Jia Tong Heng

Address: 193/2-3 Sri Don Chai Road, Muang, Chiang Mai 50100, Thailand
Phone: (053)275242
Coordinates: 18.781674, 99.001418

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Chinese restaurant in Chiang Mai

REVIEW BY MICHAEL

Jia Tong Heng is one of Chiang Mai's longest established Chinese restaurants and it is also one of the most overrated. Now run by at least the 2nd generation immigrated Chinese, I feel it has lost some touch with how Chinese food is supposed to taste. The problem about Jiatong Heng is: sometimes it's good, sometimes it's not. There are always some dishes that disappoint. For this reaon, I can't whole-heartedly recommend Jia Tong Heng.

THE PROBLEM ABOUT JIATONG HENG IS: THERE IS ALWAYS SOME DISAPPOINTMENT

I reckon Jiatong Heng used to be good in a distant past, but now it mainly rests on its laurels. I once had a Peking Duck in the branch near the Night Bazar. It was a far cry from the real thing I had had in China and Hong Kong. I meant to give an honest feedback to the owner, but he simply responded with an arrogant "we are very famous". In other words: it must be your problem!

Jiatong Heng now has 3 branches: the original one is at Sridonchai near the Nighbazar. Even the rice there is sometimes hard and inferior, while nobody notices. Another branch is at One Nimman, this is the branch that also cooks for deliveries with Grab. This branch has a limited menu, but there is the same ocurrence of disappointment, for example some seafood dishes are deep-fried instead of steamed or fried, which is really bad for the taste. Even crab is deep-fried first before making a crab curry out of it!
Anyway, even the steamed fish is not what it could be. When you dine in Hong Kong, the chef will measure the steaming time in half-minutes or even seconds! In Thailand, usually the fish is steamed too long until there is hardly and taste and smell left. This is because Thai chefs are not really able to deal with fresh food (raw meat and fish), so the easy and lazy thing to do is to fry everything to kill the germs.

On a positive note, staff in Jiatong Heng are very attentive, but that doesn't compensate enough for the varying quality of the food.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend Jiatong Heng but instead I'd suggest going to several other, especially smaller Chinese restaurants such Yangtze Jiang, Hualin and a few others.