they serve and provide a clean eating environment. Le Yen leave now!

Got there at 12pm, Not ONE customer, uh oh.
Waited a while then someone appeared from the back with Menus.
Quiet.
Cricket found on table, my buddy pointed it out, time to go? or stay. We decided to see it through. ordered lunch special: Brocolli Chicken, mediocre rice and weird dipping sauce for the shrimp… Meh.
I won’t be going back to be honest. It’s just too OUTDATED and they seriously need to catch up with the times and make authentic fresh Chinese food with organic ingrediients, it’s a good location — just need a whole new menu and REFRESH the interior —- WAY oudated. Oh yeah, clean up the tables and crickets!!!
ChhhRppp CHIRRRPPP… good night Jiminy Cricket!

Been coming here since I was a baby, will keeping on coming back! Family favorite.

By looking at this place from the outside it didn’t look like much but there is more than meets the eye! The food was really clean, fresh, not over seasoned. It doesn’t beat Chinese food from china town but it can be a strong runner up.

Never again. This place always looked like a front but I decided to give it a try. I ordered chicken chow mein which came out as 90% bean sprouts 5%veggies and 5% noodles.
The big thing for me was the cleanliness. It looks like the carpets have not been changed since the 70s and 2 decent sized insects decided to crawl across our table. If it’s this dirty outside I can only imagine how the kitchen is. Will not be eating here again unless it’s at gunpoint.

I feel like every time I’m at TJ’s, that this place is full of people. I had high expectations when I walked in for lunch at about 12:05pm to an almost empty restaurant.
By 12:35 I began to worry that I wouldn’t have time to eat because my break would be over and I still had to drive back to work.
At 12:45 I walked to the kitchen doors and told the waitress that I had to leave. She seemed unconcerned as she said, okay.
What a waste of my time!

HINT, please close the doors… Bixby business assoc — pay attention.
Close the doors. Paper the windows. Fire the kitchen. Get that Make Over restaurant Chef on TV…
Eat here at your own risk. I have never tasted Chinese food this awful.
The interior is authentic which hurts my heart. Beautiful Chinese lanterns and sconces adorn the simple dining room.
The service was constantly catering to the take out, so we sat and sat… and sipped mediocre tea. Again in authentic ceramic china. The service attendance was also scattered, unmannerly and course.
Finally — the chicken wonton soup only came in large and I thought I’ll take leftover home, right? Wrong!!! Overcooked, MSG, slop. Wouldn’t serve it to an alley animal.
So waited and waited for our meal… another bag rushed out the door. Plates came sporadically. When the gravy on everything is tasteless, thick and strange in color and a bad glean, beware.
Oh my, the egg roll! The grocery freezer at the discount corner store has better. I was expecting John Q to come jumping out to say …“What would you do???” (Like the entire meal was meant to be a joke to test me). And I’m sorry, that was NOT fried rice. The only thing palatable was the almond cookie at checkout.
With food this bad — RUN! It’s sad because I love those lanterns! The chi from those should have worked some kind of magic — but nooooo Ruck!

Once again, a year later, we go to have some of there fine soup, we order the mixed appetizer and low and behold they come back to tell me they are out of ribs, so I settle for egg rolls. The soup arrives witch is outstanding but still no appetizer. When they do arrive they are some deep fried «something», not an egg roll, it’s just frustrating knowing going into a place they will be out of something, I’m wondering what time of the evening I should come and they will have everything on the menu.

We’ve been coming to this restaurant for several years and have never left unsatisfied. Le Yen is a family-​owned business that obviously takes pride in appearance, food and service. The staff is friendly and personal, the menu is easy to read and the choices, though somewhat limited are easy to decide upon. The food is plentiful and in this case quite tasty. My only negative comment is that you have to go through the kitchen area to use the restrooms, but overall it’s a great place to dine out.

Today I’m sick so a family tradition lives on.
Since I was a little girl my mom always got me or my brother two quarts of egg flower soup if we would get sick. When anyone I know has sniffles or a sore throat this is the soup I drop off for a friend.
Also, having dinner here is yummy. It was best Chinese restaurant in LB for 10 yrs.

