Lychee Oriental

I’m a huge fan of The Great British Menu (I remember watching it with my gran and never missing an episode) so I was really excited to visit Lychee Oriental! Situated on Mitchell Street, it’s definitely a ‘hidden gem’ (or it was for me anyway, I never walk down Mitchell Street) and is worth visiting.
My mum and I were booked in for lunch and were greeted warmly by Jimmy (fangirl moment — I was so excited, haha! Remained composed) who showed us to our booth. The lunch menu offers a selection of two courses (starters & mains) for just under £10.00. There is a great range of dishes to choose from. Whilst we were deciding what to have, we ordered drinks and were served a bowl of the most delicious prawn crackers I have ever tasted.
I ordered the chicken noodle soup and crispy shredded chicken with chilli sauce whilst my mum ordered chicken wings and a traditional Chinese chicken curry; both opting for rice. The food was presented beautifully and I could immediately tell that a lot of care and attention had gone into preparing our food. It was easily the best Chinese meal I have ever had. My mum agreed too and she has tried more Chinese restaurants than I have!
Jimmy was really friendly, taking the time to chat to us and the whole team work ridiculously hard to ensure that each customer is well looked after. Looking at the tables around us, everyone was tucking into their food and I overheard various people commenting on how delicious it was.
I’m already planning other visits with family/​friends who I know will love Lychee Oriental as much as I now do. I honestly cannot recommend this restaurant highly enough.

Went here with a cracking voucher deal and wasn’t let down, great atmosphere, friendly staff and great food, all cheap as chips given the voucher so whats not to like. Happy to go back at full price anytime

** Gluten Free Chinese Menu **
Being gluten intolerant chinese food is usually a no no due to soy sauce and wheat used to thicken sauces. I was really happy then when i saw lychee offering a full gluten free menu.
Normally this type of restaurant is out of ny price range but i was celebrating with the bf so we decided to treat ourselves.
I booked through 5pm who offer 20% off the al la carte menu which was a good wee saving.
We were seated quickly and offered prawn crackers which the waitress informed me where gluten free.
I had the garlic mushrooms to start and the honey chilli chicken with fried rice. The portions were really generous and honestly the food was amazing. I really wish they offered takeaway as i would def make the drive into town for this.
My bf had the duck spring rolls and duck in oyster sauce and he was also impressed.
I really cant wait to return and try out the sweet and sour chicken as thats my fave chinese dish!
Well done lychee on a fantastic gluten free menu!

This place is a wee bit pricy, but they have some good dishes. I really enjoyed the appetizers — prawn spring rolls and crispy tofu. The tofu was lightly battered and tasted amazing.
For a main course we shared the Sichuan vegetable stir fry and it was great. It came with lots of veggies and seasoned tofu. It was pretty spicy but I love that. A side of white jasmine rice cools it down and of course goes great with vegetables.
I also enjoyed the udon noodles. Simple but delicious.
Only disappointment of the meal was the scallops. The dish was £16 and came with 4 scallops that were overcooked and overpowered by a soupy onion and pepper mix. Scallops should not feel chewy.
But I enjoyed the appetizers and stir fry thoroughly and would go back for that. Overall this place is pretty good and the staff were very kind when I showed up 20 mins late to my reservation.

