Xo Cafe & Grill

This establishment is NOT CLOSED. I ate there this evening & my guests & I were pleased w/​dishes as usual! Their restaurant on Centre Street closed quite a while ago.

came here for lunch because my uncle likes it. this place has one of the most extensive menus i’ve ever seen. it’s easy to get lost in it. typical cha chaan tang style hk options. i was advised to try to the japanese style dumpling, their version of gyoza i guess. turns out it’s more like a meatball of dumpling filling barely contained by a gyoza wrapper that’s been fried… there was no part of that previous sentence that i did NOT like. i think i’ll order that just for me next time. my aunt’s congee with pork liver and watercress was pretty awesome too. pops ordered the baked pork chop over rice and we expected that to take the longest but it was first out. i’ve had better elsewhere but pork chop and rice is never bad. i’d probably never go outta my way to come to this joint but it’s an option when i’m in chinatown already.

This is like a Fusion Chinese style restaurant for cheap people. Toms more restaurants in the area with better food.
Can’t believe Penang closed down for this crappy joint! Boo-​Hoo.
Don’t bother.

I am definitely a fan. I didn’t even know about this place because this is a street I don’t walk by. We were just walking thinking of this viet place that we went last time and then passed by here. They accept credit cards!!!
Food is decently priced. I got the singapore mai fun. In my mind I kept thinking it was Ho Fun which is what I wanted. Nevertheless, it was really good. Also their wonton noodle soup was amazing and for the price it’s unbeatable! Broth? Good, Noodles good, wonton? GOOOOOOD. (I am saying this like Joey from Friends when he was eating the trifle that Rachel made)
They also have those specials! $ 16.95 for steak!
Must try Singapore Ho Fun next time.
By the way the singapore’s style is like curry, but the drier kind

im very mixed about this place because ive been here enough to have good experiences and bad experiences. the first few times i came was when they first opened. not much business and not many people ate here. i thought for sure it was going to close down soon. but a few months later it was crowded and all the tables were taken up! so the good experiences, they make my order the way i want and come out on time and every thing goes jolly. the bad experiences they dont want to help, dont want to fix their mistakes and try to blame you for ordering wrong. and all they do is take the messed up dish and plop it onto a different plate and add some different sauce. really. you think i don’t know how it should taste if i’ve had it from here before and only a few days ago? she’s lucky i didnt cancel the order and i just sucked it up and knocked the difference off her tip money because that’s bad service. and yeah i’ve seen the waitresses pick their feet during their down time too so i really only come here when im looking for a cheap meal with a big menu to choose from and every other place is probably crowded.

This place is pretty decent. The restaurant is big and good for large groups.
As for the food, its mediocre.
The only thing I absolutely LOVE from there is their Teriyaki Chicken Udon Noodle Soup. It is the best thing everrrr! If you haven’t tried it, you must go NOW! The soup base is made with miso and their udon’s texture is bouncy and chewy mixed with a few pieces of bok choy and a few pieces of seaweed. Their grilled chicken is on the side with a spoonful of cole slaw. Their slaw is unique because it does not taste like the average slaw. I can’t ever get enough of it so I usually ask them for extra on the side.
There’s a large selection of dim sum there but I do not recommend it because it’s not as tasty as the dim sum at other restaurants.
They also have a large selection of drinks but again, it’s not really that good there.
Overall, I will give them three stars based on their Teriyaki Udon Noodle Soup :)

It’s really a crazy menu. I love getting their hot pot, but I think they need to work on their soups. It can be better. You get to pick unlimited seafood, meat, and vegies! Not only that, but you can also get all you can drink milk tea, red bean slush and so on. I love their fried dumplings appetizer and their ice cream and steamed egg desserts. Both are included in the all you can eat hot pot price. The list is so long, you can never get bored!
Cons: They do not have enough waiters, so it takes a long time before you can find one to call on. So order everything at once!

First of all, X.O. CAFE GRILL IS NOT CLOSED.
Second of all, it has a great variety of good and well-​priced options.
I highly recommend it.

XO CAFE CAFE MOVED — THEY ARE NOT CLOSED
New address is 41 Elizabeth street. You can also order through their new website
This is my favorite dim sum place in New York. I even brought my wedding guests!