Service here is terrible and the food doesn’t make up for it.
The bus boy (man?) Can’t take any orders whatsoever. He’ll bring you water and tea when you sit down and then he can’t help you with anything else. This would be fine of course, if there were waiters. There’s one woman who I think owns the restaurant, that takes orders and brings the food out. I’ve been here twice. Once on a Friday night and now a Saturday night always 7:30 –8:00 and there’s never been more help working. People are always being ignored. As we were waiting to pay at the front there were literally 4 other people waiting to be helped.
My first visit we weren’t even brought menus and had to ask for them, and didn’t have anyone approach us until 5 minutes later to give us water. 10 minutes after that we asked to have our order taken since no one even came over to us or looked in our direction.
This time we went and there were two other tables of people already eating and one couple that came in a few minutes after we were seated, the place was near empty. Again, only the women was waiting tables and the busboy with his waters. The woman was hardly around and walks right past you rather than most places where they’ll ask if everything is alright.
We decided to order one of their meals that has a lineup of dishes pre-​decided. Under each title it says «for two or more people». As it turns out this means two orders is the minimum you can buy of these. So even though it says $ 11 whatever as the price, you’re paying double that. This was EXTREMELY unclear and should be advertised as double the price if you’re forced to buy two anyways.
We got our food which is always large portions, but very meh. The sweet and sour shrimp was fairly good, while everything else was very bland. The chow mein is pretty much just bean sprouts and lettuce. All of the vegetables you leave on the plate when you eat noodles elsewhere.
It’s unfortunate how disappointing this place is because it’s so close to my house. I would not recommend this place to anyone.
Go across the street and try Sushi West, or Panda Garden which are both pretty decent for a good price.
And of course right behind Jamba Juice is Aura Thai which is amazing. 5 stars every time. But save yourself some money and a lot of time and avoid Le Yen.

Unfortunately this place gets my first review of 1 star. The food was disgusting. old, over-​cooked, and cold. What made it worse is 2 small ROACHES crawled on the table… the waitress was not very pleasant either. waitress only gave us a 50% discount when we complained. she said everything was made fresh YESTERDAY? And then warmed up fresh today? Alright then.
Not coming back until they take the food seriously.

Feel horrible for leaving this rating but that’s really what I’d have to give it. When you walk in you can tell this is a struggling restaurant. The décor is supposed to be «traditional» but really it’s just outdated. When the waiter started helping us out I realized this was a family run restaurant (which is why I feel I bad for the review). The waiter was friendly and gave us great service. I ordered the sizzling rice soup, chicken chow mein and pepper beef steak. The soup was honestly the best part of the meal although the «sizzling rice» had a slightly burnt taste. I’ve had this dish elsewhere and don’t think that that’s how it should taste. The chow mein didn’t come with noodles. Not sure if I read the dishes description correctly or not. Instead it had bean sprouts. The chicken pieces were pretty sparse. The pepper beef had too much bell peppers and not enough meat. Both dishes weren’t really too flavorful. Although I avoid sauces I found myself pouring on some hot sauce to get some flavor on these dishes.
I see here a family run restaurant that is struggling and may be giving up. This place needs both an interior and a menu makeover. Although the economy is tough I think that a restaurant that offers a unique taste can still succeed. I hope this restaurant turns it around as I had heard that it USED to be good but now…

*************Mixed feelings**********
I’m conflicted as to how many starts I should give this restaurant, My rating will primarily reflect the quality of the food.
For starters though the inside of the restraint is a bit dark, I actually like the subdued décor. I particularly like the ceiling lamps. They have the old traditional wood craved lamps with rice paper. Very pretty and and ornate.
The tables are clean and interior colors match well. I don’t particularly like restaurants with carpet as it tend to trap smells and quite frankly carpet is like underwear that you can’t changed, ummm yeah odiferous and stained… the underwear I mean. The actual restaurant didn’t smell bad bit there were some unsightly stains on the carpet.
Our sever, I’m not sure it is one of the original owners, was a very kind and gently looking soft spoke and amiable grandma that made me just want to hug her!!! My husband had to restrain me, apparently he thought it would have been «awkward» for me to hug grandma :(She was super sweet, love her!
But let’s get down to the meat and potatoes. My husband and I ordered: chicken egg foo young, Szechwan spicy beef, shlimp fly lice… sorry meant shrimp fried rice. the Chinese in me just came out, and chicken won ton soup.
Hummm…the shrimp fried rice was not really fried, more like steamed and a bit pungent with a fish smell. Unfortunately it was bland and dry.
The chicken egg foo young, not what we are typically used to. The gravy was way too salty, the foo young patties were dry and the sprinkled pieces of sandwich chicken breast, well not very authentic.
Szechwan spicy beef, was ok fresh veggies, but the meat was a bit meaty and it was not spicy. Although I’m not the best person to rate spiciness, most often things are never spicy enough for me.
Finally, the chicken won ton soup, well that too was a bit disappointing. The broth was bland and there again where the sprinkled pieces of chicken breast you typically use to make a sandwich with.
I’m really sad that Le Yen didn’t offer better food, as I am strong supporter and advocate of Ma’ and Pa’ business, but the quality of the food needs drastic improvement, before we can consider another visit.
So, if you’re in the mood for chinese I’d recommend going elsewhere, Le Yen just does not cut it, I’d recommend:
Peking China
11 039 Downey Ave
Downey, CA 90 241
(562) 869‑2607
Their shrimp fried rice is to die for!