Ruby Chinese Restaurant

Believe it or not after living here for over thirty years we’ve never dined at the Ruby. Friends have said it’s their go-to Chinese restaurant and today we decided to try it for lunch because I had a real hankering for duck pancakes.
You are able to BYO (bottled wine only) for a $10 corkage fee and so we called on the way over and found a park around the corner.
Jeff served us and the restaurant was large and elegant and although we were the only diners on a Friday for lunch I’m sure it’s a lot busier at night.
We had duck rolls for entree and salt and pepper squid.
The duck was lovely but the serving size was odd - it was three small rolls that had been cut to around 6-7cm each so maybe it started as one long one, and a bit difficult to share three when there’s two eating - but they were crispy and tasty and the dipping sauce was tangy too, not overly sweet.
The squid looked like chicken Twisties and it was delicious, hot and tasty and tender and was a generous serving size. Some vegetables would have been great with this.
For mains we had shantung chicken and pork chops with vinegar.
Both were a decent size too as well as being very tasty.
The chicken was moist and yet still had crispy bits and a good piquancy and the pork (not ribs as described in the menu but pork chops cut up in chunks) had a sticky, sweetish sauce and they were pretty tender.
Again some vegetables would have been good with these.
Next time if it’s just the two of us I’ll only order one main and have some veggies to complement the concentrated flavours.
I didn’t order vegetables because they were all around the $20 mark and I feel that’s a much higher price than I think is warranted unless they’re fantastic and we wanted to try the place first to see what it was like. Plus we’d ordered a fair bit for the two of us.
We ordered just one plain rice and that was enough.
I did think a few of the dishes were on the higher side price wise, for example I didn’t end up having duck pancakes because the duck could only be ordered as Peking duck (they use a whole duck for the dish) and at over $70 we didn’t want to commit to this on our first visit.
However what we ordered we thoroughly enjoyed and we will definitely return.
Jeff was very friendly and knowledgeable and we couldn’t fault the service at all. Thank you for a lovely lunch.

Ruby delivers up great Chinese food - fresh barramundi with ginger & shallot, salt & pepper tofu, duck and vegetables were amazing, highly recommend a visit to this quality restaurant A +

I've been here with my friend today and had a very disappointing and unpleasant experience. The food was fair, but overall too greasy. And garlic moss was not well cooked.

One of the waitresses was very unprofessional and rude. She shows her attitude when I ordered in Chinese, saying that she can't speak Chinese, I said to her "Well then can you get someone who speaks Chinese (in English) ? " She seems like wanted to punch my face. I wonder why she is so angry. Is that because she has not ability speak Chinese but she works in a Chinese restaurant, and she feels shame? Or has She just been jealous because I can speak one more language than her? Anyway, a male waiter came this time and take over ordering, with a pleasant attitude even though he speaks Cantonese.

I will not come back to this restaurant again or recommend anyone visit this restaurant either. 0 star for the service.

26/08/23 update:
The main point is the attitude of that waitress! What happens if she meets someone who does not speak English at all? Will she look down on the client? I doubt it because I do not see any quality of hospitality from this waitress which should considered important in the hospitality industry.

Plus, I have attached the photo of the dish we had that day in which garlic moss was undercooked.

Again, not recommend anyone visit this restaurant.

Not sure why it is so expensive. In China it is considered street food. Cheap and not overly complicated.

Good service but.
We were a table of 7. Was seated quickly but waited over 10 minutes to order and water for our table (it wasn't busy). The Duck, sizzling pepper beef and chicken with shallots were good. The chicken & cashew, satay beef, fried rice and sweet and sour pork were a let down with flavour and heat. The other dishes were just ok. The service after ordering was great with lots of smiles and quick retrieving of empty plates.
For a quite expensive Chinese restaurant it was mediocre at best. We probably wouldn't go back and explore the other options in Dickson.

The restaurant was okay. Sadly the Peking duck was not worth it. It's 75$ and enough for about 1 person. Other places have the same dish for 30$ with 50% more duck.

Average food, unprofessional service. They left the table filthy knowing that we’re gonna have birthday cake candle blowing coming.

Seafood cooked perfectly. Service is professional. We had the parrot fish and it was wonderful! Ordered too many dishes as usual.

We've been going here for years, they remember us, even if it's been a while. Food is always excellent, good wine/beer selection. Parking can be a problem at Dickson, with limited parking and short time limits doing the day.

My family and I had a really nice evening, the service and food was great. We'll definitely go again

Very bad experience, why there is a minimum $30 each person? That is waste of food and money. We were 6persons short of 46$ and were asked to take away.

We are from melbourne and wanted a special dinner before leaving. We received The best service and the most amazing food and please try the toffee apples and ice cream worth it.
Thank you to all at Ruby’s.

Really bad experience, will never go to this restaurant.

The waitress' English really bad, can't even clearly tell $17, and $70, when she told me the price was $70, I misheard it as $17. Otherwise I wouldn't have ordered the dish. Of course I had to pay the difference because of her mistake.

Disappointing meal tonight at Ruby’s. Egg plant entree had a heavy batter that tasted like something from a bad takeaway shop. The dumplings were like for like coscos and cost 11.80 for four! The special fried rice was not fresh. Ribs and scallops okay. But jeeze an expensive meal out for something pretty bloody ordinary.

Absolutely first class. We had a party of 5 including 3 kids 8/10/13 and had the honey chicken, Mongolian beef, curry chicken, ginger and shallot king prawns, roast duck and asian greens. Every single dish was the best I've eaten of its class. The service was unobtrusive yet welcoming and attentive. I cannot rate highly enough. Slightly unflattering photo as we had basically eaten everything before I could stop long enough to get my phone out. Well done guys we will be back.

Family favourite. Covid has hit it a tiny bit but still it's a Canberra iconic institution and I am honoured to be a customer.

Owner operated Chinese restaurant, so always get quality and best service and food. Great venue for any events you're hosting. Had our work xmas party here, staff friendly food great. A friend had their wedding reception here, in the back area of the restaurant. Very spacious, they had a dance floor and dj booth set up. Staff attentive and food was out in good timing even though large group.

The flavours were ok but not worth the price, as such, I have critiqued more harshly than usual.

We ordered:
- steamed eggplant with vermicelli. Cooked with coriander and soy sauce.
- seafood and fried beancurd hotpot.

Food: 5/10
The flavour of the steamed eggplant and vermicelli was not bad but there was too much soy sauce. So the dish was very salty, especially since the vermicelli absorbs a lot of liquid.

The seafood and fried beancurd hotpot was slightly on the bland side but at least it wasn't salty (balances the first dish) and the seafood was the star of the dish. However the squid was tasteless and the fried beancurd was nothing special, like the ones you can get from the Asian grocery and cooked at home. This was almost like a home cooked dish which is actually nice but not for this type of restaurant.

This is still a decent place to bring guests or for a special occasion as this is a slightly more formal restaurant. Perhaps we were unlucky with the dishes we ordered. If the price was standard (like CBD dumpling house for example) then I'd give this a 3/5.

They're following social distancing so plenty of room, not as crowded as it was. Live crabs, crayfish and fish cooked to order! Friendly staff. SIZZLE STEAK!

This place has gone downhill fast in recent years. My family will be looking elsewhere for somewhere to host our Christmas eve dinners. Lobster came out first. 40 mins later another main. Still no entrees, no rice.