Seafood Palace

2523 Nicollet Ave
Minneapolis, MN 55404
(612) 874-7721
www.seafoodpalacemn.com

Category: Chinese

Rating (Scale 1-10, with 10 being the highest):
Food: 8
Service: 7
Ambience: 6

Recommendation: Very Good. This lesser known Chinese restaurant serves top notch Chinese food with quality seafood dishes and gives places like Rainbow a run for their money. Great place for Chinese Hot Pot.

Seafood Palace is located on Minneapolis’ Eat Street. The restaurant is clean with typical Chinese restaurant décor – mostly bare walls, a few Chinese symbols, some red lanterns, and pleasing Chinese music in the background. There are a few seats in the back room that face Nicollet Avenue and are great for people watching. This place is also popular for Chinese wedding receptions and birthdays as they have the capacity to handle large groups. In addition to the daily buffet (which looked pretty boring/unoriginal to us), they have a long menu (140+ dishes) and also offer Chinese Hot Pot during certain winter months. Our sever couldn’t tell us exactly when the Hot Pot was offered but we’ve heard it’s between December and March (call before you go). We’ve done Hot Pot here once and it is a lot of fun to do with a large group of friends. Hot Pot is like Chinese fondue and consists of a simmering pot of stock at the center of the dining table. While the hot pot is kept simmering, ingredients are placed into the pot and are cooked at the table by the diners. Ingredients such as thinly sliced meat (beef, chicken, pork), leafy vegetables, mushrooms, wontons, and seafood (jumbo shrimp, scallops) are laid out in buffet style. Diners fill up their plates and bring them to the table where the dunking/cooking begins. They offer a few different sauces to dip the cooked food into.

In addition to the large menu, Seafood Palace also has a special weekday lunch menu that is served with a soup for less than $5. All three dishes we tried were part of a handful of dishes that were the “Chef’s Suggestions.” The Honey Walnut Shrimp ($12.95) had lightly tempura fried shrimp covered with a white creamy sweet sauce (mayo base). The Walnuts were crispy and coated with sugar. It was an excellent dish. Another great dish was the Sweet and Spicy Baby Beef Ribs ($12.95). It came with fried red chili peppers so you could turn the spice level up or down based on your preference. The sauce was spicy and sweet, the ribs were crispy and not too fatty. The Fried whole Walleye ($30) in Black Bean sauce was remarkable. Note that they bring the entire fish out…head, eyes, tail, the whole lot. The sauce was very flavorful and the fish tasted fresh. Even though it was a large fish (could feed 2-3), we thought the price was a bit steep. Shuang Cheng in Dinkytown offers similarly fresh and flavorful fish for about $20.

$$. Street parking on Nicollet Avenue. Free parking available across the street at Truong Thanh Market, 2520 Nicollet Avenue.