Easterly Hunan Cuisine - Berkeley

Absolute highlight is the fish filet soup dish. So hearty,warm and perfectly savory. Makes for a killer broth to pair with rice. Lamb was a bit oily, but still really solid. Great service. No doubt Easterly is a top 3 Chinese restaurant in Berkeley.

I hardly leave any reviews, but only when it's extremely good or extremely bad. Ordered three dishes, one of which is the duck. I understand there's inflation and all but come on, there's NO DUCK! Only duck bones. It has less duck than the duck bones we get after ordering Peking duck at other places. For 26 dollars, you basically get a dish of bones. What makes it worse is that this is too salty for our dog.

We could not get a table at nearby Gather, but it turned out even better as we dined at Alborz right across the street. The food was so very tasty, the staff ever so friendly, and the setting was classic without being pretentious. A special thanks to the hostess and owner ? Zaleh who was the friendliest and most helpful person around. She made our meal there memorable!

This is an excellent Hunanese restaurant in Downtown Berkeley. A total gem situated in a neighborhood known for just okay college food. I usually go to Wojia in Albany to fulfill my Hunanese fix but this place gives them good competition. I had lunch with a friend here and the restaurant was filled with mainlanders, mostly Chinese international students...that's how you know it's a good place! I ordered D5. Poached Fish Fillets in Sour Soup 酸湯魚片: This was fabulous. The soup was deeply savory and had a nice kick to it. I liked that there weren't too many Sichuan peppercorns. Wojia's version tends to have a lot of peppercorns that you need to fish out. A4. Eggplant with Minced Pork, Garlic and Cilantro Special 三味茄子: Hunanese places tend to do eggplant well. This was steamed eggplant with ground pork and cilantro. There was a nice sweet savoriness to the dish that contrasted well with the sour fish soup. I'm glad I found this place. I enjoyed the food a bit more than my last trip to Wojia, which was just okay. Service was excellent. I dropped my chopsticks and I didn't have to flag anyone down, they already gave it to me!

I'm from Asia visiting and the pickled sour fish has always been my favorite dish. I came to Easterley to try this dish, it was excellent. Spice level is serious. Gets spicier as it's boiling on a stove which is also a nice touch. It hits the spot. Fish is fillet so no bones. Others might prefer fresh fish but I personally prefer fillet as I don't want to be dealing with bones. Will come back to try other dishes