New Dim Sum Place, good bad??! (Lei Garden)

Restaurant: Lei Garden
Address: 10125 Bandley Dr, Cupertino, CA 95014

Recently, this restaurant opened where Fatima Restaurant used to be, if you know. It's around the plaza with Marina Foods and Tapioca Express as well as the plaza with Target and Paris Baguette (replaced SK Noodle). It shouldn't be too hard to find.

Parking wasn't too big of an issue but I can see parking being a problem if Lei Garden does turn out to be a big hit among locals, which it is beginning to be.... The restaurant has parking itself but the parking lot is a small to medium size. There is parking on the street as well as in the surrounding plazas, just not sure if customers would like to walk to get to the restaurant.

As a dim sum connoisseur, I love to try out new dim sum places. Like I've mentioned before, my favorite dim sum place has still got to be Joy Luck. You can check out my review of Joy Luck here: http://foodlover888.blogspot.com/2013/04/dim-sum.html

I'm actually planning on heading to Joy Luck tomorrow, which foreshadows my thoughts on Lei Garden. It's not BAD, but I still prefer Joy Luck. Here's what we ate: I'll do a mini-comparison with Joy Luck for each ;)

This is the first thing we ordered. It's just "Drunken Chicken" which is basically chicken that's been marinated in rice wine and the dipping sauce is a ginger/green onion sauce, which is delicious. This dish is pretty good and I actually prefer it over Joy Luck's version because the rice wine flavor is not as strong. Joy Luck marinates their chicken really well with rice wine so the rice wine taste is very strong. For those who like less rice wine, you would enjoy Lei Garden's version but for those who can handle a lot of rice wine and really enjoy the taste, you should try Joy Luck's.

This second dish is just Chinese Broccoli with oyster sauce. Just from the picture you can see that Lei Garden's broccoli looks much shinier than Joy Luck's, which means that there is a lot more oil...which I don't like. But because there is more oil, it definitely does taste better. Otherwise, it tastes very similar. I would say that if you're going for a healthier lifestyle, Joy Luck's is better but if you don't mind the oil, then Lei Garden's is pretty good. Honestly, the amount of oil is really the only difference.

 This next dish is beef rice rolls. Right off the bat you can notice that the rice rolls are already ripped which isn't too good of a sign. Nevertheless, the rice rolls were still chewy and the mat was still decent. The sauce seemed to be a bit sweeter than that of Joy Luck's and I still prefer Joy Luck's but that could just be because I am used to Joy Luck's version. Nevertheless, this dish was pretty decent.

 This next dish is some pork/veggies wrapped in a bean curd skin and braised in some soy sauce. This is delicious and they make it very good. Tastes, again, very similar to Joy Luck's.

These pork spareribs were okay. I definitely prefer Joy Luck's over Lei Garden's because Joy Luck's pork spareribs are bursting with flavor whereas Lei Garden's seem to be a tad bland. Nevertheless, the quantity given by Lei Garden is much more than Joy Luck, especially since Joy Luck started putting taro chunks on the bottom, which again lessens the amount of pork. I guess you're getting more "bang for your buck" with Lei Garden but the quality of Joy Luck's spareribs are still better, in my opinion.

 These are fried taro dumplings. They are fried pretty well and very similar to Joy Luck's. TIP: try eating this with some mustard (ask for it from the waiter); pairs so well.

 This is where Lei Garden went downhill for me. I love love love getting tea-infused glutinous rice when I have dim sum and the best glutinous rice I've had is from Joy Luck. Because all the dishes I had earlier seemed very similar to Joy Luck, I was excited to open this baby up and experience the deliciousness. Boy was I wrong. Lei Garden's glutinous rice is not my cup of tea. The rice was way too soft and mushy. The way Joy Luck does it, which is the way I like it, is that the rice is cooked so it's chewy, so not hard or soft and Lei Garden's rice was just way too soggy and soft.....didn't even want to finish it.

This is Chicken's feet. Very similar to that of Joy Luck's, pretty good.

These are sesame balls. Usually at Joy Luck we get the one with black sesame inside which is better and my favorite but Lei Garden didn't have it so we settled with something else. Not sure what's inside of here though but it's a sweet paste. Not bad but definitely enjoy the black sesame paste more. Hope Lei garden will bring black sesame balls in because they're definitely very popular!

This last dish was another huge downfall for Lei Garden. This is a dish that Joy Luck does not have but that I've eaten at a few other dim sum places. This is supposed to be an herb-infused jelly so it should taste bitter but end with a sweet, palatable flavor. It's also supposed to be very healthy because of all the herbs infused. I actually really enjoy the bitter taste of this kind of jelly but this dessert is one that Lei Garden must improve on. I ordered this and thought it tasted just like grass jelly that I could get at any supermarket. There was very very little bitter taste and it just tasted sweet which is not what I had expected nor wanted. I could barely taste any herbs too.....felt like I was ripped off because this was just way too "off" from what I had expected. Really don't recommend this if you are expecting that herb-infused bitter jelly.

All in all, service was pretty good, definitely better than Joy Luck, but that could be because they just opened. I do feel like the variety is a bit lacking and the carts come out much slower than Joy Luck but that may be, again, because they just opened.

In conclusion:
Taste: 7.5/10
Service: 7.5/10
Price: 7/10

I won't be back here in the near future for my go-to spot for dim sum will still always be Joy Luck. Nevertheless, this place would have to be ranked number 2 so if it's not Joy luck, it would be here. I do feel that the drive between here and Joy Luck really isn't that far so you might as well head a few more blocks down to Joy Luck to get the best quality and best tasting dim sum in the area.