Great China

My order: Beef & Broccoli; Chicken & Broccoli (steamed); Chicken Rice Soup; Pork Fried Rice. I’m passing through and we chose to stop at this Chinese food place based on the ratings being over 4 stars… Unfortunately, the food was a massive disappointment. Bad texture and VERY mushy. Straight mush. The chicken was unappetizing and looked horrible to begin with. I took one bite of the pork fried rice and it was mush that had no flavor. Normally you can taste the pork bits or different veggies, but this wasn’t like that. We threw everything out. The food was done in the time they estimated (15min) and the bathroom was clean. Those are the only two positive things to say.

If your food tastes so good from here, then here is the secret reason why... the 35-year-old owner LITERALLY PUTS HIS HEART AND SOUL INTO EVERY MEAL THAT IS MADE BY HIM, AND BY HAND. THIS IS WHY THIS PLACE IS SO SPECIAL. ALSO THIS IS THE ONLY PLACE IN MADISON THAT CAN MAKE WHITE RICE CORRECTLY!!! So yeah watch my video, I actually caught the owner doing a repetitive and banal task of taking some weird fiber thing out of pea pods with great cheer and joy! THERE IS NO NEGATIVE ENERGY AT ALL IN THIS CHINESE RESTAURANT!! Unlike some of the others in Dane that are haunted by Chinese dragon spirits!...

Food was not good. Deep fried items had an old used oil taste. Rangoon filling did not taste like it should, bland and off. Sesame chicken had a bright orange sauce that was like sweet and sour. The chicken itself was tough, dry and stringy. Over $40 for food that was largely inedible. The sad thing is, occasionally this place puts out decent food. It's a crap shoot, and really not worth it anymore.

Great spot I like to go on break at when I'm working in my taxi. I used to work in a kitchen where I had to crack several eggs, scramble them, then store them for the chefs to cook later when they need to. This results in a less flavorful egg that doesn't taste as fresh as a freshly cracked egg. Once I came to pick up my dinner and the chef was not done making my food. I watched him crack an egg for my fried rice. He could have used pre-cracked, pre-scrambled eggs but he used a freshly cracked egg. I understand that it's a little more effort to use a fresh egg but I really appreciate the dedication to flavor. Yum!

I would not recommend spending your money here. I was shocked with how bad the chicken chow mein smelled, absolutely horrid had to throw it away immediately. The sweet and sour chicken was ok, but so greasy and overly breaded. Egg drop soup was not good at all, had a very weird taste to it. Very very disappointed. You can tell very little care goes into making this food.

Ordered the wings, fried rice, pan fried noodle, orange chicken, and sweet and sour chicken. Pan fried noodles were dry, brittle, and parts of it were burnt. Chicken wings were burnt and son couldn’t finish eating them. Sweet and sour chicken was incredibly dry. Orange chicken was great. Not sure we’ll be back.

I ordered cashew chicken. It had about 12 cashews, a small chicken tenderloin cut up in very small pieces & about 2 lbs of carrots & celery. The sauce was tasteless. First & last time I'll order from here.

Great China is our go-to for Chinese takeout. The staff are friendly and polite. The food is familiar, consistent and prepared quickly - it is exactly what anyone would expect from a high-volume, American Chinese restaurant. I really appreciate them on the days we can not, or will not be bothered to cook and even more so on occasions such as Christmas Eve when our oven basically exploded with our entire feast inside of it...Great China to the rescue! I'm giving two stars, though, because their menu also includes sushi which ought to be avoided at all costs. The selections are more expensive than offerings at other neighborhood establishments, like Tokyo or Jackknife but the quality is dubious at best. Of course, with any cuisine, there will always be many tiers of food freshness, preparation and presentation. In the world of sushi, call me a snob, but, I had always considered the low end to originate somewhere near grocery store deli counters which are only slightly above gas station sushi but that seems irrelevant because what kind of idiot would eat gas station sushi? Well. The order I took home from Great China made gas station sushi look like a delicacy. I refuse, though, to assign them any status on the Tiers of Sushi Quality because what I received was certainly not an edible meal, but rather an instrument of biological warfare. In summary: If you're looking for lo mein, sesame chicken or egg rolls or what have you, Great China will get you exactly what you expect and you will not be disappointed. If you're looking for sushi, look elsewhere unless you have a legitimate desire to cancel your plans for the next 30 hours or so because what you get will probably be food poisoning.

