Mathis Field Cafe

Excellent service, bland food. The waitress and table staff were very friendly, courteous, and provided top notch service. Sadly, this can't redeem the food. I ordered a beef broccoli with fried rice and a coffee. Coffee was fine, nothing special but nothing wrong. The beef broccoli on the other hand, wasn't. The broccoli was overcooked so it lost any semblance of texture. The brown sauce bears no resemblance to the traditional sauce and was more of a generic brown meat stock sauce flavored with salt, pepper, mushrooms and onions. The fried rice was the worst offender as it was just rice sprinkled with some soy sauce or brown sauce. It was not stir fried at all and had no other ingredients making it by far extremely bland and tasteless. I did not finish that part. The food is okay if you just want a bite, nothing wrong with it as food, but as so-called Chinese food, it's rather overpriced and underwhelming. I can't in good conscience give it a recommendation.

My friend had told me this place was not the same since new ownership so I had avoided eating here. I finally went with my cousin on a Tuesday for lunch. I had an egg roll, combo order of the chicken in black bean sauce and general chow’s chicken, and a half order of the special (pineapple pork). My cousin had a combo of broccoli beef and lomein, and a half order of the steak fingers. Everything tastes exactly as I remember it. My mom worked there for 20+ years as a cook so I grew up eating here and eventually worked there as a server myself as did my cousin. Most of the reviews here are positive but some state that the taste is not the same or not as good and I just simply don’t agree, unless I just came on a lucky day. One of the original cooks is also still there. There are two differences that I did notice. They are positive changes. The American food is better. I think the steak fingers are made from scratch instead of frozen. The pork chop on the special I had is also a thicker cut of meat. My friend tried it one more time and still doesn’t think it’s the same but I will definitely be back to taste my childhood every time I come to town. If you’re hesitating on trying it, don’t. Just make the decision for yourself if it’s the same or not.

Excellent, top notch service. Really good food. Can’t say enough great things about this surprise cafe experience before our flight. The lady working the register was really just the sweetest. We were trying to get a snickers after dinner at the vending machine outside of the cafe, but we didn’t have cash. She brought us a slice of pie!