It had to happen. PF Chang’s was destined to fall in to the lower quartile of about-to-be-over midscale dining establishments. You can always tell a restaurant on its way up. Usually they’ll have a decent bottle of wine for under $20, and the portions will be hearty, the service will be snappy and the entire establishment will be clean, calm and collected.
How things have changed from when PF Chang’s China Bistro fitted into that category. I recall waiting, on a regular basis, for 90 minutes outside an outlet in Denver. The wait used to be so long that I could get my name on the list, then go to the nearby Park Meadows Mall, drink a beer or two and then return (with bleeper stuffed into my overtight hipster jeans) to the restaurant in order to wait…. and wait…. and….z….zzzzzzzzz.
Well, that was in 1999, and this is now. The PF Chang’s at the Beverly Center in LA is usually half-empty on a Saturday night. The tables that used to be so clean and polished have now lacked the luster — some even have carved in graffiti that’s been there forever. And, over the past year or so, the margin-enhancing, cost-cutting measures have kicked in earnest. Let’s start with my favorite dish: Ma Po Tofu.
This dish is now very small. Sure, enough sodium and fat to keep me in heart disease and obesity (respectively), but a far cry from the Ma Po Tofu of old. You can see in this one that the tofu pieces are larger (but far less) and there’s less sauce and broccoli than there used to be. AND IT GETS WORSE.
The Steamed Dumplings now arrive on a Looooong dish (to make them seem larger, and more dominating) rather than the old dumplings that used to arrive in the (more expensive to clean and store) steaming bowl. See before and after, below:
BEFORE
AFTER
Now, this may seem subtle, but the “AFTER” has dumplings that are 30-50% smaller, as well as an absent leaf that was very tasty to eat. Not only that, but these dumplings are clearly MICROWAVED. The other were steamed. PF Chang’s is losing its luster for sure.
Now, let’ talk about the other key dish for us vegans, the Spinach Garlic. Sadly, I don’t have a picture of it from the good old days, but I have a picture of it from yesterday:
Seriously, there is NOTHING ON THIS PLATE…. about a can of spinach and no garlic to be seen. It didn’t even taste right — too watery and mulchy like you left a bag of spinach in the fridge for too long and forced yourself to eat it…. VERY SAD.
Next, we have la pièce de résistance, the Buddah’s Feast:
Yes, you are reading this picture correctly. We are looking at 1/2 a carrot, 6 pieces of broccoli, some snow peas and 11 (thin) slices of tofu. This is a fucking JOKE for $7.50.
Even the wine selection is unbelievable. A crappy bottle of wine that can be bought in Ralph’s for $5.99 costs $26.50. It’s so funny to see a server showing up at your table, giving you no eye contact and pretending to carefully ‘present’ a bottle of wine to you that is marked up by $20.00. Fucking despicable.
So, here we are. Dining at PF Chang’s like we wander the Queen Mary - a place of decaying elegance and of times gone by when things were better. I hope PF Chang’s goes the way of that other shitty chain that increased its prices and poured smaller beers until it ran out of money, and people stopped going there.
I hate you PF Chang’s. You took all that was good and made it jokingly smaller, more expensive and less tasty while at the same time hiring assholes to laugh at me when I show up at your door.
You are SO OVER!
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6:08 pm on August 11th, 2008
That spinach is pitiful. We have a PF Chang’s that I haven’t tried. I guess I’m not missing anything!
8:17 pm on August 11th, 2008
I loved your comment about RFD! I agree that Follow Your Heart is better. What I’ve had at M Cafe has been wonderful, but I think my options are a little more limited there than yours due to my intense hatred of onions. I’ve not been to Flore yet and I have enjoyed the 2 meals I’ve had at Pure Luck. I can’t really opine about beer because I don’t care for beer at all, but I know your taste tends to run more in the direction of a place where you can relax and have a good beer with your meal, so I understand that.
As for PF Chang’s, my favorite is the Coconut Curry Vegetables. I’ve had the Ma Po Tofu once (when I was at dinner w/ my peanut allergic brother and didn’t want to chance having peanuts at the same table as him), but I haven’t had anything else you pictured. I haven’t had a negative experience at a PF Chang’s yet, but I’ve not been to the Beverly Center branch for about a year and a half. I usually go to one in the Valley. Thanks for the heads up; I’ll definitely be looking out for what you described next time!
8:40 pm on August 11th, 2008
thanks, Vegyogini. Yes, a hatred of onions must be awful in the vegan world. Miss Anthrope (not me: owner of this blog, Quarrygirl herself) hates bell peppers, a fairly ubiquitous item in vegan cuisine. No beer, no onions… do you like garlic? What do you do for fun?!
7:32 am on August 12th, 2008
It is with deep regret that I must second your eulogy for PF Chang’s (Beverly Center). All the conditions you describe in your post were painfully apparent during our last dinner there. Additionally, PF Chang’s is frequently chosen for our staff meetings at work. Over the past three years, I’ve watched the portions shrink from generous to nearly-microscopic … now the average lunch item looks like a side dish!
11:31 am on September 20th, 2008
WOW!!!! THANK YOU FOR THIS ARTICLE…. it is very true. I recently went with my family and we ordered the ma pa tofu and we wondered if they had made the dish smaller or if it was just us (i guess they really did cut down). We also ordered the veg. lettuce wraps… they tasted HORRIBLE!!!!!!!! it was like they just cut up the tofu and the just put it on our plate, gross! We are probably never going back to that restaurant again.