Another night with beef fried rice, first time trying this order hopefully it will be as good as the rest!

Don't get delivery lazy butts. Don't call for pickup. Walk in. Order like a normal person and take your shit to go. Not only will you be treated like a real customer not some random dude getting food. You know like when we were kids and you k we the lady at Subway? And she'd always hook it up with extra cheese cause you were there for 3-4 mins being nice cause you'd actually go to the spot and get your food. That being said. Fresh Rangoon's from here are amazing. I'm from the west coast and idk how but we don't have Chinese like this. I've been told there's better Chinese in Madison and I believe it. This place you can't dine in and is kinda raggedy but it's a mom n pop Chinese restaurant what you expect? It's old not dirty...haters! Next time go to the store. Look in the bag and...Doi , they made a mistake and forgot rice. Who knows they might throw in some extra Szechuan sauce. 5 stars y'all.

I ordered king pow chicken and received a $15 order of undercooked carrots. There were a few peanuts and virtually no chicken

This is our go-to place for Chinese delivery. The food is consistently good and the delivery service is impeccable. Seriously, everyone who has delivered has been so incredibly nice. And the food arrives quick and fast. We've never had bad food from here. And love the egg rolls!!

Don't come here for crab rangoon!! It didn't have cream cheese OR crab. I'm not sure what's in it but it looks like nasty icing. I get skimping on the crab, but what the hell?! This place is a dump and the food is bare minimum at best. They also charge a surcharge for cards. 3%. The food isn't worth the surcharge FYI

The chicken in the dishes we ordered was very chewy, like the ligaments and leftover parts of chicken you usually don't serve. The texture was gross so we didn't eat most of what we ordered. We are ordering pizza now instead.

Every time I work in this side of Madison I like to visit this place. Just a small place that is primarily a take out and delivery. Not a nice place at all, but the food is always good. Except this night. Mongolian Triple Special. Beef, chicken and shrimp. Though I requested it with beef only. Very dark looking when I played up at home on top of a bed of plain white rice. No color to speak of. Green onions were cooked to the point of sogginess I can't recall ever seeing before. The regular yellow onions were over cooked, they looked like the way you'd get them in top of a burger, very caramelized and soft. Too soft. Cooked to virtually zero bite. The meat was similarly over done. Huge disappointment. I also always order a wonton soup. Very bland and I'd guess this isn't a chicken stock. A bit dark for chicken broth, may be beef, though it doesn't actually have enough flavor to be sure. This might be a bullion, I'm not certain, if I made this at home I'd fix it before serving it. On the positive, the wontons are very tasty now that it's cooked enough to try. In the past the foods been much better. Tonight if this was a first visit I'd be hard pressed to try this place again. But I know I'll try again.

Excellent food. Best fried rice, so tasty, and packed with fresh meats and veggies. Quick efficient service

When I get this from my favorite Chinese place, I love it. Today-bland, tasteless. I'm hungry & so disappointed.

Told me 15 to 20 minutes took 35 did you have to stand outside in the cold food was pretty flavorless

ordered delivery today. got the chicken with mushrooms and they didn't give me any rice. Really??

Very fast delivery! We were looking for some delivery options on NYE, and we decided to give Great China a shot. They delivered the food faster than advertised. They said about 45-50 minutes and they were here closer to 30. The egg drop soup was pretty good. Thick consistency, good amount of egg bits. We ordered a tofu garlic dish and a chicken broccoli dish and were disappointed to see that they were basically the same dishes sauce and veggie-wise just with different proteins. Both dishes were not terribly impressive. Both sauces were a little too sweet for my taste and could have used some more peppers or other flavorings. Overall, mostly a standard cheap take-out/delivery fare.

