Great in its day, now leaves a lot to be desired.  Deserves credit as a Phoenix landmark Chinese restaurant.  

This restaurant has been here for 38 years.  I've been going here off and on for 35 years.  I go here more for sentimental reasons, and not so much for the food.  

The interior still retains some of the original decoration style from the original restaurant established nearly 40 years ago.  The rest of the decorations have been torn out.  I believe the decor is modeled after the Forbidden Palace in Beijing - see the vault-of-the-heavens style crenelations in the ceiling.  

I have this restaurant - in its former self - to thank for this:  Back in its day, this restaurant was really great, and the entire atmosphere lent to an ambiance that actually inspired me to study Chinese and then later go live over there for some years. 

Sadly, the food here is not all that good.  The fryer oil they use here is pretty old.  The fried rice arrives looking almost black (from the fryer oil?  too much soy sauce?) instead of a rich golden brown, and tastes overcooked somehow.  The eggrolls are just OK.  Definitely not fresh.

A lot of the menu items from the original owners are no longer on the menu; for example the special "Chinese cakes" served on a plate topped with a delicious gravy-like brown sauce and shallots - probably some form of Cantonese food.  All of this is gone, and replaced by very plain fare, and not very good at that.  

If you like salty, greasy, plain-tasting yet somehow edible Chinese food not far from the $1-per-scoop variety, then go here.  Golden Phoenix's heyday as a great restaurant is long-gone.  Let us bow our heads in sadness to a place that once was very good - now passed on...