Their crazy huge menu, consisting of not just a menu but the dozens of fliers listing dishes which are pasted all over the walls, shows a dazzling array of dishes meaning they must simply make everything. I’ve had lunch here monthly for about 2 years for its lunch special: borscht soup, tea, entrée & simple desert for $ 8. It’s not the height of cuisine but it’s a nice meal at an alright place. Its more excellent dishes are those ordered in Chinese, especially the fancier pricier ones.
I haven’t been there since they did renovations during the springtime but recent reviews suggest it’s turned into a hot pot place which makes me worry it’s trying to do even more.

This has got to be the worst hot pot place ever.
The broth, was ok, flavors were there, the spicy broth was a bit too oily for me. The herbal broth was the better choice.
The ingredients, seemed skimpy. Some of the ingredients were still frozen were served. The meats didnt look too fresh.
The sauce section was kinda ghetto. They had a few bottles of sauces out, some bowls of garlic, cilantro, green onions etc. Even the sauce bar seemed skimpy.
The dessert was probably the best part. At the sauce bar there was a slow cook pot of hot tapioca with mung beans. Similar to the vietnamese dessert «che», it was super tasty and very good.
The service, sucked! The waitress was super slow, and although we did the all you can eat, every time we asked for something it just felt like they didnt want to serve it to us.
I’ve experienced better, probably wont be back.

I came here with a bunch of my friends for the dinner all you can eat hotpot. It was sad! The sauce section did not have the sauce I needed («sacha»). All the seafood (snail, clam, scallop) I ordered had sand in it. Hopefully I didn’t chip a tooth. The beef slices were ginormous and tasted like rubber after cooking it. Oh the fried dumplings was the best food of the entire meal. I was going to give it one star, but they had unlimited bubble tea/​slushes/​soda (33 choices) so that was probably the happiest moments during my dinner. It took them 20 min to make my red bean slush…
For $ 30 per person (tax/​tip included), I could have went to a sushi buffet or harvest buffet in long island. Hot pot/​Shabu here was just sad.
PS. The paper where you mark the food to eat is all in Chinese. Good luck.

7 us at lunch= hot pot = $ 25 unlimited food and boba
You had a list of 35 boba drinks you could choose from and you could get unlimited refills. They had appeitizers, hot pot ingredients, and desserts. The background is for hot pot while the front is more just restaurant people. You get 2 hours and its def fun place so much closer than flushings. The service was ehh. spotty sometimes it was impossible to get people to come.

I come here for the variety. Got the pork chop an cheese casserole + squid salt and pepper + rice noodle with beef filling (not minced beef, more like sliced beef).
We asked for beef tomato but after we almost finished eatig everything else we realized they missed the order and didn’t seem to be sorry about it at all. so we canceled since we were both stuffed already.
Food is reminiscence of Hong Kong fast food. It fixed my cravings.

When it comes to Seamless choices, I’ve probably ordered from XO Café the most. It’s my go-​to Chinese restaurant for delivery.
Why? Well, the food, while nothing extraordinary, is cheap and satisfying plus there are tons of items (some rather exotic) to choose from. And they have congee!
So I looove congee. I could eat it for every meal, including breakfast (yes, that’s so Asian of me). And the congee at XO Café is really very good — it has the perfect consistency. I personally prefer the classic lean pork with preserved egg congee, but the others I’ve tried were also quite good.
As to the other food available, there are quite a few hits and misses. The steamed shrimp dumpling (ha gao) is very tasty, as is the braised stew beef with Chinese vegetables on rice. Their broiled vegetables are also fairly fresh-​tasting, such as the Chinese broccoli, and I really liked their steamed bean curd skin.
However, it does take some trial and error to identify the dishes which are not quite up to par. The pan-​fried dumplings, Peking-​style, were so oily they looked as if they’d been covered in clear lacquer. The shrimp of cashew was somewhat bland too.
Oh yeah, and be careful when you pick up your delivered food. One time they didn’t put the congee container’s lid on properly and congee spilled all over my desk! Argh!

