Super Noodle Express

So where do I begin? Before I dive into this tale of horror and frustration, let me just say that I’m American via the third world, so that might contextualize my anger a bit. I was craving Chinese food as I regularly do and walked down Spadina to window shop. I figured the location that contained the most people must be an indication of the restaurant’s quality, etc. I order the General Tso chicken which is my go to staple at any Chinese place regardless of where in the world I am. I ask whether it includes rice and the lady says quite aggressively «no.» Now, I’ve come to realize that almost 99% of Chinese restaurants in Canada do not include white rice, which seems crazy to me. So I decide to be ostentatious, hedonistic and glamorous and order a vegetable fried rice. I ask whether I can sit while I wait for my food and the lady rolls her eyes and says, «Ok.» So I sit on a chair next to the register (not a table) playing with my iPhone to avoid eye contact with anyone. The food comes out fairly quickly and I proceed to pay. The total is $ 23. I double check to se whether that number is correct, but I figure «what the hell, live god damnit!» and just go with it. I proceed to pay with a card and I cannot for the life of me get rid of a $ 2 tip automatically included in the machine. I keep going back and pressing 0% for gratuity which makes this beeping loud sound, but it doesn’t stop me from doing it at least five times. Oh no, this sound isn’t going to break me, but nothing happens. The $ 2 tip seems to be built into the machine as a minimum. The lady is giving me a death glare that could kill babies but I just keep glaring back at her determined to get rid this $ 2 tip. After about what seems like an eternity I give up and walk away paying about $ 25 for the two items which is seriously the most I have ever paid for Chinese food anywhere. I eat the food in a state of anger and wake up the next day with violent food poisoning.

Stumbled into this place on a weekday late evening thinking we would try something new along the Chinatown strip. Now we love hand pulled noodles so we went for the (A1) House Special Hand-​pulled Noodle [Large] and also tried the ‘old reliable’ (D2) beef pancake. The nice and chew noodles were well complimented with the savoury broth. My only complaint about the noodle soup dish was that it had very little in terms of toppings. Instead of a nice assortment of meats and vegetables, we had two leaves of bok choi and minimal meats. The beef pancake also just okay. We both found it very «doughy» with not a lot inside it.
I think this place had some nice perks, but overall I was hoping for more.

Ordered take out and when the food was here the noodle were all stocked together~I think it will be better to dine in then take out~the green onion pancake was also not that tasty at all~no flavour and hard to chew~beef was ok tho

I love the atmosphere and you can see the noodles being made. A small bowl is totally enough and for under $ 10 totally awesome ^^

Wasn’t too impressed with the food. We also had to ask about 5 times for the bill before it came.
Ordered C3 (fried hand-​pulled noodle with lamb). The noodles were nice and chewy but it was drenched in sauce with some sour taste to it. To me, this dish was too oily, too saucy, and had very little lamb in it.
Tried some of the appetizers as well. Both the chicken heart skewers and lamb skewers were flavoured the same — very crispy and heavy on the cumin. I wasn’t a fan.
My friends who ordered the soup noodle dishes enjoyed their meals a bit more I think.

3.5÷5, +.5 for service
Super Noodle Express is a rather intriguing name for this place in Chinatown. If it’s meant to attract customers due to its captivating name, well it did its job for me.
There seems to be an increase in these Northern-​style noodle places in Chinatown, so I wanted to compare this place to Magic Noodle (similar to how I compared Homemade Ramen to Magic Noodle).
What really caught my attention in this restaurant was the robot sliced noodles. I’ve had sliced noodles before, but never from some automated machine… so I decided to give it a shot and see if there’s any difference from the regular shanxi noodles.
Considering the speed that Chinese restaurants are known for, I will say the food comes out here quite slow compared to other restaurant; I didn’t get my food until about 15 minutes after ordering. Wasn’t in too big of a rush, but thought I’d bring that up.
As for the food… the noodles were definitely cut perfectly and were long and thick. Magic Noodle’s shanxi noodles are also thick, but the length is much shorter. Overall I didn’t see too much of a difference, although you would definitely notice the presentation to be more neater. In terms of this meal, I quite like it. The broth was a bit more flavourful than Homemade Ramen, but I didn’t give it much thought as it’s the noodles that one should be paying attention to in these places.
Service was great for Asian standards; they will ask you beforehand whether you want hot water or tea, and they will make sure you receive your order if it seems you’re waiting longer than usual. That’s honestly more than you can ask for in these establishments.
I do recommend this place if you’re into the whole Northern Chinese stuff. Maybe I’ll try their skewers sometime as well.

Another place specialized in handed made pull noodle. Came during a not so busy Saturday afternoon. The décor is clean and simple. Have tried ox tripe in chilly oil and spicy shredded chicken for appetizer. Ox tripe comes with tiny bit of sesame on to top. It’s quite appetizing, I would prefer it to be more spicy so I added some more chilly oil. I don’t feel much about spicy shredded chicken because it’s all white meat. The portion of the noodle is big for a large order, broth is hot and decent but texture of the noodle occasionally misses the mark. Another type of noodle they serve is machine cut slice noodle, I think personally I would prefer this type of noodle. Very yummy with good texture. Price is average and they don’t skimp on the portion. Overall I enjoy the meal and would frequent this place.

