Wah Lai Yuen

Lured in by the delicious-​looking bbq in the window. Ordered the duck and the beef chow ho fun. The noodles were either burnt or raw, and the beef in the dish was all gristle. The duck tasted off. Couldn’t stomach very much and left hungry.

The Good…
Order their barbecue meats, it’s very fresh and very tasty being well seasoned. We ordered half a duck and it was a meaty one! Great service, friendly and prompt. The Wonton dumplings are excellent, featuring the traditional, full shrimp tucked into a morsel of ground pork. Portions are generous, you definitely get value!
The Bad
The soup broth is a little plain and could use some excitement, like carrots, cilantro, corn and diced barbecue pork.
The Ugly
None… it’s old, it’s what we expected. You can call it a dive, but we loved it!
Didn’t Try, but Recommended
Try their baked goods at the front of the shop! Their almond cookies look killer!
Return for More?
Definitely, yes.

Picked up bbq pork (char siu) and duck on rice for take out. About $ 13. First time and last to eat here. While walking out I check my food and noticed 3 pieces of duck and 3 slices bbq. I tot, what a frikin rip but lots of plain rice. Went back in and asked the waitress. Is this all the duck? She brought it back and basically have me one more piece. As for the food, bbq pork was salty, not sweet BBQ pork char siu, duck was a bit bland, below avg, and no sauce on the rice. The only flavor was what the meat touched. So basically plain rice… i should have followed my gut feeling when I saw the bakery items as they all looked unappetizing when I first walked in. Not sure about all the good reviews. Unless I’m comparing to much to what I can get in vancouver Chinatown or richmond.

The family and I missed Chinese food after a few days in Victoria. After a whale watching trip in the morning, we walked over to Chinatown and had lunch at Wah Lai Yuen.
The inside of the restuarant lookes like the kind that I grew up with. They had the Hong Kong style bake good at the frontend of the restuarant. We didn’t tried any but they looked legit!
We’ve ordered:
Sliced beef and veggie chow ho fun (thick rice noodle)… 3 stars. It tasted legit but a bit too salty.
Congee with sliced chicken: 2.5 stars. While the chicken was very tender, I thought the cook forgot to add salt to the Congee. Adding the sauce from the Chow ho fun surprisingly balanced out the taste!
Roasted duck & Chashu (BBQ pork) combo with steamed rice: 3.5 stars. For $ 12, I was hoping there would be a bit more meats. The dish only had only 4 pieces of duck with 3 pieces were all bones. While there were 6 big pieces of Chashu, most of them were dry. May be not too many people ordered Chashu here?
I may give it another try next time we are in town.

I have been eating here for 26 years and have never had a bad meal. Their honey buns are the best in town. I will always remember a friend of mine being short of money in university and surviving for 3 days on a box of pork buns from here. He had one per meal. When you are looking for a good, quick and authentic Chinese meal, this is the place to go.

Yummy! I am so glad that we stopped here for lunch. We had originally planned to have Fish and Chips at what was supposed to be a great local spot but when we got there at 12 noon there wasn’t a soul in the joint… So we did what all Chinese do on vacation, find the nearest Chinatown…
I am loving how much the Chinese restaurants in Canada remind me so much the old school LA Chinatown joints I used to frequent as a small kid… This was right on… From the moment you walk in past the row of ducks, charsiu and siu yuk hanging in the deli window you are instantly taken back to the 80’s. Awesome.
We looked on the wall and found specials… Yay! The food was GREAT!
Here are the highlights:
Shredded duck chow mein. Soooo good! The noodles were cooked just how I like them with that great charred taste from the wok. The duck and duck skin made the dish so rich tasting.
Shanghai noodles: Fatter rice noodles made chow mein style. Think chow-​mein udon. Also had that great charred taste with bean sprouts and spinach. Wonderful dish.
Side order of SuiYuk (roasted pork). My favorite way to have pork skin. So tender and moist with that great crunch of pork skin. Awesome.
All plates cleaned. Will be back again.