Consistently yummy food and fast delivery. We order it at least once a month. I'm a fussy vegan and love their curry tofu, and their veggie fried rice (ordered with no egg) is worth getting a quart so you have leftovers, because it's even better the next day. My kiddo, just as picky but not a vegan, digs their shrimp with mixed vegetables and we always get a couple of veggie spring rolls to share.

Pretty mediocre. Don't expect anything, then you won't be disappointed. Not recommended for eating in, they'll bring your meal in delivery boxes and plastic silver to your table.

The food is excellent arrived on time couldn't be happier!!I think everyone that likes Chinese food she come and check them out

egg roll was greasy and had an odd taste and the chicken in my chicken fried rice was undercooked. this was my first order and I will never order again. just awful

Abysmal atmosphere. White fluorescent lights, sad vinyl booths where you can watch the fish tank of turtles swimming furiously around, wishing THEY were on the menu so they could just stop swimming already, a self-serve water pitcher in the cold case containing canned sodas. Menu/food: Sadly subpar, even for Midwestern Chinese food. Sesame chicken was breading lumps with sketch meat inside (suicidal turtles?) and an orange sauce that wished it were as good as Panda Express's standard, Orange Chicken, egg rolls that were more skin than filling, and pork lo mein than tasted only of salt. The basic flavor of all dishes was... SALT. Maybe those are sea turtles...? In short, this place is like Pong (with a broken screen) when what you want is a Nintendo 64.

I love this place. For cheap, no-frills American-style Chinese food, this is my absolute favorite in town. Every dish I've had has been solid, and I've been ordering from them regularly for going on 5 years now. To be clear, the stuff on the menu is not even close to what real Chinese food tastes like. As far as I know, they don't even have a Chinese menu, so if you want authenticity, this is definitely not the place. But you know how sometimes you don't necessarily want a filet mignon, you want a burger? It's like that. For something more authentic, try Fugu on Gilman. But if American-Chinese is what you want, this is the place.

I finally found interesting vegetarian sushi options!! I honestly can't comment on any of the Chinese cuisine here, as the last 3 times I've been I've gotten the same thing: seaweed salad, the peanut & avocado sushi, and the sweet potato tempura roll. I've really liked them each time. Great taste, pretty fresh. The interior isn't great, but I think this place is meant for delivery & take-out. Really nice people. Reasonably priced.

Awful service. Ordered online. My card was charged. Waited 2 1/2 hours for delivery. Called multiple times and told "we busy". Recommend avoiding this restaurant. Never got the food

This place is solid. Gotten delivery a good handful of times and it hasn't disappointed. They have a slick ordering site, the portions are ridiculously huge, and they literally are ringing the doorbell in like 20 minutes. I've had Culver's take longer and Great China brings it to my house.

I think myself pretty patient, but enough already. I ordered delivery.The food came on time, but it was more expensive than it should have been for lunch specials- so clearly I was charged full price. when I went to sign the credit card receipt I crossed out the tip line, planning on tipping in cash. The guy took the receipt out of my hand and before I could pull cash out of my pocket said "no tip? I am loosing money coming here!?" Is it just me or is that really rude? After all that the food is only OK- I ordered the chicken and garlic sauce with fried rice. The rice was too salty and there was barely any chicken. The vegetable lo mein was OK. I will not order here again.

Good and very cheap for both lunch and dinner. Best cheap chinese food in the area! Crab rangoon free with lunches. Bought dinner for four people, lo mein noodles, chicken egg foo young, chicken fried rice, and general tso's chicken, and it was less than $30 bucks.

I'm not a total snob. I lied, I'm kinda a snob, particularly about ethnic food. The most ethnic thing about this place is the name, it's that bad. I would have been quite confused even if I were not a snob. Long story short, chow mein with no noodles. WHAT? I have never in my life heard this. Chow mein literally means "fried noodles". I ordered shrimp fried noodles and got grocery store frozen shrimp on saucy lettuce with rice. Best part of this meal was the mountain dew. Don't judge me for drinking Dew either. This was my work lunch and the sugar/caffiene combo kick in the face was a valid need. I think my egg roll committed suicide. Just now. I'm totally eating this food as I write this and I'm only becoming more and more convinced that I ordered this food as some sort of punishment. The fact that it's this bad and I'm still eating it tells me I need to see my therapist again because self-harm is wrong.