Although I always knew the original on Hester was better, I always thought this place was okay for a quick bite. Unfortunately, not anymore. I got takeout to bring home after jury duty (ohh fun). When I got home, I noticed the water spinach (tong/​ong choy) was drenched in a disgustingly salty mixture of water and the fermented bean paste… I could barely eat it. There were also bits of sand still stuck on the veggies. The minced beef in the minced beef congee seemed to still be pretty raw, so we recooked it ourselves. It was just horrible. My fiancé and I did not feel well after eating from here.
I also forgot to mention that a fight practically broke out between two of the women who work there. They were yelling at the top of their lungs at each other in front of me while I was trying to make an order with one of them. Everyone in the restaurant was staring. At some point, she threw her pen down and started wailing her arms at the other lady. I was ready to leave at that point (it probably would have been better if I did), but the manager came out to apologize and took my order. He did nothing to stop the women from screaming at one another though, so they just kept at it for quite awhile.

was really excited to find a place with unlimited hot pot, then i was less excited.
the hot pot itself is quite good, but i wouldn’t come back here again without someone with much better chinese skills than myself and a huge appetite.
the experience was sort of tainted from the beginning when i encountered perhaps the creepiest man i’d ever seen in my life feeding his wife who was seated IN HIS LAP while his young child and mother looked on, both rather out of it (whether they were trying to ignore it or had become so desensitized to this strange behavior that they actually had just zoned out i have no idea).
when it came time to order i had written down everything from the english menu, since the check list they provide is all in chinese and i didn’t want to check off anything sketchy by accident. i tried to read it to the waiter but instead he snatched the paper from my hand and said OK. you’re supposed to get a free drink and appetizers with the $ 25, this was explained to me when i arrived but when it came time to order from our waiter, he didn’t seem too open to the idea. i’m pretty sure he just hated me.
we ordered the beef, which was good and cut rather thickly for hot pot but it was really fatty. pork wasn’t very good. mussels were yum, scallops came on the shell and made me feel sick so not doing that again. the best part is they have eggs for the taking right at the sauce area YES UNLIMITED EGGS!
anyway, i don’t think i ate $ 25 worth. i was too sickened by the sketchy scallops to eat much more besides the broth and didn’t opt for the included dessert. i think i’ll just stick to pay as you go hot pot from now on…

I like hot pot and I like food. XO has both. The value of the hot pot was excellent — flat fee for unlimited drink (from the bubble tea selection) + unlimited food + dessert. The second round of oysters were of dubious quality, but overall I think the food was good. The cilantro base broth is fantastic and from what I hear the spicy one is good as well. Not the healthiest place if you are going for healthy and definitely not the place to go for a diet.
However, when I want to throw down some food, and in super copious amounts, yummm… XO here I come!

As much as one would hope that this was merely a more convenient location for people who enjoy the food from XO Kitchen coming out of the yellow and 6 train lines, I would urge people to walk a few extra blocks over to the original on Hester Street instead.
With a smaller space and a Congee-​Village-​inspired theme, the menu is an exact replica of XO Kitchen’s Japanese-​Chinese fusion style. Having eaten at both XO restaurants, the drop off in quality is rather noticeable. The seafood udon noodle soup was served with overcooked, frozen fish and scallops that tasted soapy, metallic, _​_​_​_​_​_​ (feel free to insert your own adjectives here). The baked pork chops with over fried rice casserole had a sourly taste to it.
Despite the bad, the udon noodle soup with pork chop cutlet was tasteful. The pork chops were perfectly skewered and served on the side along noodle soup in a black pot. Other basic items such as congee casseroles and snow pea leaves were flavorful and not oily. However, if you were just looking for basic menu items (not to mention cheaper prices), walk up a few blocks to Wonton Garden or Congee on 98 Bowery instead.
Memorable: Udon Noodle Soup with Pork Chop Cutlet
Forgettable: Udon Noodle Soup with Seafood, Baked Pork Chops over Rice in Casserole

1) Very GOOD Thousand Egg & Pork Soup — GENEROUS amount of egg/​pork — the pork is made nicely. Soup is in perfect shape — not too thick, not too thin. There is some msg/​preservative but in suitable amounts. 3.95 for a bowl that is good enough for two people
2)The two X. O’s in chinatown are well known for their casserole. (which is baked ingredients with either pasta or rice. Both usually come with cheese. I had the Seafood Cassrole w/​spagetti — and it was very very good. The seafood, though NOT the Freshest was adequate enough. Not too much cheese or flavoring/​preservative. The spagetti was not doused with msg, and tasted really good with the mozzerlla (white) cheese. Ranges from 6 — 8 dollars — will completely fill up one person or can be shared by two.
They have two seating areas, one section with the tree — has a weird seating format because of the small round tables with large chairs. The other section which is away from the «kitchen» is smaller but for normal tables. Male/​Female bathrooms — not clean.