Went to this place last night with my SO. First thing I noticed when I walked in, it was quite small and looked quite ordinary. I was sent to a table by a friendly but frantic waiter.
There was a bit of a wait to be served, but nothing too long. The food was overly salty, and the portions of meet given were small in accordance to the price I paid for. I was disappointed overall.

Really good food. Skeptical at first, place was simple, but very happy we stayed. Food didn’t only taste good veggies were fresh and perfectly cooked. Wonton soup, beef chopsuey, sweet and sour pork and fried rice VERY GOOD! Staff was friendly and service was quick. Highly recommended!

Which food do you jones after when you’ve been away from home for a week or more? It was kebab when I lived in London, unagidonburi under Tamachi-​eki in Tokyo, a slice in New York, burrito in LA and Chinese food now that I’m settled in my beloved new home, San Francisco.
I couldn’t wait to scratch that itch and so supped at Wah Lai Yuen, a Chinese deli whose front window was adorned with the appropriate duck, pork, etc.
The flavors (bbq duck, bbq pork, crispy bbq pork and the pot liquor drizzled atop rice) will never outpace my beloved Cheung Hing. Their portions were a bit parsimonious. Therefore, the value-​for-​money quotient is nothing to write home about.
In the end, if you find yourself in Victoria and you’ve got a jones on for Chinese deli, you could do a lot worse than Wah Lai Yuen.
I would ask Wah Lai Yuen to reflect on their value-​for-​money proposition.

Tried this place off Skype reviews while visiting Victoria. We weren’t very impressed. There were four of us, trying various menu items including Lo Mein, Chow Mein, BBQ duck, fried rice, soup. Fried rice was the best of all of them and has a generous portion of BBQ pork in it. There service was fast, and friendly, and you could tell they wanted customers to be happy. Their food, however, lacked in flavor, but heavy on salt. I’m not sure the «chicken» in the Chow Mein was chicken, and the duck was a chunk of bones and fat. Their prices were better than some of the surrounding restaurants.

Came up from Seattle looking for some authentic Chinese. Unilocal did not disappoint with this little gem. Skip the duck and just get the pork. The dry-​cooked string beans and the ganshao yimian (turns out Unilocal doesn’t do characters) were awesome. Buy a few pastries to go and they make a great breakfast the next morning.

Was there 9÷10÷11, not as good as before. Just ok-​good but do I really need a reason to go to Victoria?

If you’re eating at a place with «BBQ & bakery» stencilled on the window, you should try both or at least one of them. We opted for the BBQ.
The BBQ duck was very good. The skin was crispy and the meat not overly chewy. It was also not overly salty — perfectly done.
We ordered Chinese broccoli which is leafy and not the same as North American broccoli. In a few too many Chinese food establishments, local broccoli is produced when you order Chinese broccoli — not here. It was served hot and still crispy with the right amount of oyster sauce, again not too salty. Crunchy! Good news for aficionados.
I ordered the congee with chicken and Chinese mushrooms. It was delicious. The chicken was fresh and the mushrooms chewy. I ate half the bowl before I noticed that I forgot to order Chinese donuts with it. Next time!
Now the bad news. The BBQ pork was dry and overcooked. Cha-​sew should not look like that — ever — especially in a BBQ place. We arrived at 7pm and the place closes at 8pm, so perhaps this is what happens if you order BBQ near closing time.
The shrimp fried rice was overly saturated in soy sauce and was way too salty for my taste. The table beside us ordered the special fried rice and it looked perfect (the rice was white and not soy soaked).
So there you have it — a mixed bag. I’ll probably return for lunch to see if it was an anomaly. The place has been there for 25 years; they must be doing something right (maybe duck, broccoli and congee?). Next time I’ll give the baked goods a try as well.