I used to order takeout from Great China all the time. The food is good, and so are the prices. However, I'm giving a low rating because I had back-to-back experiences where my food arrived much later than they said and the food was cold. Both times I was told that my food would arrive in 45-50 minutes, but it didn't actually arrive until after I called back 1-2 times and an hour and a half or more had passed. The most disappointing thing is that even though they knew I was a loyal customer, they didn't do much to remedy the situation. Since having these experiences, I've decided to vote with my dollar and take my business elsewhere.

live on the north side such a food desert anyway ordered chicken cashew for pickup. Tons of food enough for two meals the chicken was minimal as was the cashews the sauce was non existent guys throw some fresh ginger and garlic in your sauce maybe add some 3crabs fish sauce in the end food was ok sauce no good easy fix by bumping up the sauce

It's more Carry out place, I order large Hot and Sour soup with mushy pork for lunch. Soup was good, lot better than most of Chinese buffet in town. Mushu pork skin for rapping was only 4 sheets then every edge corner were dry, pork was candy sweet. I hope Wisconsin state governor don't try here.

I've been ordering from this joint since 2005 and honestly- I love it. I used to live right near it and just ordered out of convenience but I've moved away now and any time I'm coming through the area I love to grab something. We just had the Beef & Broccoli tonight and I love that it had thinly sliced carrots in it- excellent veggies (along with TONS of broccoli) and delicious meat. I pretty much stick with Beef & Broccoli and Cashew Chicken anywhere I go (I am a creature of habit and I fully own that...I like to enjoy familiar things). And these guys? They got those nailed. The place itself is nothing fancy but the staff is nice and the food is great!

This is definitely a place you would want to go for carry out or delivery only. There's a few tables inside, but no atmosphere whatsoever. That being said, we order from great China on a fairly regular basis and find it to be consistent. They have never messed up our order and normally say 30-45 minutes for delivery, but it ends up being more like 15-20 minutes, which is great. Delivery is free ($10 minimum order) and they always have coupons on their menu for free crab rangoons or fried rice (depending on how much your order was). I've heard that other Chinese restaurants in the area tatse better, but they are also a bit more expensive. I'm not a Chinese food connoisseur, so for me this is just fine and I have no complaints!

I ordered from Great China last night and had the worst food ever. I ordered general tsao's chicken and house special friend rice. The food was delivered 40+ minutes after the order, was barely warm and had little to no flavor. I am also pretty sure the rice was old. For $22 dollars this was no where near satisfactory. I will not be ordering from this restaurant again.

1) Where's the meat? These dishes are all veggies and sauce. Completely disappointed in the quantity of the meat! 2) is this meat? Or is it rubber? The struggle is real. Completely disappointed in the quality of the meat. 3) what are these flavors? Salt and ginger for the chicken with cashews. Salt and ginger for the beef in oyster sauce. Salt and ginger on everything and way too much of it.

Fried rice is very dry and the General Tso isn't really spicy. Portions are pretty good size. Never had them mess up my order which is good. Delivery is on part with other places.

Just... meh. Less greasy than Chang Jiang, but not as good as China Inn. Pretty run of the mill, average food. Decent delivery time.

Terrible customer service, food is okay but not great. I ordered chow mein which is a fried noodle dish and their food description says "with white rice and fried noodles." Instead, I got a chicken and cabbage dish in some sort of soupy sauce which tasted gross. I called to ask about the mistake and they said they sent the right dish and there are no noodles in chow mein. Umm... google chow mein and see what comes up. Even then, their own description says fried noodles, but they wouldn't admit they messed up! Refused to give me a refund for the dish or acknowledge this was their mistake. Their website still says fried noodles and I have pictures. The other food was okay. Terrible experience, do not order from here.

Very predictable and never had problem with orders. Egg rolls, fried rice and pork Lo Mein are good and Order frequently. Just had chicken chop seuy and found to be tasty and not overwhelming.

I never had issues with them before until yesterday. Order took more than an hour, got delivered the wrong food and they refused to fix it. The guy said he knew what he sent out and re-sending the correct order was not an option. This nonsense lasted 2.5 hours and didn't get my food. Hard to consider ordering from them again. Bummer, is all about the attitude, not friendly people.

