Yi Mei Gourmet Food

The food is cheap ($ 4.50) but I wasn’t particularly impressed with the dishes. I love this kind of takeout place (some of my favorite places are in HK and LA) but Yi Mei was disappointing. I had the loofah, which didn’t look very good and unfortunately also didn’t taste very good, stir fry cabbage, a fish and pork blood with bok choy. The only thing that was decent was the fish, and the veggies had this weird taste (also found this taste at veggies at Deluxe Food Market) that makes it gloopy and almost kind of sour-​y. Not sure what it is but it tastes disturbingly chemical to me. Was pretty disappointed overall. Maybe I should have tried the place next door.

Just can’t beat $ 4.50 with 4 choices plus white rice and a bowl of soup. I got a whole steamed blue crab, fresh and delicious, the fried shrimps were okay, veggies was on point, the sweet and sour pork was only okay. I skipped the soup, looks more like msg with water.

When I ate here, (Fall 2009) the sign on the window said $ 3.99. I expected $ 3.99 per entrée. Turns out it was $ 3.99 for FOUR seafood /​meat entrees and rice. The total meal price with a bottle of water, they don’t serve tap water, was $ 5.50! I read the prices have gone up slightly, but it is still a steal
And the food was really good! I simply hope their prices and food are still that good.
Disclaimer, this area is traditionally Chinese, and this hole in the wall is a DIVE. So the food is not your average Chinese American fare, and the accommodations are on the low rent side.
Definitely, be careful where you dine in this area unless you are lucky enough to be brave in your eating habits and with good taste bud /​intestinal fortitude!

Oh, thank God you found my review before you were beckoned in by the lady behind the counter. Don’t do it. Don’t let her friendly wave distract you from the horror you were about to experience. This food tastes as bad as the dirtiest corners of Chinatown smell. If you somehow manage to finish your meal, you won’t be able to get the taste off your breath or out of your psyche for days. Mine went in the garbage after just a few bites.
First off, bones and cartilage in the chicken and the fish. Not once but several times through the course of a single half-​meal, I bit in to the disconcerting crunch of bones where there definitely should not be any. My two chicken entrees were thus unsalvageable. I had purchased either one hoping that the sauce might make up for the lack of chicken quality, but both sauces were nauseatingly sugary and bland, like medicine. This left me my fish cake, which was incredibly cold and greasy (as in to the point that it had a slippery texture), and contained more bones (as well as some ground scales).
This same cold-​and-​greasy character was also true of the rice, which had been overcooked and caked in oil. Same goes for the tofu, which had somehow become floppy from all the grease and nastiness; that paired it quite nicely with the familiarly foul-​yet-​tasteless sauce it was coated in.
I could chalk it up to an improper palate or a fluke bad choice, but I got a variety of dishes and found myself repeatedly disappointed by the same things on literally all five fronts. I went for comfort foods in case my more adventurous choices were no good. But everything was godawful, and for consistent reasons. The lack of concern for food quality and safety is more than apparent. I would not wish this meal upon my worst enemy.
Edit: Dept of Health Inspection map shows that as of April 2014, there were signs of active rats in this restaurant. Can’t say I’m surprised.

You would think when there’s competition next door at New Golden Bowl, they would do something that separated themselves from the competition. But no, exactly the opposite. I was stuck in picking between the 2 as ladies from both sides were trying to catch my attention to eat at their restaurants. I happen to choose Yi Mei and let me tell you I regret it. The rice was ok but the portions of meats and vegetables were minimal. It’s like when did broccoli get this expensive. They literally left half the takeout box empty and worst of all they tried to make it up with a tasteless seaweed soup that tasted like dishwater. Go next to Golden Bowls and you’ll save yourself from growling stomach.

There is nothing gourmet about this dive, food not excepted. For $ 4.50 you get 5 choices from the trays, rice being one choice. Unlike other Unilocalers, I actually found the food decent, not too greasy and while not as heavily flavored in a thick sauce as other places, it was okay and somewhat tasty. I had the eggplant, string beans, fish (a measly half a fish, I must say), and the manila clams, which were a little overcooked by the time I took my takeout to where I could eat it Is Yi Mei a place I dream of returning to? Not at all. But I needed something quick, and even the ladies who couldn’t understand my Cantonese or English managed to whip it up fast and had me out the door in two minutes.
My only gripe was that the food was not steaming hot, but I guess the ubiquitous metal trays are always easy to keep hot and I did travel 15 minutes.
There is a lot of variety here, and none of the food seems heavily cornstarched in some thick gravy. The veggies, like baby Bok Choy looked good and the string beans were very fresh. Maybe carnivores get more food. I got 7 baby clams and thought the string beans were skimpy in portion. But hey, a FAST meal for $ 4.50. Oh, rice gets counted as 1 of the 5 choices and what self respecting Chinese doesn’t eat rice!

I am going to give you five for this one.
Anything for this place less than 5 star should be ignored. there are a few reason.
If you can get a meal that feed 2 people or more under $ 5 in NYC, that is amazing. Taste, cleanness, crowded or whatever should not be a reason unless they poison you which is possible in some place but not this. I ate here for 10 years and the place across. I am still alive since I am writing this review.
I always come here for a comfort food after a sad stressful day. paying for cheap food and a full stomach makes me really happy after.
Please don’t expect much if you come here. Imagine going to street food in a third world.