I’d wanted to visit Wai Lay Yuen for some time since hearing about their bbq pork and duck. I’ve now been twice and will return many times. I can’t believe they’ve been open over 20 years and I’d never been.
Service was good, prices were pretty reasonable, the wonderful omg this is real Chinese food smell hits you as soon as you walk in. The portions are well sized. The honey/​pork/​coconut/​etc buns are all excellent (although I believe they source them from somewhere else, they’re still great). The bbq duck and pork were fantastic.
Next time you’re in Victoria’s China Town, be sure to visit this little gem.

Wah Lai Yuen is yummy! We ate here three times in one week! We heard about their Crispy BBQ pork so came in to try it our first day in Victoria. We were there at dinner time and they had sold out of the Crispy Pork so we ordered the regular BBQ pork, the BBQ duck and beef fried rice and everything was delicious.
We returned a couple days later and arrived at lunch time. We ordered the Crispy BBQ pork over white rice. The Crispy pork was AMAZING! The skin was seasoned perfectly and very satisfyingly CRISPY. The fat next to the crispy skin just melts in your mouth. We also ordered some honey buns and egg custard tarts to go. Both were the best I ever had.
A few days later, we returned for more Crispy Pork! This time we ordered it with Chicken Fried Rice. Another incredibly satisfying meal!
If we were here another week, we would go back and try some of the other dishes on their menu. Everything looked so good.
Service was fast and friendly. I highly recommend this place!

I haven’t visited all the BBQ places in Chinatown yet, but Wai Lai Yuen you have more than earned my vote for best Cantonese-​style (from Hong Kong) BBQ house in Victoria.
+ BBQ pork (stick with the non-​crispy skinless one) and duck over rice or egg noodles in won ton soup are excellent
+ The egg custard tarts here are absolutely DELICIOUS. Not only was I so surprised at how good they were out here, I bought a dozen to bring back to my coworkers
+ Price: a full lunch including drink and dessert will only set you back about $ 12 – 15
This is a fantastic place to get fresh Cantonese-​style BBQ and noodle soup dishes. They also have plenty of other entrée items for dinner.

I have been coming here for wonton soup and BBQ pork since I was 7. Décor hasn’t changed, and the prices have only trickled up a few dollars. It was such a necessity in my family that my dad and I used to come every second saturday for won ton, before we’d head out for playing snooker.
I came back over the Christmas holidays to show my partner, who’d never had their food (he had taken me to his fav in Toronto, so I owed him)…and our ‘snack’ of BBQ pork ended up being a full meal.
Want fantastic BBQ pork or duck? come here. And the honey buns? oh, you better save room!
PS they make their own wontons and I’ve never had a bad meal here.

This is a small family owned restaurant with affordable yet delicious food. I live in chinatown and go quite often, especially when i don’t feel like cooking dinner, I pick up some pork and duck to take home. They are super friendly not to mention the food and prices are great too.

I’m amazed no one has Unilocaled this. My husband and I walked up and down C-​town, even asked 3 merchants for recommendatins (in chinese) and were directed to the higher priced places.
Finally we passed by this place and saw the duck and roast pig hanging in the window. It reminded me of a real, authentic chinese bbq place. We looked at the menu and walked in. The portions are smallish, but the prices are cheap, and the food have good flavor.
We ordered the Soy chicken, the Roast Duck, and the BBQ Roast Pork ($ 11.95), along with a side of chinese broccoli in oyster sauce and bowls of rice. It was just enough for the 2 of us, but didn’t stuff us to the gill. Price w tip: $ 25. What a bargain compared to the neighbors for $ 25 for ONE DISH.
This place had soup noodles, pan noodles, meat over rice dishes, and other comfort Hong Kong style dishes. The front of the store have chinese barbecue to take away, and also baked items like buns and sticky rice.
I gave it a generous 4 star because it was affordable and authentic Cantonese food. Compared to the neighbors charging 3x’s the price for «white» Chinese food, it deserves a 4 star