Xiao - Târgovişte

I've been here since the last few years, the food was always very delicious. It's the best Chinese food I eat in Romania.

Good food and fast service. Clean and quiet. The restaurant also has a delivery service.

The food quality is really good, it is delicious, and I think it is the only Chinese restaurant in Târgoviște. I also recommend the waitress is really nice!

Great food, fresh ingredients, very cheap. I had countless times of Chinese food in my life all over the world and can say that this was a very pleasant surprise. Very recommended!

I will write this entire review in English to make it accessible to anyone interested in a fair bit of reading. For whoever wants to read this in Romanian, Google Translate is your best friend! I will try to be as objective as I can, although I have some bones to pick with a few of the other reviews that don’t do any justice to this restaurant. First thing first, my personal impression. To make it clear from the beginning I will compare Xiao with my previous experience with Chinese restaurants and not Internet stories. I had the opportunity to eat in restaurants in mainland China, more specific Shanghai. Also, I have eaten great Chinese food in Europe and USA from local Chinese communities: Amsterdam, San Diego, San Francisco, etc. I can tell that most if not all dishes at Xiao are Chinese sourced and the recipes are followed as close as possible by the chef(s). The noodles are high quality and well prepared, the vegetables in any dish are perfectly seasoned and cooked and the meat is tender and juicy (at least in all the dishes I tried and I tried quite the lot). My personal favourites are the soups, especially egg and seaweed (algae) or sweet and sour soup. The main dishes that I recommend most are the hot plates combinations. They come in a tough cast iron plate in which they are prepared and it burns your skin off if you touch it by accident. As much as dessert goes, I’m in love with their sesame dumplings (which also have a peanut butter filling). Now, how does this compare to the real Chinese food? They have reduced the heat and spiciness in the dishes to accommodate the Romania market, which is understandable since it looks like I’m the only client insisting in ordering ultra spicy and never gets enough. Next time I’ll try to persuade them to make my soups Sichuan style. Another thing that lacks is some of the more hard to get ingredients like lotus bulbs for instance or weird mushroom species. Nevertheless, the menu is plentiful even without those. Oh, and they don’t serve the “weird” dishes, but that is also understandable since probably nobody would order them anyway. And sincerely no restaurant outside of mainland China I’ve eaten at has fried pork intestines in their menu. Concluding on the restaurant focused part, I say, and I’m being subjective but honest, that Xiao is probably the best Chinese restaurant I had a chance of eating at in Romania and probably one of the best I have eaten at outside of China. Kudos for that and hopefully you will keep the business unchanged. It has and is a blessing to be able to come to you every time I’m in Targoviste. Now the bone picking part... I’ve read reviews about the food being too spicy or too oily. Well, that’s how it is supposed to be: Chinese food is usually oily and spicy and peppery and garlicky. I suppose you expect dishes that have the little pepper(s) next to them to have at least a little bit of heat. Like I said above, the Romanian market is not used to Chinese spicy, but you can probably order something that is not spicy at all if spicy is not for you. There are also some reviews about the food tasting like fast food. Let me tell you, it is far from fast food. Now, I don’t expect all people to appreciate this kind of food, but to call it fast food only because you had chicken noodles and didn’t like it is plain rude and mean. And the last bark out of my mouth goes to those complaining that eating inside is a bad idea because your clothes will catch a bit of food smell. Isn’t it normal for that to happen if the kitchen is actively used and the food comes steaming with flavour to your table? For example, In most restaurants in Japan chefs cook on a hot stove right in front of you. That smell, with which you leave the restaurant is the smell of quality food. Yeah, it’s sometimes bothering, but everyone’s got a washing machine. Anyway, hope you had some fun reading this review. Is by far the most detailed and passionate I have written so far.