Lucky Dragon - Goleta

Small restaurant with really authentic Chinese food. This place makes some delicious food. Almost everything here is worth ordering at least once. Except the hotpot. Don't bother with that. Be sure to bring cash or have Venmo. They only take up to 2 cards per party. Sometimes the service is slow, because the place is packed. The food is good, but don't expect American portions though. The portion sizes are reasonable. You probably wont' need to take anything home with you.The green beans are amazing.

We only ordered spicy duck head and the rice wine dessert with tapioca to go. The duck heads were tasty, just enough spiciness and numbness, and not too salty, a great balance of flavors. The rice wine dessert was good. Some people may prefer it sweeter, but we were not too bothered by it. Although higher rice wine (alcohol) content would make it shine. It's a new place at the time, but we really enjoyed the two items we got. Looking at their menu, their offerings were on the pricer side, comparing to other Sichuan (spicy) Chinese restaurants. But the dishes other customers ordered looked good.

Only place outside of Chengdu I've had Sichuan food this good... Brings me back 8 years ago when I studied abroad there : The Bashu Fish with Mixed Vegetables in Chili Oil is one of the best dishes I have ever eaten (prepare to sweat though, it's super spicy!! . The stir-fried Vermicelli with ground pork is also really good, and not AS spicy. Didn't like the eel as much as the other two dishes, but I think we also got the eggplant with string beans or something that was a nice change of pace from the heat. All in all, this place rules.

Lucky Dragon is awesome! Really great schezwan flavors!.. I love their dumplings in red chilli oil, dan dan noodles, mapo tofu, fried chicken, hot pot, kung pao chicken, spring rolls, fried pork ribs and many more items that I'm probably forgetting to mention.

Best place in Goleta to get your Sichuan food fix! My favorite Sichuan dish is 鱼香肉丝 （yu xiang rou su）， which on the menu of most restaurants is called pork in garlic sauce. Their version of it is okay but the flavor is not the best I have had. The worst version of this dish though is still amazing! I would say if you want to try something new, different, and slightly spicy this place is for you! Avoid the traditional American Chinese dishes and and go for the 'pork in garlic sauce ' and then get something else that looks good in the picture! I took my brother, who has never eaten sichuan food before, here and he was blown away and couldn 't stop talking about it for weeks.