I’d been dying to come here for so long that strangely I’d forgotten all about it until Pammi G mentioned it was on her hit list too. As there have been some rather outstanding Chinese openings in Glasgow over the past year this place had perhaps worked its way down my pecking order, but I was still really excited to finally be giving it a try.
On entry to Lychee, the first thing I noticed was the sheer classiness of the place. Its gotta be the most swish and tastefully decorated Chinese restaurant in town. The service was impeccable, the food beautifully presented and these guys can even rustle up a mean cocktail!
The menu is a pretty standard Chinese /​Oriental affair, perhaps more suited to Western palates however. Choices include things like sizzling Chinese plates (which seemed to be very popular), Kung Po chicken, Lemon chicken and some Thai curry dishes, you kinda get the picture. There was also a decent amount of seafood dishes but, unfortunately, nothing that really shot out to me, so I kinda struggled to decide.
We started with a selection of dim sum, which were again wonderfully presented and perfectly steamed. There is no doubt these little bite-​sized dumplings were rather exceptional. We also ordered some duck rolls, which were like meatier spring rolls.
Onto my main, I decided to go for the Monkfish hotpot in spicy XO. The dish itself was nice, but a bit bland and I was hoping for something with a little more kick and perhaps less sweet. The portion was generous in size with plenty of veggies thrown in. At £18.50 for the main (without rice) its probably fair to say Lychee is on the spendier side as far as restaurants go, so its not the kinda place you would go to, say, on a casual Tuesday night out.
I’m no expert in Chinese food but perhaps you could liken the menu to Cantonese, which is a lot milder than say the dishes from areas like Sichaun (more my kinda preference). Therefore Lychee wouldn’t really be my top place for Chinese food.
If you fancy treating someone to a special Chinese feast, this should probably be at the top of your list. It is expensive, but that is made up for in the great ambience and execution of the food. I’m pretty sure there will be something for most people at Lychee, but don’t go in expecting more rustic, spicy food, which is more my thing.

It seems impossible to find semi-​authentic Chinese food in Europe. I reached a point where I don’t even go to a Chinese restaurant anymore because I always leave very disappointed. The meat options seem to be good since my friends were very happy with the food. I wasn’t in the mood for meat and I couldn’t find a single main dish that was vegetarian (we chose the two course option), so I asked to have the noodle with scampi but without scampi and just with vegetable. I got the noodle without scampi but they added so much tofu and only a few pieces of vegetables. That was not what I asked for so I just pushed the tofu away and ate the rest which was very delicious for British-​Chinese.

I don’t think I can say enough how much I loved my dining experience here, but I am going to try. I should start by saying I was lucky enough to meet Chef/​Restaurant owner, Jimmy Lee, who came over said hello and told us all about the menu. One of the perks of coming into a restaurant late on a weekday evening when it is a bit slow, you may meet the owner and said owner may actually have time to chat. Jimmy even ended up taking our order! Honestly he may be one of the nicest people I have ever met. If I could give a sixth star for that I would; it made the whole dining experience so much more personal to see how excited the chef was about his creation!
Our group decided to share a bunch of items off the menu since we couldn’t decide and we were starving. We ordered 3 starters, 3 mains and ended up with dessert… oh and let’s not forget the cocktails!
We started off with two of the signature cocktails: The Lychee Daiquiri. It did not disappoint and was a very well-​balanced, unique drink. Make sure to eat the alcohol soaked lychee at the end! My next drink was the Singapore Sling and as expected it has quite the kick of alcohol, definitely not meant for the light weights, but again fabulously prepared.
To start we had the Dim Sum Platter and personally it was my favourite, but I also just love dim sum! The dish was beautifully presented, though it did not last long as it was devoured by the table! The mushrooms in Garlic and wine sauce were amazing, even if you don’t like fungus! If I ever order a steak, I am having it along with it! And last, but definitely not least, was the crispy duck rolls. They are what you would expect, but you really can’t go wrong with a deep fried duck rolled up into a delicious little morsel!
The mains were the Monk Fish, the sweet chilli chicken, and one of the sizzlers. I did not eat much of these as I was pretty full… but of course I had to try a bit of each. All the flavours were wonderful and each dish was quite unique. For me the Monkfish won the flavour award and the sweet chilli chicken had a lovely presentation. Honestly I don’t think you can really go wrong with anything in this restaurant. All of the food we had was absolutely delicious, and beautifully prepared.
For dessert we were waffling, literally and figuratively. It was late, around 1030, we knew the kitchen was closed for the most part, so we figured we should probably pass so the staff should go home. And Jimmy wasn’t going to have it, so we ate the Waffle with maple syrup, ice cream and chocolate. Yum yum YUM! Yes, that plate might as well have been licked clean. We also had the banana fritter and the Cheese cake. To be fair I am biased, love chocolate and waffles, so that won for me!
The décor here is nice and modern, with an airy ambient feel, as opposed to the kitschy Chinese restaurants filled with lots of gold, red, dragons and Budas. The prices are a bit high but it fits; this is definitely not Chinese street food, and what I would call fine dining.
Chinese food is not generally one of my ‘go-​tos’ that I crave, but I would definitely come back to Lychee!

