First China Restaurant

I came here because everything else was closed and thought I would venture away from New Paradise. I ordered the Spice Beef Clay Pot which had almost no bok choy at the bottom and a little too much tendon (and I generally like that). I also had the roasted duck with wonton soup. The wontons were ok, but the duck was not crispy, and old. The broth had a strange taste, almost as if they used old, reused oil. Nothing was fresh, except for the fortune cookie. Worst of all, they gave us a bowl of cold rice. If they can’t get that right, you can imagine how much they care about making sure you come back.

Too much MSG, especially when a friend asked for no MSG. The food at First China caused my friend and me to suffer from migraines about an hour after eating. We felt weak and dizzy afterward, and it was not the feeling of a typical food coma.
The taste was mediocre, not horrible, but not good. The décor is a bit shabby, and it could be cleaner.

This is a fairly nice restaurant. When we arrived there was a sign on the door that said no more dim sum. We ordered a variety of dishes. The scallops in spicy garlic sauce was very interesting. There was a lot of lime juice in the sauce which made it tart and hot. We also ordered ½ a roast duck which was very good, along with a tofu dish and some spicy beef. Everyone enjoyed the meal and the service was excellent. The take out menu has your usual Chinese fast food items, but the sit down menu is very extensive. I would go back here again to try some of the other dishes they have.

Getting dim sum in Atlanta is always an adventure in itself. I am always looking to strike gold, but it has become obvious to me that I am running out of options. This is one of two Chinese restaurants called First China on Buford Highway. I driven up and down Buford highway a number of times and missed this place. From the outside, its looks like a pretty run down abandoned place. Peeking inside a dirty window, above a decrepit fish tank, I was amazed to see that there were in fact people dining inside. The inside was much more dingy looking than I have imagined from my observation of the outside. It is a bad sign when there is only a few patron’s during what I would consider the peak time for dim sum for a Sunday morning. The occupancy was about 3 out of 25 tables. I will not bore you by listing every dish of dim sum that I had. I did try about ten pretty standard dim sum dishes. Ten dim sum dishes divided among 3 people is very little food. My hunger wasn’t satisfied; however, I was not inspired to continue trying anything else. Here are some noteworthy details. The flour wraps around the steamed beef crepes were too thick. The bamboo tofu wraps looked like they were shrivelled and aged and tasted like its appearance. The Phoenix claws were probably the best thing we had in First China, but not the best by far. I thought the worst item was the shark fin dumplings which I usually don’t ever order because you almost never get real shark fin in the dumpling. The shark fin dumpling meat was tough and rubbery. I regret to say that this might be the end of very short journey for my search of good dim sum in Atlanta.

This week’s dim sum quest brought me to this disappointment on Buford Hwy. As Kit explained it to me once, good Chinese chefs here in Atlanta play musical chairs and dim sum joints are crap shoots.
I had the usual line up of food
Beef wrapped in flat noodle: yuck
Tofu skin w/​pork filling: yuck
Sticky rice w/​chicken wrapped in banana leaves: yuck
Chicken feet: yuck/​borderline terrible
Siu mai: average
Pork riblets: Not bad
Shark Fin Dumpling: Yuck
Egg custard tart: not bad
Very disappointing, the best thing I had there today was the tea. Lack of patrons leads to low turnover. Low turnover leads to stale food. Stale food leads to the darkside.
I was in and out of here in less than 30 mins. Someone please message me when this place has edible dim sum again.

Went here for lunch with friends on a lazy Sunday. 4 people and we ordered a ton of food, and the bill came out to be 14.00/each, incl tip. if that is not cheap I don’t know what is. everything tasted great, the steamed shrimp rice rolls were nice and firm in texture and wasn’t mushy/​over steamed like some Dim Sum places. food was not oily, and everything was clean to the palate. The place is a typical medium size Chinese place, where food is great, décor… well there is none.
Come with a huge group of friends and explore the dim sum experience, there’s nothing like it. If you are a newbie at this I recommend:
1) hakao
2) Si mi
3) shrimp steamed rice rolls
4) Dacon radish cakes
5)Roast duck. it’s dark good (my friend Adam R. ate almost ½ a duck I think)
7) if you are adventurous ask for the bowl of stomach, and innards, that are cooked in a great sauce. w/​dacon radish. it’s so tasty.
6). Egg custard to finish the meal.
Service was great, food was beyond exceptional. I think this is on my top list for Dim Sum for sure!