I also dont like their aggressiveness. I past by this place a million times and never tried. Frankly I usually dont like these buffet places but decided to give it a chance. I like it. It not swimming in a pool of oil. That is always a plus. I think it is better than the Division Lunch Box Buffet because of less oil.
Seriously I had manila clams, pigs feet, snow pea tips and sesame chicken with rice and a seaweed broth for $ 4. Happy camper here! I like looking at the variety in the window. Just that the flavor is so-​so.
It can never be better than Sanur on Doyer Street though. Too bad Sanur is closed on Mondays!
But wait. I just bit into the snow pea tips and there is NO FLAVOR. I make it better! And the pig feet is CRUNCHY HARD. They need a better cook. (–1 star)

Tried this place for dinner after reading about it in a NYC Dirt Cheap book.
If the serving lady needs to shout at you to come eat here, how good could it really be? Turns out that the food is just OK. Same deal as mentioned by others: 4 scoops of various entrees, rice and soup for $ 3.50.
Yes the value is there, but you can find 2 places on the same street that keep the food hot for the same price or a little more. Yi Mei doesn’t have all of their food trays in a steam table and they get cold or lukewarm. The included soup looks like nasty dishwater, but at least you know that they are washing the dishes ;-)

I’ve walked by here a couple times and have always been enthralled by the variety of food displayed in the window. What a feast to the eyes. However it had to take a recommendation from one of those «cheap guides to NYC» books that I was flipping through to get me here. I mean how often does a hole-​in-​the-​wall Chinese joint get mentioned in an English publication? This should be good…
So while in the vicinity, I made it a point to try this place. I was just browsing from outside when the food lady started to get all pushy and kept luring me in with words, gestures and all. When I didn’t budge, she started hitting the tongs against the glass window to attract my attention. A little too much for me to be frank… so, I decided I would take my time, browse at the offering from the next stall (which didn’t look as good) and then come back to Yi Mei. Finally, I decided to head in.
I must have forgotten that this was the 4 dishes and 1 soup offering for I thought they would charge in accordance to what you select. The good thing is it only costs $ 3.50 for rice with 4 dishes and 1 soup (whether you eat in or out — some places charge more for eating in)…
BTW, when I asked her for the price, she told me $ 3.75 then corrected herself and said $ 3.50 Hmmmmm (actually I’m only bringing up this point because of what happened later on re the price)
Anyway they have quite a good selection here, including some premium items like crabs (although I must say that the seemingly soft-​shell crab I ordered was really NOT that soft in shell and would be better served eating it the way you would a normal crab), dou miao etc. When I asked for a piece of fried yam cake, I thought I heard the lady ask if I wanted it as part of my 4 items or separately. To which I responded we shall see if I can even find 4 items for my take-​out. Eventually, I didn’t so asked for that to be included as part of the 4 items only to hear her mention that that’s typically charged separately. I mean, sure, my Mandarin may not be all that fantastic but that’s just low especially when you just provide me the option earlier.
Regardless, still quite good value for money.

Great Selection & Price, But Food is too SALTY!
I stopped by at Yi Mei last night to pick up food to go.
4 dishes + rice + soup for $ 3.50 !!!
The food can easily feed two people, so if you split it, you’re essentially just paying $ 1.75 for a full meal (seafood, veggies, meat, whatever is to your liking), no need for a drink b/​c soup is included, and of course there’s no sales tax b/​c this is Chinatown we’re talking about.
The selection of dishes yesterday included squid, fried shrimp, fried crabs, bitter melon, pig’s blood, mustard plant, pork belly (the fatty kind that Chi-​PS likes), chicken skin-​like parts (haha, no clue what it is, but I liked it), tofu skin, mahpo tofu, bamboo shoots, tripe, etc. Not shabby for a place the size of a smoothie store.
If the food weren’t overloaded with salt & MSG, I’d easily bump my rating up one star.

i didn’t really enjoy the meal i had here but i just had to finish it as i was famishing after crossing the manhattan bridge from brooklyn. i had fish, broccoli, pork plus steamed rice (all in plastic plates & not the usual styropore containers). service was attentive. the whole meal’s priced great, though! but i noted the «locals» eat here (i think those who have migrated from chinese speaking countries & staying now in the vicinity) which may mean they’re «good or reasonably priced.» its façade is more attractive than the other one next to it & the bigger one at least 7 doors away.

If you’re short on time and need to order something to go, you can’t go wrong with Yi Mei! $ 3 will get you three items, rice, and a smile. OK, maybe not the smile. Unsure if the staffer even understood my English.
Rice wasn’t crunchy (a good thing), food* was tasty (a better thing), and I had plenty of time to enjoy it on a three-​hour long bus trip from NY Chinatown to Philadelphia’s Chinatown (the best thing). Yi Mei has a large selection of dishes available for order. Recommended for cheap, good eats.
*see my photos for what I ordered