Located on Mitchell Lane, Lychee Oriental is gorgeous. The vibe is cool-​contemporary with a underlaying current of discrete sexy glamour. The décor is 100% up my street — it’s all funky statement lights, lovely big comfortable booths and a soothing colour palette. It’s a great environment to enjoy a meal.
It was Jimmy himself who took our order — he is SUCH a nice guy you just can’t help but like him. The waiting staff were great too — they brought me food and booze quickly… what more could I need?
The menu is small and compact which I like — there are a few traditional British favs to pick from like chicken sweet and sour or kung po prawns but the rest of the menu consists of wonderfully tempting speciality dishes.
To start we decided to get some dishes to share — Dim Sum, Duck Spring Rolls and Mushrooms with a Garlic White Wine sauce
Everything was absolutely delicious — the spring rolls were packed fully of tender moist duck and the dim sum was gorgeously sticky and flavourful, I am assured by AllyG that the mushrooms were also excellent (bleurgh! ‘rooms are a food nemesis)
For our mains we picked 3 to share between 4 of us — Honey Chilli Chicken, Chicken with Green Pepper Black Bean sauce and Monkfish Hotpot with spicy XO sauce, along with sides of fried rice and pancetta and a salt’n’chilli chips.
The Honey Chilli Chicken was amazing — nicely sized strips of chicken, lightly battered and served in the most gloriously sticky, sweet and slightly hot sauce. I am going to go out on a personal limb and say that it is the nicest thing I have ever eaten in a chinese restaurant. I would struggle now when we go back not to just keep ordering this dish over and over.
I only had 2 very small bits of the other two dishes because I was so into the honey chicken, both were beautiful tho and I would have happily eaten a lot more but I wasn’t prepared to give my belly space up when it could be stuffed with Honey Chilli Chicken.
The sides were excellent — the salt’n’chilli chips were fries which worked really well but boy were they hot, hot, HOT!
After our main the waitress brought us dessert menus. I had it narrowed down to a couple of choices and when I asked Jimmy which I should order he told us that the kitchen was closed — well it was about 10.30pm at this point. We took this as a sign that we shouldn’t have ordered dessert but Jimmy went off to the kitchen promising to bring us back some easy to serve cheesecake.
Next thing we know all the dessert dishes we had spoken about appeared at our table — how amazingly nice is that?
I got to try the Warm Belgian Waffle served with lashings of Maple Syrup and Ice Cream, this is a major comfort food for me and it didn’t disappoint one little bit — it was perfectly sweet and doughy which left me feeling all warm inside.
I also got to try some of the absolutely lush Banana Fritter and Ice Cream. The fritters were coated in a mega crispy light batter and the banana was soft and gooey… mmmmm I want another one just thinking about it.
I had a brilliant night at Lychee Oriental drinking AH-​MAZING lychee daiquiri and eating what I am going to claim is the best chinese food I have ever had.
I love literally everything about this restaurant.

Took my family here for lunch today and loved the whole experience. The service was excellent as well as the food. If I still lived in Glasgow this would be a regular place for me to eat.

Whenever I travel to a city I always try to find a really good Chinese restaurant. Lychee was recommended to me and after my first visit I was hooked!
Lychee is decorated extremely well and is quite an intimate design.
Staff are extra friendly and always on the look out for anyone needing them.
Food is really nice, I have chicken curry egg fried rice every time I go.
I would recommend Lychee to anyone who is looking for a Chinese restaurant in Glasgow.

This is our favourite place to eat bar none. We are to be found here most weekends as a twosome or bringing delighted friends or family with us.
Chinese restaurants can be very similar, but this is proper Asian fusion with some amazing dishes obviously dreamt up by their ‘celebrity chef’ Jimmy.
As well as the food, they have a fantastic wine list and must try unique cocktail selection.
Service is intimate and friendly.
This is a must try restaurant hidden from view but worth looking for. I promise you won’t be disappointed.

