Burma Cafe - Daly City

First time here! We forgot to take pictures of the food before we started eating, but let this be a testament that it was good food. We ordered: Green Tea Salad Coconut Rice Chicken Curry Chicken Kebat

TL;DR Burma Cafe has become a SAD excuse for a restaurant. Not even a glimmer of the goodness of its FORMER self. Sad. I 'm sad. Sad to discover Burma Cafe has taken an unfortunate DEEP dive in the quality and number of dish choices. Sad to have a happy memory of the DELICIOUS offerings from my last visit a few years ago; comparing the happy memory heaps more pain to the memory of my recent experience. Sad that the vibe has gone flat. Sad because I raved to my two guests that we would have a superb meal. Sad that the menu is a single page of paper whose quality is in line with the food, an accurate foretelling of what is to land on the spartan table. Sad that Burma Cafe 's website burma cafe.com/menu.html reflects the menu from just a few years ago, with 75% of the items NO LONGER offered. The bad that makes me sad: Platha and Dip: Pan fried roti until golden brown and crispy served with a mild coconut chicken curry sauce : Small triangles of the platha flat bread appeared and tasted as if they were made a week ago and soaked in oil. The chicken curry sauce was a weak and thin excuse for a sauce. $18.00 Tea Leaf Salad: Marinated fermented tea leaves, romaine lettuce, tomatoes, jalapeños, fried garlic, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, fried split peas, peanuts : No resemblance to the glorious version I was expecting. Seemed preassembled, which caused the dressing to be absorbed by the fried split peas, peanuts and sunflower seeds. Sliced lettuce is being passed off as the specially prepared tea leaves. A Costco pre packaged salad would have won a blind taste test. $18.00 Turmeric Chicken Fried Rice: Chicken, jasmine rice, turmeric, cumin, egg, green onions, fried onion : MUSHY with very few bits of anything beyond the rice. It takes a special lack of culinary skill to serve a mushy version of this special Burmese dish. $22.00 Mohinga rice noodle and fish soup : A bowl of thin mushy rice noodles soaked in a broth of fish sauce flavored water. Mohinga is widely considered to be the National dish of Burma Myanmar , which made this rendition particularly SAD supremely egregious to the definition of Burmese Food. $20.00 Garlic Sautéed Shrimp: : Must have used denatured garlic, not even a small hint of garlic flavor. Resembled boiled shrimp coated in oil. $24.00 Pork Stew: On par with a pork dish served in a cafeteria style buffet joint. Not bad but: value meter did not muster a quiver. $24.00 Tea Jasmin : Tea bag hot water. Sadly, the tea was the highlight of the meal in terms of matching the description on the menu. $5.00 NOTES: I speculate that Burma Café was bought out and the new owner is in the kitchen pretending to be a chef. The waitress was very nice and pleasant. She however neglecting to stop by and ask how is everything . Not wanting to have the food experience reflect on her, a cash $30.00 tip on the $143.94 includes tax bill. $175.00 for a big regret.

This is my first time visiting this cafe. I don't usually have many opportunities to have Burmese cuisine. Probably twice, one in the country and had terrible diarrhea. Second was in the US and thank God they dialed down the coconut milk and butter, spice so I was fine. This would be my third. My brother celebrates his 15 years anniversary with his loved one and I am honored to be an invited guest. So excited already. The restaurant looks humble from the outside along with other establishments. One would not know if is not a local. The interior design is artful, cozy and minimalist. There is no guest when we arrive. I'm glad coz we get to pick a nice lounge seating. They are packed half an hour later. Waitress is friendly, knowledgable. She comes and checks on us as often as she could despite the busy flow (she is by herself on the floor). I'm sad that they remove most of their fried dishes (incl. samosas and fried tofus). My brother came about 5 years ago. Some of his fav dishes are no longer on the menu. Pity. We order what the waitress recommends to us. Tbh, the entree dishes are my absolute fav especially, the Tea Leaf salad...the rest of them is meh. I have high anticipation for the Turmeric Fried Rice, smells inviting however, the rice is soggy to the core. The Fish Stew is bland and again, noodle is soggy. We couldn't finish the bowl after one spoon each. Shrimp curry is bland and oily. Pork stew is 3.5/5, flavorful, tender. Nothing special really. We sit for another 1hr because of the cozy atmosphere and I haven't seen them for awhile. Jasmine tea pot keeps our convo delightful. This is a nice spot to change up your daily flavor and hang out. I really think they should bring back some of the fried dishes and adjusting flavor on some of the dishes. They seriously need great attention.

Food amazing, service amazing and friendly. Ambience cozy. I love this place, I tried the garlic noddle w/ pork delicious

The best Burmese in the bay go ahead and me is this elegant restaurant tucked into a strip mall in Daly City. More than half of their menu is vegan or vegetarian, and their staff is sweet and friendly and conscious of dietary needs. Favorites: tea leaf salad savory, crunchy, sour, salty; if I had to pick a last meal, this might be it. Samusa soup is warm and comforting. The house special noodles with tofu. The okra egg curry (eggs are optional). Ginger salad, sweet and sour and refreshing. Burmese food has lively combinations of flavors and textures and this place gets it all right. The first review here recommends reservations, but I've never needed them if you're hungry now, don't let that stop you!