Extremely fast delivery if you live on the North side. Food is what I expect for Chinese food. Sometimes it's fine. Rarely it's bad. Dumplings are great. If you are a food snob don't go to their location...

I used to think Great China was ok. Not the greatest, not the worst. Just middle of the road, slightly high priced good hangover chinese food. Store is fairly gross though. Very unclean looking usually. But now...*shudder* I will NEVER eat there again. Why you ask? Well, I live nearby and noticed one of the cooks, one who is there every single day I've ever been by there. Can't miss him. He's always wearing filthy greasy camouflage pants. Anyway, I see him out in the alley having a smoke and he does a full on snot flying through the air, on his upper lip, all over double nostril farmer blow. Then, he takes his hand, WITH the cigarette in it, and rubs the snot on his face off with the back of his hand. Stub the smoke out on the ground. Rub his snot covered hand on his apron that he rubs his hands on all day and...does he go in and head to the bathroom? Nope. Promptly picks up his utensils and right back to cooking. And then I saw him do the same basic thing a couple weeks later. So yeah...it'snot for me.

I live 2.5mi from the store. Literally on the same street, yet it still took almost 2 hours for my food to arrive. I called around the hour mark to ask if they had received my order and were just that busy. "no. no your food should arrive shortly". was the answer I got. At almost the two hour mark I had given up, and was in the process of just ordering a pizza when the guy finally showed up. I ordered the chicken lo mein and chicken fried rice combo. I have seen more chicken in ramen noodles. There was no flavor and everything was cold but they managed to burn the rice. Next time I'll eat the ramen noodles, and burn my own rice.

It's near by, it's fast, and it's easy. It's never exceptional but it's never bad. They mess up my order sometimes but I've never cared enough to take it back. It's pretty overall okay. Nothing phenominal but always hits the spot and I know what to expect. Service is fast and friendly. I grab food here once every few weeks and am always "satisfied".

Ordering was easy and the food was delivered pretty quickly. We ordered general tso which was ice cold when it arrived, like it was pulled from a fridge or icebox. Our second order cashew chicken had barely any chicken or cashews. It was filled with celery and carrots. Big disappointment. Definitely a big disappointment.

This is a solid place for some fast chinese food. We always order General Tso's Chicken, Sesame Chicken, Chicken fried rice, cheicken/vegitable lo mein and crab rangoon. Our order arrives in 25-30 minutes and is piping hot and delicious! for $25, you cant complain. This is our new go-to for Sesame Chicken cravings! Yum!

I ordered Cashew Chicken and Crab Ragoon for delivery. The crab ragoon was not that bad, but the cashew chicken just was not good. The sauce was so thick and tasted differently than what I am used to. It wasn't horrible, but I've had better from numerous other Chinese restaurants in Madison.

1st time ordering from them. Ordered online. Delivery timely and all items there, and tasted as expected. I've ordered Chinese from other places online and they would mess up the order. Great China didn't mess up the order. I plan to order from them again.

Just awful. We don't have high expectations of most small Chinese food places, but this was a new low. Stopped in on the way home instead of ordering for delivery. Counter svc. was fine--the food wasn't even passable. The "spring rolls" were deep-fried to a crisp on the outside, mush on the inside. The only flavors were grease and salt. Shrimp w/Chinese Vegetables consisted of mostly bok choy chopped the size of wonton; with a few carrots, canned-looking mushrooms, and soggy water chestnuts thrown in w/a few shrimp. All were bathed in a gelatinous, flavorless white sauce. The Sesame Chicken was unlike any we've ever tasted, and we don't mean that in a good way. Greasy (?!), tough, and gristly. The prices might be slightly cheaper, but the food we had was significantly worse than any other place in Madison. They won't be getting a second chance from us.

This place was the reason I signed up for yelp. I asked for spicy Szechuan and got a bowl full of sweet and sour onions. Gross! They also deemed it necessary to add an entire Morton's of salt to my shrimp Lo Mien! Equally gross! You get what you pay for...crap