I came here for a work Christmas do and they were very accommodating. All the meals were delicious and the staff are very friendly. I would return again.

Exceptional. Wow. Still wish I was there now eating the amazing food! I honestly can’t rave enough about how good this place is. I’m in mourning that a/​I don’t visit Glasgow often and b/​there is no Chinese restaurant in Edinburgh that is comparable. Everything served was completely fresh, similar to Thai in that although we ate a greedy sized amount of food, we left not feeling over stuffed. Not a gloopy sauce in sight!
For starters i chose chicken noodle soup and my partner had hot & sour soup. Both lovely. Mine was the perfect hangover cure with a clear chicken stock, generous strips of fresh chicken breast and thin noodles. My partner’s was tangy and hot with bits of prawns in it. Next we had barbecue ribs and yuk sung. The ribs were small and the meat came away from the bone easily. The yuk sung was a mix of minced chicken and pork which you scooped into a bit of cos lettuce with some crunchy carrots and cucumber strips. OMG. Total food-​gasm! I’m struggling to describe how frickin tasty it was. Drool…
For mains we had 2 dishes to share: spicy chicken clay pot with fresh ginger and shiitake and beef with crunchy asparagus in chili garlic sauce. Both very, very tasty. Not a scrap left on our plates! The noodles and egg fried rice soaked up the remaining sauce nicely.
All in all a genuine 5 star experience. The service was great, friendly and not overly attentive. The ambiance was modern and classy. I highly recommend. 3 days later I’m still dreaming about the food. It was that damn good!

After reading Jules M’s review I was desperate to try here, and sneakily suggested it for dinner with friends between Christmas and New Year. I figured that Chinese would make for a pleasant change to Christmas food!
We were seated in a large booth. The décor of this place is beautiful — classy without being over the top, spacious and modern. I liked that it felt like there was a lot of space between us and the next table over, and through the night new arrivals were seated all around the restaurant rather than cramming everyone into the same area.
The menu is pretty long and detailed so it was a little bit of a challenge narrowing down the options. There doesn’t seem to be a pre theatre option, just a lunch deal, so keep that in mind if you are thinking of coming in for an early dinner. There is a banquet option at £34.50 but I didn’t think that worked out to be great value, so we instead got a mixed starter platter to share (£12 between two) and then I got aromatic duck with pancakes (like Peking duck) for £18.50.
The mixed starter platter was huge and came with two serves of:
BBQ ribs
Beef satay
Wontons (4 in total)
Salt & pepper chicken wings
Sesame prawn toast
Great value and the only downside being it is probably a little too filling. It was good to see that for a two person sharing platter they included two portions of everything so there was no need to worry about trying to split a rib, for example. Everything on the platter was delicious and I would definitely order it again, although I think the beef satay was my favourite.
The duck for main came with a basket of pancakes, cucumber and a plum sauce. The duck initially seemed a little dry but it actually wasn’t, it just needed a dab of sauce with it. There was an incredibly generous amount of duck and you couldn’t complain they’d been stingy! In fact, there was so much that I asked to take it home with me, and Graeme ended up having it for lunch the next day. So while the initial price of the dish seemed very steep, this would actually make a great sharing main between two with a side or another starter.
Staff were lovely throughout the meal and were never far away to get more drinks. If I remember correct the meal came to around £140 for 4 people, with cocktails and beers as well. So while that’s a little more than I’d normally like to spend on a meal out, the fact that the portions were so generous and that it was the festive season meant I was totally fine with it. They also gave us a card for a 50% discount off food in January, so that is a good incentive to return!

I visited here not long after it opened and was quite sceptical. It received great reviews but I feel Chinese food tastes the same whether it be from a takeaway or a 5 star restaurant.
The inside of the restaurant was very nice, and definitely nicer than most Chinese places in town which are all quite dated. This felt very fresh and modern. The staff were friendly so no complaints there, apart from being a tad slow.
I ordered the mixed seadfood in a fish sauce. This was a mixture of prawns, squid and scallops stir fried. It was good but definitely not worth £16.50. This wasn’t even served with rice so had to buy a side of that too. My boyfriend got his usual, chicken satay. He said it was nice but he wasn’t raving about it. He has tried chicken satay in loads of different Chinese joints and I have seen him more satisfied at other places. We were given free prawn crackers which was good.
We skipped desserts and ordered cocktails. The lychee martini was lovely however my boyfriends mojito was awful! His came about 10 minutes after mine and was too diluted and not fresh tasting.