I’ve been going to First China for almost as long as I’ve been in Atlanta (11 years now), and while it’s changed owners at least once that I know of, the food is still really good.
Friends and I often go for dim sum (Chinese-​style, tapas-​like brunch), especially on weekends when there’s a larger variety of dishes on the carts. It’s also a good late-​night place (open ’til 3AM) when you’re craving something other than what’s available at Waffle House or Landmark Diner.
Note that there are two menus. While they have many dishes in common, non-​Asians are usually given the one with a selection that is supposedly geared more to Western palates whereas the other is typically given to Asians; this is the one that includes «down home» dishes that many non-​Asians may find, well, unappetizing. I often order from both, whether I’m eating there or taking out.
Congee is quite the comfort food for me but I’m not big on the version here because they add ginger. However, they rock on others of my comfort foods, like the Roast Duck Noodle Soup, Shrimp and Egg rice plate and Beef and Tofu rice plate. Another that reminds me of going out with my mom: Seafood Pan Fried Noodles, which was one of her favorites and still is one of mine.

Asian chefs like to play musical chairs so they’ll stay at one place as long as the music doesn’t start. Once it starts. .. .. where will they land?
I came here recently with my friend’s family and the place was packed with Asians (good sign). We had a fantastic meal: Fish stomach soup (it’s not as crazy as the literal translation sounds), fried salt and pepper shrimp (soo good!), sweet and sour pork (a prerequisite when going with family — they somehow always think the «kids» love that stuff), beef stew hot pot (extremely tender slow braised beef with lots of tofu and vegetables), gai lan (it’s like Asian broccoli), pan fried chicken (very good — minus the MSG dipping salt), and light battered fried fish.
All that plus dessert for 4 people: around $ 30. Can’t beat that! The key: bring an Asian that can read the Chinese menu to order the «set meals».
The other reviews may have been correct at the time, but to me it was fantastic half a year later. Better stop by before the music starts!

First of all I don’t know what the other writers was on… I wasn’t even sure if this is the same place I been to multiple time forced on by family friends.
I have to say the service suck! There was no excuse for that. You have 4 waitstaff on hand with maybe the most 2 table excluding our table to serve. There should be no reason to slow and non-​responsive.
I also recommend that you use the bathroom at home before you go there. The bathroom stink and dirty. It reminds me of a dirty gas station in the middle of no where. When I saw how the restroom looked I was a bit worried about my food. So I look up to see there score was the 70+. Which makes me a hesitant to eat my food.
The place looks out dated and run down.

I recently went back with some friends for some late night snacking. This used to be a place I loved to go to, but I can’t say the food tasted as good as I remembered it. Their Mongolian beef (chong bao niu ruo) was a little too sweet for my taste, and their service was a little slow.
Don’t get me wrong though. This place still gets 4 stars. I went at around 1am in the morning, so I guess that might account for things.
I feel that the food might have a little too much MSG, as I was really thirsty later on, but that was just a small nuisance.
Overall, it’s still one of my favorite late night meal places, and they have great dim sum on the weekends too.

4.5 stars really. Ignore the karaōke and plastic roses, and concentrate on the spicy pork with Peking sauce or the beef with garlic sauce. Décor consists of an industrial-​strength paint scheme and bright lighting, and tanks of lobsters and crabs. It’s open till 3AM. Portions are large and ridiculously cheap. Its Chinese name, Da4 Fu4 Gui4, means «Big, Rich, and Expensive».