Happy House Chinese Restaurant - Summerland, British Columbia

Robert Reeves

Nothing fancy, just traditional Canadian Chinese food, well prepared, and lots of it. This restaurant is a storefront fixture in Summerland, evolving and enduring through the last several decades. The buffet is gone, and they do a very substantial volume of takeout, but its still nice to sit down and hear the sizzle of the wok.

Pricing is very reasonable, and there is none of the ingredient and portion shrinkflation that plagues this restaurant sector. Kudos for the owners; it's a really good deal for your dollar.

Emma Castorf

Food order was wrong - chicken was slimy and didn't even look or taste like chicken. Chow mein was greasy and tasted like pure sesame oil.

They also didn't make us what we ordered and weren't willing to fix it - and charged full price!

Ethan

I'm genuinely surprised that this place has 4 stars, kinda seems like some people have very low standards when there is only one of a particular kind of restaurant in a town.
Chicken chow mein had maybe a quarter of a bland chicken breast in it with no vegetables whatsoever. Chow mein noodles tasted like they were cooked in a dirty pan and also had a noticeable burnt taste to them.
Sweet and sour pork was very soggy and chewy, the sauce tasted like cheap sweet and sour sauce from a bottle.
The ginger beef on the other hand was super dry/over-cooked and also seemed like it was more breading than actual meat.
I could only eat about a 1/5 to a 1/4 of my meal before I started feeling sick to my stomach from the food. The server also didn't seems to happy that I didn't want a takeout box for my leftovers.
I don't know if they were just having a bad night in the kitchen, or they were just trying to use up the leftovers from their lunch service or something, but I wouldn't recommend eating here.
If you really have your heart set on getting Chinese food, it's better to take the 15 to 20 minute drive to penticton or peachland.

bristollad

If you like ALOT of veggies, large veggies at that, this is the place for you.
My chicken foo-yung had more huge pieces of vegetables that it did, actual chicken!
We ordered take-out, was back home in Peachland, by the time we discovered that my wife's pork chowmein was also full of vegetables rather than pork!
Won't use again!

Keith and Marie Manhard (Rusty Kam)

The food is very tasty and heaping platters with Mouth watering smells Chicken, Rice, Chowmein ,Mushroom's all combined to make a great little place to visit.

Devon Smith

I ordered the veggie chowmein and spring rolls. Chowmein was ok although a little bland for my liking. The spring rolls were excellent and flavorful and i would recomend them to compliment someone's meal. Price was very fair for the portion size and i do feel full after eating the chowmein and springrolls.

Blemished Nicely

We ordered a bunch of Chinese food for our Chinese New Year dinner, I have been away some time & was sad to see the Beijing closed/was unfamiliar with the Happy House (where Johnny's used to be, IIRC)...

...But the food was EXCELLENT!!! We were VERY happy & relieved to find the Happy House as the sole remaining option in town (no offense to the others, I grew up with them/have fond memories, but theyre GONE), after having ordered & discovering the quality they offer.

If you haven't tried them, you SHOULD. Seriously good stuff.

Not even kidding, I think its some of the best quality Chinese food I've had in my entire adult life (restaurants were a bit different in the 80's, even Burger King was better & nothing like it is now, etc) - even with me walking it home/us not dining in, getting it fresh out the kitchen.

Typically, be it grease/fat or sitting awhile, etc, some of the things in Chinese food that ought to be crunchy end up soggy or mushy even...NOT the Happy House's food!

They did it PERFECTLY. It was crisp, but not overcooked or saturated, I really struggle to think of anywhere the technical cooking for that bit was done so well (proper fryings much harder than many think).

The lemon sauce was VERY good, too...this is usually an overly sweet sauce in most restaurants that usually doesn't even taste much like lemon. Happy House's lemon sauce has a subtle sweetness that compliments everything from wontons to almond chicken to prawns (m a prawn fiend & ALWAYS get prawns/squeeze lemon wedges over them ever since I was a kid...literally EVERY time - i LOVE it! Happy House's prawns aren't the common battered ones, theyre the PRIMO coconut-crunch kind & the 1st place that hasn't given me battered [which are still good] - a VERY pleasant surprise I was happy to get) - anyway, the lemon sauce was SO good, for prettymuch the 1st time in my life, I didnt add squeezed lemon to my prawns (or any of my meal) & just used the sauce, it was fantastic.

The sweet & sour sauce also isn't the typical overly sweet kind, its a more subtle sweet with a bit of a sour (plum sourness is range I want to say, but more profile than flavour, if you get me) kind of "drop" to it...I actually prefer it to the typical kind most places serve. We were both impressed by the S&S/lemon sauces - something that we usually just view as being there merely for condiment's sake & don't usually take much note of.

The almond chicken was great, too - nice sized pieces, good crunch & excellent ratio of batter to meat (often places give a tiny strip shrouded in mostly batter) & the almond coating was terrific, down to the consistency of the almonds themselves.

The ginger beef was quite rich in flavour while maintaining a nice balance, had a very good crunch while the meat was tender/had a good coat of sauce (we WERE a bit surprised when our 1st piece preferred being scooped rather than pierced by the fork, it was IMMEDIATELY apparent why & turned out to be a good thing the moment it landed/upon chewing) - often when places hit most of these boxes, the sauce is scant/kind of "dry" or the beef is soggy/bit squishy...Happy House nailed them all/aced it.

I've never seen a place that doesn't have an egg roll on the menu, BUT the spring rolls are a pretty impressive circular/roll style (rather than the typical small, rectangle packet phylo-pastry style ones) that seem to have a thicker wall & (to me, at least) somewhat bridge that gap - I'd recommend trying them.

The wontons were the tightly wrapped kind (not the huge bibbed ones the size of restaurant tortilla/nacho chips), which I prefer & the portion was quite generous as well (in fact, we found ALL the portions of each dish we ordered were).

The beef & tomato rice (my mother's favourite dish) had quite a bit of tomato & sauce, as well as veggies & egg etc throughout the rice itself (also often skimped on in many places these days) & was also very good.

They also don't cook with MSG - bonus points!

HIGHLY impressed by the entire meal. VERY satisfying as a 1st-time customer - we wish them great succes

brian gale

Had to extra seasoning to all dishes
This was the third time from the Happy House
Go to Penticton
Spend the drive time and enjoy your Chinese food