Turns out I’ve just discovered a chinese restaurant to which I would love to return. I say chinese, but there was an element of japanese influence at play on Lychee’s menu, which I guess is why its called oriental. Yeah I’m a bit slow!
I’m not usually big on chinese cuisine as vegetarians can be a tad overlooked, but there’s been a buzz around Lychees Oriental for a while so I took my chances. The lunchtime menu runs til 4pm and £9.80 currently gets you a starter and main course. My two fellow diners added dessert (banana fritter, ice-​cream and syrup) for a very reasonable £2. I like to take a cheeky wee spoonful of everyone elses dessert. I’m annoying like that. It tasted good.
Tucked away on Mitchell Street not a million miles from the famous Lighthouse, Lychees has a smart sophisticated vibe thats perfect for special occasions. Cocktails, asian beers on draught and an interesting selection of wines are available. To give you an idea of drink prices £4.50 got me a pint of kirin ichiban beer, coke was £2.20 and a very decent cup of coffee came in at £2. Not cheap, but not too shabby either.
I’m told that the chicken satay skewers with peanut sauce was moist and delish, and the chicken katsu curry and lemon chicken were excellent. OK enough about the meat. I chose the vegetable spring rolls with a chili dip and salad to start, followed by vegetables in black bean sauce and egg fried rice, and had no room for dessert. There were three of us lunching; one vegetarian, one avoider of nuts and one all-​round contrarian. I’m pleased to report that we were all wowed by Lychees, with food, ambience, décor and service all top notch.
Lunch is a bargain. We WILL be back.

I cannot fault anything: from the warm welcome to the delicious food, the attentive yet discreet wait persons to their interaction with us; this is definitely a hidden gem– discover it!

I was brought here by a friend who had been in on the very first day this lovely restaurant opened. How were they doing 3 days later? Well this is what I have to report to all my fellow Unilocalers:
On entering we were greeted by lovely friendly staff who showed us to our table in the window, and handed us the set lunch menus. As it was lunch when we went in, they were doing a set menu of 2 courses for £9.80. Great price and enough choices for there to be a good selection without being over loaded. This set lunch menu is clearly designed with express lunch in mind! The dishes are more western and certainly recognisable, I think the a la carte menu has more traditional dishes on it for those who are looking for a less Western offering. I chose the chicken skewers with satay sauce and her across the table settled on the chicken and sweetcorn soup. We didn’t have to wait too long for the starters before we tucked in and enjoyed the tasty dishes in front of us. My chicken was seasoned beautifully and was just enough to whet the appetite.
Next course — wok fried beef noodles for me and mixed vegetables in black bean sauce for my companion. Again, we didn’t have to wait long and the presentation of the dishes was great. Clean and contemporary and more importantly very yummy. My portion was quite big but I was famished so scoffed the lot! We both said how fresh the dishes felt. I think that sometime Chinese food can be especially prone to being full of MSG and feeling very gloopy as you eat it. But fear not; this is definitely not the case here! The dishes were tasty, light and a million miles away from the junk that one may encounter at a certain all you can eat buffet chain in the not too far distance.
We were in for a celebration so my friend decided that we would have a cocktail with lunch. My Mojito certainly packed a punch, but hey we were living fast and dangerously. Cocktails for lunch on a Thursday? Yeah that’s how we roll…
Overall these guys were top class. Fast and friendly service there wasn’t much more we could have asked for. I’m reserving my 5^th star for a return visit when I want to try more of the menu. But if the rest is as tasty as what I’ve already tried then this may become a good treat when I’m in search a quick and tasty Chinese bite to eat! Definitely worth a look up and it’s a great location for those getting the train etc etc. Not a very obvious location but honestly take those extra few steps down Mitchell street and you won’t be disappointed!