A nice friendly and enjoyable lunch. Good value and good food.
Yes this is as good as it gets.

Super Noodle Express 嘉家蘭州拉麵 is an unassuming noodle place in Chinatown. Their Lanzhou Lamian is one of the better ones I have ever tired in Toronto. Interestingly, there is a noodle machine that is in a shape of ultraman. Their lamb skewer is a pleasant surprise. Bursting with rich flavours of cumin and other spices, the skewers are of generous portion. If you have a craving for a late night snack with hearty beef broth, this is the place to go.

Actually I’ve experienced better chinese style noodle in chinatown. Some dishes like cold potatoes dressed with sauce, beef soup noodle were not bad but the cold noodle with chicken in spicy oil tasted really bad… My friends and I came there for Thanksgiving day but this meal didn’t make us feel any better. The price was reasonable but there were many other good restaurants nearby.

Wow, the noodles are good! (and the portions are huge!)
I got the braised beef brisket with thick-​cut noodles, and it was really, really good. The beef is fall-​apart tender and both juicy and flavourful the entire way through, and the broth, while a bit salty IMO, was very savoury. The noodles were fresh and chewy just as they should be, and happily never-​ending. Seriously, I was still on the noodles 15 minutes in.
I also got the lamb skewers, which I hated because they were crusted with cumin (ugh) and quite fatty. The dried tofu in hot and sour sauce was a bit too oily for my taste, but still good and very well portioned for 2.99.
Definitely worth more visits!

The place is new and clean. My favor is the house special noodle dish. The wudalang pancake is a must-​try dish. Looking forward to try the braised brisket hand pull noodle next time. Will be back for sure.

The noodles here are excellent. You can get thin/​wide hand cut or robot cut. The pricing is good (less than $ 10) and the sizes are more than enough.
I got #1 before, the house special, and while the meat was good, the egg is definitely over cooked.
The pork ribs option has a much richer broth than the others, so I’d recommend that.
Lamb skewers are thick and spicy.
Make sure you bring cash (visa above $ 25).
Place is clean (especially for Chinatown) so overall I’ll def be back!

We tried two bowls this evening: the braised brisket and the house special.
The noodles are very good. Both the hand pulled and the «robot» cut (whatever that means) had nice texture. It’s too bad there’s not much meat in each bowl. The broths were just alright. Neither had enough flavour for my liking.
The side dish of julienned potatoes was okay too. I think it’s worth a try to come back for some other non-​broth noodles and various menu items.
I would love to just buy the noodles and take them home to cook myself.

This new place is definitely authentic northwest Chinese cuisine. The price is very reasonable. The environment is very good and waiters are very friendly! They even have a robot to cut noodles!

I am a sucker for any place that does hand pulled noodles. I split a small order of the hot and sour hand pulled noodles and the vegetarian fried noodles with a friend. At the back of the restaurant, I literally watched the chef pull our noodles. It’s a lot of fun to watch and quite mesmerizing. The soup was tasty and the fried noodles were amazing! We were stuffed and had leftovers to take home. For the price, this place is great.

I invited two of my dearest friends to «lunch» today, and we decided to give Super Noodle Express a go. I’ve previously experienced the joy of Hand Pulled Noodles (the most sensual of the pulled noodles). This place did not disappoint.
Conversation did, however, leave a bit to be desired. It seemed that each individual was trying to progress their own agenda, giving very little thought to what had already been said. Not much of a dialogue. More like 3 individuals dribbling on in their own respective vacuum. It would be difficult for me to even summarize the various themes of what was said.
Nonetheless, I’d recommend Super Noodle Express for a no frills experience of hand pulled noodles. Do not go with the machine pulled variety as they lack character and body, and the menu refers to them as «Noodls» (omitting the «e» for some reason).

My «friend» invited me to this place because it has hand pulled noodles. Personally, I don’t care whether my noodles are hand or machine pulled, pushed, squished or smushed… so long as they taste and feel good inside my mouth.
We ordered a noodle soup each (A5), plus a shared fried noodle plate (C1, I believe)
The soup was a strong 3.5÷5; flavorful broth, healthy serving of noodles and meat, overall clean and balanced flavor.
The fried noodle was excellent 4.5÷5.
The restaurant has a minimalist design with friendly service. It was a bit hot inside for noodle soup consumption but I can’t blame anyone else for my sweats.

Pretty awesome handmade fresh noodle dishes. I loved my C1 aka lamb noodles. So good with a little siracha. Service is slow but the noodles are worth it!

Decided to give this place a try after a friend mentioned this restaurant has a robot that cuts their noodles. They have a 10% discount during their grand opening, and the portion-​to-​price ratio is quite good, comparable to other restaurants in Chinatown. Service is a bit slow, but it is to be expected of their recent opening.
They serve mostly standard Northwestern Chinese fare, like kebabs and Lanzhou-​style noodles. My friend and I tried their green onion pancake and radish salad for appetizers. Appetizers were of fair quality. For our mains, we had their robot-​cut noodles with sliced pork and braised pork for mains. The noodles weren’t too bad and seemed quite authentic, but the pork was too overcooked.
Overall, I would suggest give their noodles a try, but don’t get the pork. At the very least, go and check out their robot noodle cutter, it’s an interesting retro contraption complete with light up eyes and robotic noises.